The U.S. Navy has approved low-rate, initial production (LRIP) for the Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile, a guidance upgrade for the basic High-Speed Anti-Radiation weapon. Details are under negotiation with contractor Alliant Techsystems. However, LRIP is expected to be about 5% of the total buy of 1,879 missiles.
ITT picked up a $26-million U.S. Army contract to expand command and control capabilities of Iraqi army signals platoons (for communications intercept) and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) battalions. These Iraqi army units will work with Iraqi air force units that are fielding Cessna Caravan 208s (some armed with Hellfire missiles) and Hawker Beechcraft King Air 350s for advanced ISR (see p. 30).
European Aviation Safety Agency certification of a Tupolev Tu-204-120CE freighter holds potential benefits for the Russian aerospace sector—though more export sales of the model are unlikely. Gaining an airworthiness type certificate from EASA for the version powered by the Rolls-Royce RB211-535, has taken four years.
Michael Mecham (San Francisco International Airport)
Seven years after the 9/11 downturn stifled San Francisco International Airport’s original plans, it’s revived the conversion of its old Terminal 2 in a $383-million, two-year project that will give it 14 more domestic gates. SFO closed the facility in 2000 when it opened a new international terminal, which was an immediate hit with passengers with soaring, skylighted ceilings, ever-changing historical art and crafts displays and an emphasis on San Francisco-based food vendors, all of which will be picked up in the new Terminal 2 design.
Germany’s federal capital is facing a growing capacity crunch in its airport system as historic Tempelhof Airport prepares to close at the end of this month.
National Aviation Co. of India Ltd. (Nacil) will set up a joint venture with EADS to create an aircraft maintenance, repair and overhaul center, at Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi. The facility will open early next year, pending government approval. The $40-million facility, to be completed in five years, will initially focus on Airbus transports.
David A. Fulghum (Washington), Amy Butler (Eglin AFB, Fla.)
After years of hopeful talk and a number of test failures, U.S. Air Force researchers are planning to demonstrate an airborne, electronics-killing, standoff weapon that could receive funding in the Fiscal 2010 budget.
Disastrous losses from unregulated credit default swaps could help the Air Transport Assn. make its case to Congress for more oversight of oil speculators. ATA President James C. May says wild speculation in sub-prime housing loans—which forced the U.S. and European governments to put up several trillion dollars to keep the banking industry from collapsing—is akin to speculation that helped push oil prices to a record $147 a barrel earlier this summer.
Russian aviation authorities were expected to ground nine airlines by the end of last week for failing to pay off their debts. Interavia, Dalavai and Omskavia are the three most well-known airlines affected. The others are Tesis, Vyborg, Aeroshchit, Irkutsk Bezbokov, Ulan-Ude Aviation Plant and Buguruslanskoye Letnoye Uchilishche. The country’s many small domestic airlines are in deep financial trouble from high fuel prices and a sharp drop in demand since July. Almost all of the smaller carriers still operate inefficient Soviet-era aircraft.
Complete with a five one-millions-of-an-inch-thick reflective aluminum coating, the 2.5-meter-dia. telescope mirror has been reinstalled on NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (Sofia), a modified Boeing 747SP, at NASA’s Dryden Aircraft Operations Facility. The coating was applied in a vacuum chamber at the NASA Ames Research Center. Ground tests of the telescope and cavity doors will be conducted later this year; flight tests are to begin next spring.
President Bush signed new authorizing legislation for NASA last week that requires the agency to add two space shuttle logistics flights to the International Space Station to its baseline flight manifest and “take all necessary steps to fly a third” mission. It also requires the agency to take steps to ensure that ISS remains viable through at least 2020.
General Atomics President Thomas J. Cassidy, Jr., is understandably upset by the Predator article (AW&ST Sept. 1, p. 24; Sept. 22, p. 10). However, you were reporting and corroborating the findings of a government assessment of his company’s past and potential performance.
Indian Navy Cdr. (ret.) Ajit Kumar Kokkeri has become aviation surveyor in the Indian office of London-based Airclaims Ltd. He was contract and insurance manager for Kingfisher Airlines. Tan Soon Keat has been named aviation surveyor in the Singapore office, effective Nov. 1.
