Cisco Systems is extending its demonstration of the IP Routing in Space (Iris) experiment by 12 months, according to Rick Sanford, chief operating officer for the program at the company. U.S. Strategic Command sponsored the Joint Capability Technology Demonstration of the payload, which is to be launched on the Intelsat-14 spacecraft. Iris is to provide C- and Ku-band communications from geosynchronous orbit.
Rolls-Royce is aiming to certify its RB2011 open-rotor engine by 2017-18 for a 2020 entry into service, and the company is increasingly confident it has a solution to the noise problem that has previously blighted development efforts with this propulsion concept.
Dave Krogman has been appointed general manager of the Grand Junction, Colo., facility of West Star Aviation Inc. and Keith Rash sales manager for Texas. Krogman was the facility’s director of hangar operations and succeeds Rick Brainard, who is now vice president-sales. Rash has held sales positions with Wing Aviation and BizJet.
Scientists are puzzling over a massive planet-sized object discovered by Europe’s Corot orbital observatory that is unlike any heavenly body seen before. The object, dubbed Corot-exo-3b, is about the size of Jupiter but with 20 times Jupiter’s mass, and takes only four days and six hours to orbit its parent star. Magali Deleuil of the Marseille Astrophysics Laboratory, which made the find, says researchers “were taken by surprise” by such a massive object orbiting so close to its parent star and are still debating its nature.
Winglet Technology expects to certificate its elliptical winglets for the Citation X in June 2009, and is preparing to work with Cessna on winglets for another, unidentified, Citation. Flight tests on the Mach 0.92 Citation X have shown a 4-5% reduction in fuel consumption, 150 naut. mi. increase in range, 15-kt. higher speed above 41,000 ft., 40 min. faster time to 43,000 ft. and the ability to climb direct to 45,000 ft., at maximum weight. Hot-and-high takeoff performance is also improved, the company says.
Britain’s military is assembling a “collaborative warfare” force for its operations in Afghanistan and elsewhere in the theater that roughly parallels the U.S.’s latest technology effort in Iraq. That classified collaboration is being given more credit by the Pentagon for curbing bloodshed over the last two years than the much ballyhooed troop surge.
European Space Agency engineers are wrapping up analysis of the debris-impact pattern from the Jules Verne Automated Transfer Vehicle, which performed a controlled destructive reentry Sept. 29 after a successful six-month logistics mission to the International Space Station. Following a final deorbit burn that slowed its velocity by 70 meters per sec., the ATV entered the upper atmosphere at an altitude of 120 km. (75 mi.). The 13,400-lb. vehicle broke up 75 km. above the Pacific, with remaining fragments falling into the ocean about 12 min. later.
As Europe revises the ground rules for the entire carbon dioxide cap-and-trade system, airlines could face much stiffer regulations than initially expected. Earlier this year, European governmental institutions worked out a compromise on how to include aviation in the Emission Trading Scheme. But now there’s concern among both industry and European Commission representatives that lawmakers will use a review of the broader ETS—cutting across all industries—to implement more draconian terms for airlines.
The U.S. Air Force last week stopped work on Boeing’s $1.1 billion KC-135 Programmed Depot Maintenance contract after the U.S. Court of Federal Claims ruled in favor of a suit filed by losing bidder, Alabama Aircraft Industries (AAI, formerly Pemco Aeroplex). The dispute has been through multiple reviews at the Government Accountability Office, and the court is now suggesting the Air Force conduct a new competition for the work after problems in the process have come to light. In the meantime, both contractors stand to gain.
Mitsubishi Aircraft is close to deciding whether to allocate work on its MRJ regional jet to fellow Japanese manufacturers Fuji and Kawasaki Heavy Industries, but is warning that the decision will be strictly commercial, not based on any sense of patriotic duty. President Nobuo Toda expects to book more orders for the Mitsubishi Regional Jet before the end of this year. The company, majority owned by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, has been set up to build the 70-90-seat jetliner.
Herb Kelleher, founder/chairman emeritus of Southwest Airlines, received the Lifetime Achievement Award, and Best Low Cost Airline and Best Low Cost Airline-Americas awards for his carrier, during the Second Annual Budgies World Low Cost Airline Awards ceremony at the World Low Cost Airlines Congress in London. Air Arabia CEO Adel Ali was named CEO of the Year and received the award for Best Low Cost Airline-Middle East and Africa for his carrier.
