In a move that caught many by surprise, Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., which last year had sales in excess of $19 billion, decided to shutter its 32-person flight department at Trenton-Mercer (N.J.) Airport, and divest its two Gulfstream Vs and Sikorsky S76C+ helicopters. The move is particularly noteworthy since Bristol-Myers was one of 18 companies that in 1947 founded an organization that soon became the NBAA and because Lewis Campbell, CEO of Textron Inc., which owns Cessna Aircraft and Bell Helicopter, is the lead independent director on its board.
NetJets Europe sold its 3,000th Private Jet Card, underscoring the accelerating growth of the European shared ownership program. The company says it has sold 1,500 since 2006—as many as it sold in the first four years following the card’s introduction. For €131,000 ($185,000), holders receive 25 flight hours on a small cabin jet in the Citation Bravo or Hawker 400XP class. As well as a sales driver, it is a strong source of growth for NetJet’s fractional ownership program since 20% of card holders eventually buy a fractional share, the company says.
The South Korean government will keep alive the defense ministry’s KFX stealth fighter project with 100 billion won ($90 million) of funding for a three-year preliminary research and development, says the Korea Times. The project sees foreign fighter builders helping the country develop the aircraft, although a South Korean think tank has called the project not viable.
U.S. Sens. Kit Bond (R-Mo.), Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) are urging defense appropriators to back a proposal to split off and give a new intelligence subcommittee some spending oversight. They focused their comments on alleged stonewalling from intelligence officials over a “major overhead technology demonstration.” Bond at a Sept. 10 defense appropriations mark-up said it was time to put the intelligence community on a path to a “responsible” purchase of this system.
Airbus believes it can boost the maximum takeoff weight of the A330-200 to 238 from 233 metric tons, and range to beyond 7,000 naut. mi. from 6,750. A formal industrial launch has not been made on that configuration, although Airbus officials say it could be available for first delivery in 2010. The engine rating would not be affected.
Sophisticated tools that automate the management of multiple unmanned air vehicles promise to improve airspace safety while increasing the availability of imagery down to the individual soldier. Operationally, unmanned aircraft are still flown singly—one operator, one vehicle—but the increased service levels demanded by military users require the automated tasking and deconfliction of multiple UAVs sharing airspace.
Europe’s Automated Transfer Vehicle has ended a flawless inaugural mission at the International Space Station with a successful undocking from the orbital facility. The maneuver was completed on Sept. 5 when hooks holding the ATV to the station opened, detaching the vehicle with a spring mechanism. After drifting unpowered for 1 min. until it was about 3 meters (10 ft.) away from the station, the freighter deployed its smaller attitude control thrusters to initiate departure. After 22 min., with the ATV located immediately below and 5 km.
Large-scale space science missions are likely to benefit from the experience NASA has gained sending humans to service the Hubble Space Telescope, and that it expects to gain servicing the International Space Station with its new Canadian robot. Ed Weiler, associate administrator for science, foresees additional human servicing missions to large space observatories after 2025, provided the planned Orion spacecraft is sufficiently capable.
The Israeli air force last week temporarily grounded its fleet of Cobra attack helicopters after a Cobra crash on Sept. 10 killed both crewmembers on board. A two-ship of Cobras was about 10 min. into a routine graining mission from the Ramat David air force base near Haifa when the incident occurred. The second Cobra landed safely.
FAA acting Administrator Robert A. Sturgell told 400 delegates attending the ICAO meeting that the organization has a critical role in weaving the FAA’s NextGen program and Eurocontrol’s Single European Sky ATM Research Program (Sesar) into a seamless network. ICAO will provide an indispensable foundation for the new technologies and practices that future systems will employ, set the global standards and make sure the U.S., Europe and other regions don’t spend years trying to agree on how to harmonize ATM modernization.
Sea Launch Commander and Sea Launch Odyssey are en route from their home port of Long Beach, Calif., to an equatorial position at 154 deg. W. Long., where they are scheduled to launch Intelsat’s Galaxy 19 spacecraft on Sept. 23. Liftoff is scheduled for 5:28 a.m. EDT, the start of a 2-hr. launch window. Built by Space Systems/Loral, Galaxy 19 will provide C-, Ku- and Ka-band service to customers in the U.S., Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean from an orbital slot at 97 deg. W. Long.
The U.S. Missile Defense Agency plans to carry out the first test of its Kinetic-Energy Interceptor next summer. The new booster is designed with the mobility—through land-mobile and sea basing—needed by the agency as it builds a layered defense against ballistic missiles.
