British Airways is selling its 10.5% stake in Air Mauritius for £3.2 million ($6.3 million) after 35 years because the carrier is mature and no longer requires foreign investment and support. The transaction includes selling BA’s 3.84% share in the carrier to the government of Mauritius, and sale of its 13.24% share in Air Mauritius Holding Co. to existing shareholders. Air Mauritius is bracing for a difficult year.
An unmanned aircraft designed to evaluate the feasibility of continuous solar-powered flight on Mars has completed a 27-hr. flight near Nierderwil, Switzerland. The Sky-Sailor UAV, which has a wingspan of 10.5 ft., flew through the night powered by a battery that was recharged during the day using solar energy, thereby demonstrating the ability for continuous flight, according to the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich that built the UAV. Design was begun under a European Space Agency study for a Mars flyer.
Partnerships between the military and industry are growing in number and broadening in scope, bringing the services and defense contractors more closely together than any previous relationship.
Five Key Questions In an interview with Aviation Week & Space Technology Congressional Editor John M. Doyle, policy analyst and former Senate staffer Jerry Cox says aerospace and defense industry leaders should seek answers to these five questions from the candidates before Election Day. Listen to the podcast at AviationWeek.com/extra By Their Advisers You Shall Know Them
Nicola Phillips has become flight operations standards and training manager for Empire Airlines , Hayden, Idaho. She was check airman/assistant chief pilot for Skyway Airlines of Milwaukee.
Richard Miller has been named president/CEO of Information Systems Laboratories of San Diego. He was executive vice president/chief operating officer and succeeds Michael Dowe, who has retired.
USAF Lt. Gen. (ret.) Howard F. Leaf (Brandywine, Md.)
The U.S. Air Force made the wrong decision in its air-refueling tanker award. Major flaws in the conduct of the competition significantly affected its outcome.
Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama, starting in January 2007, spent more than a year fighting for their political parties’ nomination for President of the United States. For all their rhetoric about everything from taxes to trade during those many months, however, they had very little to say about aviation, aerospace and national security—the unpopular war in Iraq notwithstanding.
Taiwan’s Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology is seeking an industrial partner to manufacture its Blue Magpie mini-unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and a larger version yet to be unveiled. The Blue Magpie weighs about 1 kg. (2.2 lb.), featuring a balsa-wood internal frame and a fiberglass exterior. The electric-powered UAV carries two charge-coupled device cameras, is hand-launched and has a range of about 4 km. (2.5 mi.). The larger version would have a wingspan of 1.5 meters (4.9 ft.), carry an infrared sensor and could fly continuously for about 80 min.
China has joined the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems (CCSDS), an international forum for establishing space-communications standards to enable joint operations. The China National Space Administration becomes the 11th member of the organization, which was established in 1982.
India’s Jet Airways posted a loss of $54 million in the fourth quarter ending Mar. 31 compared with a net profit of $21 million for the same period last year. High fuel prices and overcapacity in India are contributing factors, according to the airline.
High fuel prices and a weakened economy are giving the aerospace sector a severe shaking. A report from Goldman Sachs issued on June 25 sent sector shares reeling. Boeing’s stock price fell more than 6%, declining more than 5 points from the previous day and closing at $69.64, steeply down from an October high of $107.15. Taking note of a sector value decline of nearly 30% in eight months, analyst Richard Safran predicts another 20% drop. “Aerospace stocks can weather a bad economy or high oil, but not both,” he writes.
Ohio Attorney General Nancy Rogers has laid the groundwork for a potential investigation into whether DHL’s plan to use competitor UPS for express package lift violates the state’s antitrust laws. She warned both companies, and DHL parent Deutsche Post, against destroying any documents related to the issue. Meanwhile, Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher is conducting weekly meetings in an effort to avert the potential loss of 7,000 jobs at the Wilmington Air Park—a sorting site for DHL that is in danger of closing (AW&ST June 2, p. 40).
