Solar Impulse has completed initial tests of its prototype solar-powered aircraft, HB-SIA, after a brief first flight at Duebendorf, Switzerland, on Dec. 3. The1,600-kg. (3,527-lb.), single-pilot aircraft flew 350 meters along the runway at an altitude of about 1 meter. First tests were conducted on battery power. The 11,600-plus solar cells on the upper surfaces of HB-SIA’s 63.4-meter (208-ft.) wing, and tail will be connected after the aircraft is disassembled and relocated to Payerne Air Base for full flight testing, which is scheduled to begin early next year.
Lawmakers are calling for a review to determine how sensitive Transportation Security Administration (TSA) information came to be published on the web, and they want assurances that it will not happen again.
Investors and airlines are not the only ones crossing their fingers that Boeing Co.’s 787 jet will finally make its inaugural flight this month. A lot of small suppliers pegged their investments in facilities and materials to the 787’s original flight date of Aug. 28, 2007. More than 27 months later, they are still waiting for revenue to begin flowing in.
The 12th test launch of the R-30 Bulava (SS-NX-30) solid-propellant ballistic missile failed on Dec. 9. Only five Bulava launches have been successful since trials began in 2004.
French accident investigation bureau BEA plans to release its second interim report this week on the loss of Air France Flight 447. The Airbus A330‑200 departed from Rio de Janeiro May 31 and crashed into the Atlantic Ocean several hours later, killing all 228 people on board. Before releasing the latest findings, BEA officials indicate they have seen no information that leads them to alter their main determination that the airplane did not break apart in flight.
Used business jet inventories and flight operations are both showing encouraging signs, according to several industry reports. In its recent Business Jet Monthly update, JPMorgan says the used jet inventory—the number of jets for sale in proportion to the active fleet—decreased 10 basis points to 13.2% in November.
Jan. 4-7—48th Annual American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics’ Aerospace Sciences Meeting including the New Horizons Forum and Aerospace Exposition. Orlando (Fla.) World Center Marriott. Also, Jan. 20-21—Strategic and Tactical Missile Systems Conference. Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, Calif. Call +1 (703) 264-7500 or see www.aiaa.org Jan. 5-7—AUSA’s Army Aviation Symposium and Exposition. Hyatt Regency Crystal City Hotel, Arlington, Va. Call +1 (703) 907-2672 or see www.ausa.org
Michael A. Taverna (Darmstadt, Germany, and Paris)
Hopes that selection of a contractor for Europe’s third-generation geostationary weather satellite system might coincide with climate talks in Copenhagen will not be realized. But the undertaking—a key asset for studying and analyzing climate change—is still expected to obtain a prompt go-ahead from the European Space Agency.
Thai Airways has begun service to Dubai using Airbus A340-600 aircraft configured with eight seats in first class, 60 in business class and 199 in economy class. Airline officials view the Middle East market, which has seen double-digit growth in recent years, as one of the most important in the carrier’s network, despite strong competition from airlines based in that region.
Unbridled ambition is being tempered by a survivor instinct as Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE) tries to secure its place in the Middle East’s emerging aerospace industrial world.
Newfound confidence in the ability of two Space Tracking and Surveillance Satellites (STSS) launched in September to track ballistic missiles in the midcourse of their flights has prompted Navy officials to descope the radar requirements for their next-generation cruiser called CG(X). “When we started the [analysis of alternatives] for CG(X), we laid out as an initial condition or assumption that it would have to operate autonomously because the STSS was in total disarray,” says Vice Adm.
Joseph Carleone (see photo), who is president/chief operating officer of the American Pacific Corp. of Las Vegas, also will be CEO. He will succeed John Gibson, who will retire but remain chairman.
NASA should not focus on the capability to get to Earth orbit and the International Space Station (ISS), but should collaborate with the Russians and others to transport crews to the ISS. Access to Earth orbit should be opened to more commercial development, with NASA contracting for all crew transportion.