The UAL corporation executive severance plan is providing retiring executive vice president and chief financial officer Jake Brace with a cash package of $1.86 million plus benefits. The separation agreement, effective Oct. 31, approved by the human resources subcommittee of the UAL Board, set his severance pay at twice his base $653,125 salary plus a target annual incentive equal to 85% of his base salary. In addition, all equity awards will vest immediately and stock options remain exercisable. Travel and medical benefits will be offered through Sept.
Russia’s biggest domestic carrier—S7 Airlines—Air Berlin and Austria’s Niki have entered into a broad code-sharing alliance that essentially nixes S7’s previous intentions of buying Austrian Airlines. Air Berlin and Niki will put their codes on many of S7’s Russian domestic routes while S7 will grow its international presence by code-sharing on Air Berlin and Niki. The three airlines are also linking frequent-flier programs.
Scientists are set to begin using the Hubble Space Telescope for observations again after controllers at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight switched the orbiting observatory’s Science Instrument Control and Data Handling system to its backup “B” side on Oct. 16. After two days of complex commanding and calibration that required extensive practice on the ground and top-level approval from NASA managers, “a full schedule of science observations” with the telescope’s Advanced Camera for Surveys, Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 and other instruments was ready to resume on Oct. 17.
Alliant Techsystems (ATK) has reached an agreement with United Space Alliance that USA will perform subcontractor support to ATK for NASA’s Ares I launch vehicle. USA has been supporting ATK under a $257-million letter of agreement until a more formal document is completed in 60-90 days, says Michael Kahn, executive vice president and general manager of ATK Launch Systems in Promontory, Utah.
Honeywell Aerospace President/CEO Rob Gillette met with AW&ST Editor-in-Chief Anthony L. Velocci, Jr., and Senior Business Editor Joseph C. Anselmo to discuss changes in the company and his outlook for the business aviation industry in an era of economic uncertainty. AW&ST: Honeywell’s new business aviation forecast says that industry will see little discernible effect from changes in U.S. economic conditions and energy price fluctuations. Why is business aviation so different from the rest of commercial aviation?
Rocket racing has obtained an experimental exhibition certificate in the U.S., thanks to FAA approval. The agency green-lighted it to perform flight demos with its latest Rocket Racer, which is based on a Velocity Aircraft kitplane equipped with a liquid-oxygen/alcohol engine built by Mesquite, Tex.-based Armadillo Aerospace. In 2009, Rocket Racing plans to perform exhibition races with up to six aircraft at 6-8 venues selected from more than 20 approved sites. Official races are planned for 2010.
ESA is confident its newest flagship mission, Herschel-Planck, will get off the ground next spring, putting Europe in the forefront of infrared and cosmic-background astronomy. The €1-billion dual-spacecraft mission, which had been set to launch this month, has suffered from a combination of “minor issues,” says ESA science director David Southwood, including a leak on the Planck pressure controller, now being investigated, and nitrogen contamination in Herschel’s helium tank that forced engineers to drain the tank and replenish the helium supply.
Aeroflot’s interim results reflected a 55.2% drop in net profit, with the airline identifying increased fuel and lubricant costs as the cause of the decline. Consolidated revenues for the first six months of 2008 were $473.1 million, up 28.4% from the same period for 2007. Operating expenses, however, grew by 42.1%. Profits totaled $72.2 million.
This week’s planned launch of India’s first mission to the Moon will intensify the search for lunar water ice that could help support future lunar base operations. Crews kept the Chandrayaan-1 mission on track for its Oct. 22 launch date with a move Oct. 14 to the vehicle assembly building at the launch facility on Sriharikota Island in the Bay of Bengal, for mounting atop its PSLV-XL Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle.
Organizational changes are being introduced at BAE Systems in the wake of Ian King’s appointment as CEO, with the creation of four operating groups. Guy Griffiths, previously managing director of Insyte, becomes international group managing director. He was chief operating officer of MBDA. Nigel Whitehead becomes group managing director for programs and support. He held the same post at Military Air Systems.
Bruce Nobles has been named president/CEO of Air Jamaica . He was its president/chief operating officer from 2002-03. Nobles succeeds William Rodgers, who has been acting president/CEO since the resignation of Mike Conway. Nobles also has been president of The Renwick Co. of Dallas.