No matter who wins the White House in November, John McCain or Barack Obama will probably be long gone or well into a second term before all the policy changes sought by the aerospace and defense industry could yield results. They include such long-term commitments as an overhaul of the education system, changes to the tax code and an easing of regulations governing the export of high-tech parts and equipment—and more money for NASA research.
Russia’s Proton M/Breeze M launch vehicle can begin flying again this summer, following clearance by an International Launch Services failure review oversight board (FROB). The Proton M has been down since an anomaly on Mar. 15 left the SES Americom AMC-14 spacecraft stranded in the wrong orbit. In April, a Russian state commission attributed the failure to a ruptured exhaust gas conduit that caused a turbopump on the rocket’s Breeze M upper stage to shut down prematurely. The FROB confirmed the finding in May, but took more time to study corrective measures.
Kevin McClurg has been named vice president-finance for the Roseland, N.J.-based Curtiss-Wright Corp. ’s flow control segment. He was vice president/corporate controller. McClurg has been succeeded by Glenn Coleman, who was vice president-finance of the Wireless Business Group of Alcatel Lucent.
Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) conducted a full launch dress rehearsal and static firing of its third Falcon 1 rocket June 25 at its launch site at Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific Ocean. The test marked the first pad firing of SpaceX’s new Merlin 1C reusable engine—an upgraded version of the Merlin 1A used for previous Falcon 1 launches. The regeneratively cooled Merlin 1C operated at full power, with only the hold-down system keeping the rocket from lifting off, the company says.
India has agreed to sell seven Hindustan Aeronautics Dhruv Advanced Light Helicopters to the Ecuadoran air force for $50.7 million. The Indian defense ministry expects delivery of the indigenously developed twin-turbine helicopters to Ecuador in knock-down kit form to begin within six months and be completed over 15 months to two years.
Italian carrier Meridiana has launched a new industrial plan aimed at decreasing operating expenses by 30% to offset soaring fuel costs. The outlook, however, is bleak because the airline is projected to lose money in 2008 after three years of profits. Meridiana is struggling to convert its Eurofly unit into a regular carrier and labor unions have rejected a proposed 20% reduction in labor costs for pilots and 10% for ground personnel.
Japan Airlines (JAL) plans to flight test a second-generation, sustainable biofuel in cooperation with Boeing and Pratt & Whitney. Blended with conventional jet fuel, the biofuel will be tested in a JT9D engine on a JAL 747-300 during a 1-hr., non-revenue flight scheduled for late in the first quarter of 2009. The flight will be the first biofuel demonstration by an Asian airline and the first using a Pratt & Whitney engine.
Bombardier has booked firm orders for 25 Learjet 60XR business jets plus 85 options from an undisclosed European customer, with deliveries to begin next year. The firm orders are valued at $340 million and the complete 110-aircraft deal at $1.5 billion. Gulfstream has signed an agreement worth $1.9 billion to continue delivering four G450s and four G550s a year to U.S. fractional-ownership provider NetJets. The deal covers 40 aircraft for delivery from 2012-16.
The next man to fly on Marine One will herald pain for defense procurement, with high-profile programs such as the Army’s Future Combat Systems (FCS) and some missile defense system elements marked as possible targets. But rather than wholesale upheaval, changes to the Pentagon’s budget, force structure and military capabilities are likely to come in measured amounts as the U.S. faces wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as continuing counter-terrorism efforts around the world and at home.
The science team for the French-U.S. Jason-2 oceanography mapping mission wasted no time in bringing its five primary and three piggyback instruments into play. And even though the spacecraft’s formal checkout will take two months, the science team expects to begin receiving data within weeks that will continue an international tradition dating back three decades of reading the ocean’s waves to help understand climatic change.
A Sikorsky VH-3D Sea King helicopter, operating at the White House in Washington and bearing the U.S. presidential livery, is designated Marine 1 when the commander-in-chief is on board. The next President, whether it’s Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) or Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), will face immediate challenges in the aerospace, aviation and defense arenas—most with long-term economic and national security consequences. In a Presidential Special Report beginning on p.