Northrop Grumman’s Oblique Flying Wing (OFW) program will not proceed to an X-plane flight demonstrator. The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency confirms that OFW has concluded following the preliminary design effort. The OFW was a tailless variable-geometry flying wing designed to combine long subsonic loiter endurance with high supersonic dash speed. By increasing sweep as the aircraft accelerated, the leading edge always stayed subsonic, reducing drag.
Piaggio Aero Industries’ long-standing aspirations to develop a business jet are on firmer footing now that the Italian company has further financial backing from a new investor.
USN Rear Adm. John R. Hines, Jr., has been named deputy chief of staff for operations at Allied Air Component Command Headquarters, Izmir, Turkey. He has been deputy commander of the San Diego-based Third Fleet.
The turmoil gripping U.S. financial markets will have little long-term impact on demand for business jets, according to a forecast widely viewed as a barometer of the industry’s health. But critics question whether a market where demand is driven by corporate profits can really fly around the economic storm. Honeywell Aerospace’s 17th annual Business Aviation Outlook predicts that hefty backlogs and robust demand from markets outside the U.S. will push deliveries to a record $25 billion in 2009, extending a rebound that began in 2004.
Contraction of Asia-Pacific passenger and cargo traffic weighed heavily in an overall slowdown of international demand in August, but “some recovery” is likely in the coming months, according to the International Air Transport Assn. IATA expects that an easing of visa restrictions by China will help boost growth. Tightening of visas during the Olympics led to fewer flights and a passenger decline. Turmoil in financial markets is affecting global traffic as well. IATA says passenger demand in all regions is off 1.3% year-on-year.
Eurofighter, Lockheed Martin and Sukhoi have been eliminated from Brazil’s F-X2 fighter competition. The three remaining contenders are the Boeing F/A-18E/F, Saab Gripen NG and Dassault Rafale. Lockheed Martin was proposing an F-16 variant, while Sukhoi was offering the Su-35.
Joseph P. Bellino has been appointed vice president/chief financial officer of Los Angeles-based Ducommun Inc. He was executive vice president/CFO of the Kaiser Aluminum Corp.
Israel has requested the possible purchase of 25 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, with an option for 50 more—a $15.2-billion deal if all options are exercised. All of the Israeli F-35s would be configured with Pratt & Whitney F135 engines or General Electric-Rolls Royce F136 engines, and equipped with an electronic warfare package and assorted subsystems, features and capabilities.
The need to focus near-term defense spending on current operations is increasingly underlying European defense budgets, but governments are nevertheless trying to protect some key aircraft and missile modernization programs from being curtailed. Both trends are reflected in new French and Swedish defense spending plans, which also are banking on the ability to generate internal efficiencies in the coming years to free up budget for procurement needs.
The U.S. Senate has confirmed the nomination of Michael Donley as Air Force secretary, though he must still be installed by the President. Donley has been acting secretary since last spring when then-Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne and Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley were fired following a series of nuclear management mishaps and acquisition foul-ups. Moseley has been succeeded by Gen. Norton Schwartz.
On the heels of its first win last week as a Pentagon prime contractor—delivering refurbished G222s for use by the Afghanistan National Army Air Corps—Alenia North America President Giuseppe Giordo says the company is examining whether to proceed as prime for its campaign to sell the M-346 trainer in the U.S. No official competition has begun yet for a new trainer for the U.S. Air Force and Navy, but Giordo says with no stateside competitors, he feels confident. He’s in talks with potential U.S.
A group of aviation executives in the self-proclaimed “Air Capital of the World” are forming the Wichita Aero Club. The Kansas city is home to Cessna Aircraft, Hawker Beechcraft, Bombardier Learjet, Spirit AeroSystems, McConnell AFB and a host of other aviation-related manufacturers and service organizations that, combined, employ 40,000 residents. Patterned after the Aero Clubs of Washington and Atlanta and The Wings Club in New York, the new group plans to host monthly luncheons with high-profile speakers, along with holding a major annual awards dinner.
Flight testing of the Raytheon Paveway IV dual-mode precision-guided bomb will begin on the Eurofighter Typhoon this month. The integration of the Paveway IV, which uses both GPS satellite navigation and laser guidance, is part of the Phase 1 enhancement program for the aircraft that is expected to begin to open up the Typhoon’s air-to-surface capabilities.
