Running mission control and gathering data from NASA’s Deep Space Network to support the Kepler planet-hunting mission is providing students at the University of Colorado at Boulder with valuable hands-on aerospace training.
United Arab Emirates-based Airfreight Aviation and Russian Helicopters signed a contract last week covering the provision of 20 Mil Mi-171 medium-lift helicopters. Delivery will be in 2010. Airfreight Aviation’s maintenance center in Sharjah services civilian Mi-8s and Mi-17s. There are suggestions the final destination of the Mi-171s may be Iraq.
USAF Brig. Gen. Susan Y. Desjardins has been selected for promotion to major general and to director from deputy director of strategic plans, requirements and programs at Air Mobility Command (AMC) Headquarters, Scott AFB, Ill. USAF Brig. Gen. Douglas J. Robb has been nominated for promotion to major general. He is command surgeon at AMC Headquarters. Brig. Gen. Harry D. Polumbo, Jr., has been appointed director of plans and programs at Headquarters Air Combat Command (ACC), Langley AFB, Va.
A prototype of the Dozor-3 unmanned air vehicle (UAV), which is being developed by Russian companies Transas and Kronstadt to provide a medium-altitude long-endurance capability, was shown for the first time at the show. The Dozor-3 has a takeoff weight of 610 kg. (1,344 lb.) and is intended to provide endurance of more than 30 hr. at 23,000 ft., with a payload of up to 120 kg. The mockup was fitted with what appeared to be a Sagem electro-optical sensor turret. The UAV also can be fitted with a radar. First flight of the prototype is scheduled this year.
An attack derivative of the Surion utility helicopter is shaping up as a likely project to sustain Korea Aerospace Industries’ hard-won aeronautics development skills.
I share the skepticism of Jim Hendershot about the prospects for space solar power sending 200-megawatt beams of energy down from kilometer-size solar-power satellites in geostationary orbits (AW&ST June 22, p. 9; Apr. 20, p. 39).
The final Delta II launch for the U.S. Air Force sent a Global Positioning System spacecraft toward its operational orbit Aug. 17, capping a 48-mission series of flights with the Boeing-developed rocket. Liftoff with GPS IIR-21(M) came at 6:35 a.m. EDT from Launch Complex 17A at Cape Canaveral AFS, Fla. The spacecraft deployed nominally after a 1-hr. 8-min. flight. The new satellite was the eighth and last spacecraft in the GPS IIR-M series built by Lockheed Martin Navigation Systems.
Eric Bermingham states “some form of regulation must be forced on the airlines if the industry is to stabilize and generate decent, reliable income for its employees.” Michael Harbeck says “It is hard to watch the demise of airlines that started by carrying the mail.” And Karl Kettler writes of the many airline failures and low profits, and wistfully dreams of when “rarely was there talk about overcapacity, draconian cuts or multiple bankrupcies by the same airlines” (AW&ST Aug. 3, p. 8).
After three decades with BAE Systems in a variety of increasingly senior roles, Steve Mogford left the company in 2007 to join Selex Galileo as its CEO. He discussed the challenges and successes of bringing numerous Italian and British business units together under one banner, as well as Selex Galileo’s ambitions, with Aviation Week & Space Technology London Bureau Chief Douglas Barrie. AW&ST: What were your aims in trying to bring together the Italian and the U.K. elements of the company?
The U.S. and Colombia are cooking up an agreement to expand cooperation against drug-trafficking, transnational crime and terrorism. Watch for it to include more U.S. access to Colombian military facilities. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton signals that it is not about projecting power regionally, but helping Bogota internally. “There will be no significant permanent increase in the U.S. military presence in Colombia,” she vows. Washington has been helping a counternarcotics and insurgency program with airborne crop-eradication and intelligence.
Eric Bermingham cites deregulation as the cause of airline woes. He makes no mention of one enormous drag on profitability: the ability of terminally ill major carriers to continue operating while in Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
AgustaWestland plans to have fully integrated Polish helicopter maker PZL Swidnik by year-end, after being named the preferred bidder in the privatization process.
Combining its engineering prowess with a flexible production setup and decentralized management style, connector manufacturer Souriau is managing to continue expanding market share despite the economic slowdown.
Kenneth A. Myers, 3rd, has become director of the U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency , Ft. Belvoir, Va. He was a senior professional staff member for the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.
NASA and the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) are analyzing data from an unprecedented experiment with their lunar orbiters to determine if their first joint observation turned up evidence of water ice at the Moon’s north pole. NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and ISRO’s Chandrayaan-1 were only about 20 km. (12.5 mi.) apart when they focused their synthetic aperture radars (SARs) on the bottom of the Erlanger Crater Aug. 20, looking for the brightness characteristic of water ice.
Two letter writers in the Aug. 3 issue bemoan airline industry deregulation and suggest it be reinstated to “provide economic stimulus” to small communities that have lost air service and to “generate decent, reliable incomes for its (the industry’s) employees.” I don’t suggest the correspondents are wrong, but the reduction in air fares since deregulation has benefitted travelers with a 40% cut in real dollar terms, according to two studies.
A new private space venture hopes to send commercial customers into orbit for a week at a time starting as early as 2013, using updated hardware based on 1970s-era Russian Almaz reusable reentry vehicle (RRV) and space station hardware.
In the late 1990s, Korean Air (KAL) flights were crashing at 17 times the industry average. The pilots were well trained and individually proficient. The root cause was the importation of Korea’s social context into the cockpit. The crews were so deferential to the captain that he essentially flew the plane alone. Modern big jets require two or more active crewmembers for safe flight.
A generation of engineers is retiring and the number of math and science graduates from Japanese universities is dwindling as more students opt to pursue better-paying careers in finance. The trend is occurring across the U.S. and Western Europe as well.
The U.S. Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory has whittled down prospective bidders for its unmanned cargo lift contract to two finalists: the Boeing A160T Hummingbird (left) and Lockheed Martin/Kaman K-MAX helicopter (see p. 20). Eliminated were the Northrop Grumman MQ-8B Fire Scout and MMIST SnowGoose unmanned aircraft.
Institutional investors have filed a class-action lawsuit against Textron, alleging that the company violated the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 by making “false and misleading statements” about business jet backlogs at its Cessna unit. The suit claims Textron accepted orders from startups and distressed fleet operators “who neither intended nor possessed the financial resources to pay for or take delivery of aircraft during 2008-09 and beyond,” thus inflating the company’s financial position and future prospects. The suit was filed in U.S.
Pacific Aerospace Resources & Technologies (PART) has bought out Victorville (Calif.) Aerospace’s assets, finally anchoring that company after it filed for reorganization under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code last September. PART plans to grow its new Victorville base, where it will offer maintenance, repair and overhaul; modifications including passenger-to-freighter conversions, and other services to military and commercial customers from a hangar large enough to hold an Airbus A380.
The European Aviation Safety Agency on Aug. 10 issued a proposed airworthiness directive that would mandate operators of Airbus A330/A340-family of aircraft to remove all Thales P/N C16195-AA pitot probes from service, and to replace them and certain Thales “BA”-version probes with Goodrich P/N 0851HL probes. EASA says it issued the proposed directive as a “precautionary measure” following reports of airspeed discrepancies on aircraft operating at high altitudes and in inclement weather.
