Prognosticators agree that 2012 will be the turnaround year in which business aviation will move out of its current new aircraft decline. A report issued in May by The Teal Group of Fairfax, Va., described 2011 as a “trough year” in which business jet deliveries will fall 40% below 2008’s record, but then will begin to recover the following year with a 10% increase that will continue for each of the subsequent four years. The report predicts deliveries of 9,875 business jets and executive jetliners worth $183.5 billion over the next decade.
Doug Tutt, who is president/chief operating officer of Global Energy Services at CapRock Communications, has been named 2009 Teleport Executive of the Year by the New York-based World Teleport Assn. He was cited for developing CapRock into a global satellite communications provider.
AeroVironment is to build the third Global Observer liquid hydrogen-fueled high-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aircraft for a U.S. government joint capability technology demonstration (JCTD). The GO-1 Global Observer is designed to carry a 380-lb. payload to 55,000-65,000 ft. for up to a week. The 175-ft. wingspan UAV is expected to fly for the first time late this year or early in 2010. Awarded in 2007, the JCTD contract is now worth $120 million, including testing of three air vehicles and two launch and recovery elements.
USMC Brig. Gens. George J. Allen, Raymond C. Fox, Charles M. Gurganus and David R. Heinz have been nominated for promotion to major general. Allen is Washington-based director of C4/chief information officer, while Fox is commanding general of the First Marine Aircraft Wing, Okinawa, Japan. Gurganus is commanding general of the MAGTF Training Command and Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center, Twenty-Nine Palms, Calif., while Heinz is Washington-based deputy executive director of the Joint Strike Fighter program. Reserve Brig. Gen. John M.
The Swedish government has agreed to commit €25.5 million ($36 million) to the Ariane launch vehicle program for 2009-11, boosting prospects for this key European space program (see p. 35). The money will be earmarked for the Ariane 5 ME midlife update, the ARTA Ariane 5 continuing engineering initiative and the Future Preparatory Launcher Program. Volvo Aero supplies turbopumps and nozzles for the Ariane program and plans two tests later this year to demonstrate turbine and nozzle technologies.
Archie Dickey, who has been a principal investigator for the FAA’s bird-strike studies for years, is heading the International Center for Aviation and Wildlife Risk Mitigation at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Ariz., where he is an associate professor. “We created this center to support data collection efforts, develop better solutions to reduce wildlife strike hazards, and serve as a clearinghouse to share this information with industry and organizations that need it,” he says. One goal is to separate out strategies that work from those that don’t.
As a retired Boeing 747 captain who was an Air Line Pilots Assn. (ALPA) member for 34 years, I was aggravated by the inaccuracies and other erroneous material in David A. Skilling’s letter (AW&ST May 25, p. 8). The Age 60 Rule was established in 1959, the year I graduated from high school. Anyone who hired on after that date had to be aware of the mandatory retirement rule. To cry about it and blame ALPA after the fact is tantamount to wanting to change the rules after the game has been lost. I also was not happy to be retired, but I knew the rules.
Congratulations in the highest to the crew of space shuttle Atlantis for repairing and improving the Hubble Space Telescope (AW&ST May 25, p. 26). We can all look forward to much more serious astronomy and amazing photos over the next 5-10 years. One thing puzzles me about the long-term plans for Hubble. As I understand it, NASA wants to send a rocket up to dock with Hubble and de-orbit it into the Pacific Ocean. This is certainly prudent, given the problem of space junk, if no other option is available.
As Congress again takes up the vexed question of a second engine for the Joint Strike Fighter, program officials warn that funding the alternate powerplant within the existing F-35 budget will impact production and push up cost.
Back then, they were called remotely piloted vehicles, or simply drones, but unmanned aircraft have proved themselves useful in wartime before, only to be ignored in peacetime. Not this time round—not after Iraq. Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, signaled the seismic shift in April when he said unmanned Predators and Reapers were beginning to supplant some of the mission space occupied by F-15s and F-16s, allowing the U.S. Air Force to retire 250 older manned fighters.
International Launch Services has a new contract to orbit the second spacecraft intended for the hybrid mobile satellite network being built by SkyTerra (formerly Mobile Satellite Ventures). It was the seventh launch award for ILS this year, including three spacecraft to be orbited under a multi-launch agreement with SES. ILS completed its second mission of the year, Protostar-2, on May 16 (AW&ST May 25, p. 16) and is poised to launch its third, Sirius FM-5.