Wes Bush and Dennis Muilenburg, recently elevated to lead two of the aerospace and defense industry’s largest contractors, did not witness President John F. Kennedy’s call for the U.S. to land a man on the Moon. Bush, who will become CEO of Northrop Grumman on Jan. 1, was a month old when Kennedy gave his stirring speech to a joint session of Congress in 1961. Muilenburg, recently elevated to CEO of Boeing Integrated Defense Systems, was not yet born.
Pratt & Whitney is moving ahead with a larger variant of its geared turbofan (GTF) that will be applicable to potential Airbus A320 and Boeing 737 replacement or re-engining programs, following the selection of its PW1000G by Russia’s Irkut for the MS-21 airliner.
An international team of astronomers hopes to learn more about how the first galaxies formed from this near-infrared view of a small portion of the Universe collected with the new Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC 3) on the Hubble Space Telescope. It is the deepest image ever taken in near-IR, revealing distant objects red-shifted into those wavelengths by the expansion of the Universe. In this false-color image, the oldest galaxies are the faintest ones depicted in red, and are some one-billionth the brightness that can be seen with the naked eye.
Three NASA astronauts who are scheduled to be on the International Space Station in the second half of next year have gotten “preliminary training” on the Space Exploration Technologies Inc. (SpaceX) Dragon cargo vehicle. Arrival of the first Dragon at the ISS is planned during the onboard tenure of astronauts Tracy Caldwell Dyson, Shannon Walker and Douglas Wheelock.
The U.S. House and Senate agreement to immediately provide funding for a land-based Aegis missile defense testbed in Hawaii will help the program stay on its aggressive schedule to begin protecting Europe in 2015. Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) proposed an amendment for $68.5 million for establishment of a land-based test facility in Hawaii in the Fiscal 2011 military construction and veteran’s affairs appropriations bill. Though the House did not include a similar provision, the funding remained in the final conference agreement.
European Space Agency science program managers are recommending that several missions, including the Lisa-Pathfinder space interferometer precursor, be given additional margin to account for growing mission risk. The €250-million ($370-million) Lisa PF will seek to place two test-masses in a nearly perfect gravitational free-fall, controlling and measuring their motion with unprecedented accuracy.
Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport ranks among the highest in rates of online booking and web check-in, according to SITA’s Air Transport World Passenger Self-Service Survey. It finds 77.9% of travelers at Mumbai prefer online booking—up from 61.7% in last year’s survey. In addition, 25.6% of passengers there use web check-in, a rate exceeded only by Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, at 32.2%. Overall, the use of self-service check-in at Mumbai continues to increase, climbing to 68.9% this year compared to 60% in 2008.
Mike Howarth (see photo) has become managing director of Qinetiq ’s Managed Services. He was managing director of Serco Defense Science and Technology. Honors and Elections
Functional testing has begun on this platform engineering model of the Galileo In-Orbit Verification (IOV) satellites, which are intended to demonstrate the performance of Europe’s Galileo satellite navigation system and provide a blueprint for the following Final Operating Capability (FOC) spacecraft expected to be ordered by year-end. This model recently completed platform integration tests at a Thales Alenia Space facility in Rome. Delivery of the payload engineering model by Astrium U.K. is expected this month.
John H. Young, Jr., has been appointed CEO of Alenia North America Defense . He was a consultant and had been chief operating officer of EADS North America and CEO of EADS North America Tankers.
A Japanese X-ray instrument mounted on the International Space Station has completed its first all-sky survey of X-ray sources in a little more than two months, a speed record in the esoteric world of X-ray astronomy. Using the Gas Slit Camera on the Monitor of All-sky X-ray Image (MAXI) experiment, mounted on the Kibo laboratory module’s exposed facility July 24, Japanese scientists were able to distinguish almost 180 X-ray sources, and differentiate low- and high-energy X-rays among them.