Boeing was on schedule to meet its milestone for the debut flight of the 787 and had nearly completed assembly of ZA001, the first test aircraft, when machinists walked off the job. No significant near-term activity is planned on ZA001 or the three others in the 787 factory in Bldg. 40-26 in Everett, Wash. The facility can only accommodate four aircraft, although there is a staging area to hold major assemblies for another and that process had begun for ZA005.
US Airways is preparing to start flight trials of a weight-saving, low-cost, fiber-optic-based inflight entertainment system with the capability of delivering a gigabit-per-sec. bandwidth to each passenger.
Does the U.S. dollar’s strong rebound mark the start of a sustained rally, or just a fleeting pause in the greenback’s long slide against other major currencies? The answer will have big implications for aircraft manufacturers, suppliers and airlines on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.
The Pentagon and Saudi Arabian government are in talks over the potential purchase of 12 AH-64 Apache Longbow attack helicopters. The potential $598-million foreign military sales deal would include four APG-78 fire control radars and the associated APR-48 radar frequency interferometers. Saudi Arabia also would receive 28 Hellfire air-to-ground missiles. Meanwhile, the Saudi government has decided to expand its F-15S reengining program.
Leasing company Aircastle has trimmed its commitment for Airbus A330-200Fs to 12 aircraft from 15. The move, which hit the Airbus books in August, reduces the aircraft maker’s net order intake for the year to 708 aircraft. The company didn’t book any new orders in August. Airbus also says some A330-200F customers have agreed to delay taking delivery, giving the company capacity it can apply to higher-margin passenger models.
Gulfstream is expected to unveil the G250, a clean-sheet super-midsize to large-cabin business jet, at next month’s National Business Aviation Assn. convention in Orlando, Fla. It is believed the aircraft will feature Honeywell HTF7500-series turbofan engines, Rockwell Collins Pro Line Fusion avionics with synthetic vision, and a variant of the G550 wing. It will be capable of carrying eight passengers 3,600 naut. mi. at Mach 0.80, according to prospective customers.
Plans by Air France-KLM to take over the half of Martinair it doesn’t already own “might substantially reduce competition, and so raise serious doubts as to its compatibility with [EU legislation],” the European Commission said on Sept. 9 in Brussels. The European Union competition watchdog believes that KLM’s acquisition of the 50% of Martinair currently owned by Danish shipping group A.P. Moller-Maersk would deprive passengers of an alternative to fly from the Netherlands to the Dutch Antilles, specifically Curaçao and Aruba.
Airbus is proceeding with investments to build the A350XWB twinjet widebody. The aircraft maker has bought six Viper fiber-placement systems to support the building of the A350 composite fuselage panels, says MAG Cincinnati, which builds the tools. The company says the Viper tools will be involved in building 92% of the A350XWB fuselage.
Rockwell Collins will supply the integrated training system for the U.S. Navy’s new Northrop Grumman E-2D Advanced Hawkeye carrier-based airborne early-warning aircraft, under a contract potentially worth $164 million. Rockwell Collins will provide two flight trainers and three aircrew procedure trainers equipped with its EPX-50 visual systems and wide-angle displays, plus two crew mission system trainers, radar simulation subsystem, instruction system design, courseware and training media.
The NASA Phoenix lander is in a race with approaching winter to complete its soil-sample operations before the Sun drops completely below the horizon at its arctic landing site, starving the platform of solar array power. Electricity levels have already begun to drop to 2,500 from 3,500 watt-hours generated daily. Mission operations are commanded from the Science Operations Control Center at the University of Arizona at Tucson. The team is likely to request funding to extend the flight an additional month through October.
After stabilizing testing of interceptors designed to counter ballistic threats in the midcourse phase of flight, the U.S. Missile Defense Agency is now looking to bolster defenses against threats as they boost into space. Another MDA goal is to improve its ability to foil reentry vehicles in the terminal phase of flight. These are two elements of the layered system being designed to thwart missile threats from North Korea and Iran. Some of the options for boost-phase and terminal defenses could involve modifying existing systems.
The U.S. Navy’s move to meet the threat posed by the latest Russian supersonic cruise missiles will provide Alliant Techsystems (ATK) with a foothold in the targets market and a potential stepping-stone into the anti-ship missile business. ATK has won a $97-million Navy contract to develop the Multi-Stage Supersonic Target (MSST), which will simulate the Russian-made Novator 34M-54E Klub—NATO code name SS‑N-27 Sizzler—an anti-ship cruise missile already sold to China and against which U.S. warships have no assured defense.
The Indian fighter competition is certainly doing its part to bring aerospace opportunities to the country. In the latest contract, Saab has signed with Tata Consultancy to establish an Aeronautical Design and Development Center, which is to work in both the military and civilian domain. Work would focus on aerostructures, aerosystems, avionics and aftermarket support, Saab says.