Lockheed Martin has received $1.5 billion in funding to build HEO-3, the third highly elliptical orbit payload, and the third geosynchronous orbit spacecraft (GEO-3) for the U.S. Air Force’s Space-Based Infrared System constellation. A contract for HEO-4 and GEO-4 is expected later this year. The first two HEOs are in orbit; final integration of the first two GEO satellites is underway at Lockheed’s Sunnyvale, Calif., facility. GEO-1 is due for launch next year.
As Airbus celebrates its 40th anniversary the occasion, though quite joyous, is not without some bumps along the way. Two dates could vie for the historic honor, either May 29, 1969, when the A300B program was launched or January 1970, when the Airbus Industrie industrial grouping was established in Paris. This marked the European manufacturer’s first innovation—launching a commercial transport endeavor, then creating the legal structure to shore it up eight months later.
Eumetsat and the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) are discussing ways to work more closely in weather forecasting and operational oceanography. Eumetsat could allow ISRO to access its EumetCast data-dissemination system and provide a near-real-time processing and distribution service for the Altika Ka-band altimeter on India’s Saral oceanography satellite to be orbited next year. The move must be approved at the Eumetsat summer council meeting.
Michael Bruno (Washington), John M. Doyle (Washington), Amy Butler (Washington), David A. Fulghum (Washington)
Washington is roiling about ostensible cancellations of several high-profile Defense Dept. acquisition efforts, but debate is growing over how—or whether—to truly stop any of them. Moreover, what constitutes a cancellation is increasingly unclear. In the end, several programs could be merely revamped or even reinvigorated under pressure from looming military requirements, political pressure and costs—past and future.
Citing the potential for a “competitive advantage” from alternate powerplants for the single-engine F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, and noting that there could be an operational risk someday with just one engine provider, Marine Corps Brig. Gen. David Heinz hopes officials will at least consider funding a second engine effort. The JSF program executive officer says he “categorically” supports the Fiscal 2010 budget request—which does not include funding for a second engine.
The Royal Air Force is recasting a key capability in its air-to-surface repertoire as it tries to secure cash for the initial elements of the program in the next funding round.
Ricardo V. Soria, assistant principal of Choctawahatchee High School, Fort Walton Beach, Fla., has received the 2009 Alan Shepard Technology in Education Award, which is given by the Astronauts Memorial Foundation, NASA and the Space Foundation . He was selected for his role in creating the Engineers for America program, an elementary school initiative that promotes science, technology, engineering and mathematics education through hands-on flight, aviation and aerospace activities.
More than five years after entering the small but intensely competitive aircraft training and simulation business with a niche acquisition, Rockwell Collins finally is stepping up its challenge to market leaders CAE, Thales and L-3 Communications.
Wolfgang Mayrhuber, chairman/CEO of Deutsche Lufthansa AG, has been named to receive the 2009 Distinguished Achievement Award from The Wings Club of New York.
Boeing is working with Qinetiq to develop technology for solar-electric unmanned aircraft that can stay aloft in the stratosphere for three months initially, then a year, and ultimately five years or more. Such extreme persistence for surveillance and communications missions is one of the key advantages driving the rapidly growing demand for the next generation of unmanned aircraft systems. That demand is reshaping the aerospace industrial base as it addresses the emerging market (see p. 46). Boeing concept.
The first of the three Russian Beriev A-50/Israeli Elta Phalcon airborne early warning and control system (AWACS) aircraft has been delivered to the Indian air force. Using the A-50, a derivative of the Ilyushin Il-76, as a platform, the system was due 18 months ago, a fact Defense Minister A.K. Antony didn’t let go without notice. While he didn’t assign specific blame for the delays, the IAF is expected to switch to an Embraer or Gulfstream platform as it seeks a second set of three AWACS. It is expected to retain the Phalcon radar system.
Emirates finalized a $3-billion service agreement with the Engine Alliance to maintain, repair and overhaul GP7200 engines that power the airline’s Airbus A380s. Emirates’s first GP7200-powered A380 entered service last August. Emirates has ordered 250 GP7200 engines and 58 A380s.
