Eric Hofer has become senior vice president-sales and customer service for Virgin Charter , Santa Monica, Calif. He was vice president-North American sales for Travelocity Business.
Amy Butler (Springfield, Va.), Douglas Barrie (London)
The Royal Air Force is on the brink of securing funding for key air-to-surface weapon projects against the backdrop of a difficult Defense Ministry spending round. The RAF has submitted a funding request covering study work for the Spear (Selectable Precision Effect at Range) program, the MBDA Storm Shadow enhancement project and the Future Anti-Ship Guided Weapon. However, Spear’s timescale continues to shift.
Speaking of airworthiness, in the wake of the B-2 crash in Guam, a technical order has been issued for inspection of a component or an area of the aircraft. It is believed to be associated with the flight control system. “If everything is OK, the aircraft is OK’d for flight,” says an Air Combat Command official. At least some of the B-2s are now flying again.
NTSB Chairman Mark Rosenker warned against complacency with the U.S.’s safety record, which has been “admirable” in recent years, when the NTSB released 2007 preliminary accident data last week. General aviation, which has long held a bad safety reputation, last year recorded its lowest number of fatalities in more than 40 years—491 people—although the sector was involved in 1,631 accidents, 113 more than in 2006. Meanwhile, Part 121 scheduled carriers were involved in 24 accidents—non-fatal—in 2007.
Chinese airlines’ battle against pilot attrition and wage increases has escalated, with Shanghai Airlines suing nine pilots for $5 million in compensation because they want to leave the company. China Eastern, another Shanghai-based carrier, has suffered from pilots turning around aircraft and returning to their departure points on dubious grounds of bad weather.
The process that allows the formation of sea shell interiors and pearls is being examined for use to deposit nacre-like coatings onto metal surfaces. Scientists at the University of Dayton Research Institute, working under an Air Force contract, are looking for biological ceramic coatings that are naturally derived and that don’t involve high-temperature, high-pressure procedures now required for building ceramic coatings.
David Yeoman has been appointed senior director of enterprise communications for Rockwell Collins , Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He was director of corporate communications and succeeds Tim Burris, who is now vice president-communications for Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems, Tewksbury, Mass.
The supplemental spending measure being considered by Congress for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could be the only major appropriations bill lawmakers send the White House before the November elections. That will boost the likelihood that funds ostensibly for war-fighting could be significantly redirected. Look for Congress to load up the bill with domestic earmarks and unrequested conditions ahead of the national elections.
While not an issue that creates a flight safety problem for the F-22 Raptor, Boeing has sued Alcoa for defective titanium structural supports for the stealth fighter’s wings. Boeing wants $12 million from Alcoa in compensation for not following required procedures in heat-treating forged supports that connect the wings to the fuselage. About 15% of the inspected supports have been fingered for the complaint, which means they will have to be monitored frequently for cracks.
Thanks to the efforts of two Bristow helicopter pilots, rotary-wing aircraft can now be equipped with Traffic-alert and Collision Avoidance System II. It was in 2002 when Mark Prior, Bristow Eastern Hemisphere’s chief test pilot, asked flying safety officer Derek Whatling why TCAS II “won’t work for us.” Some aviation experts said helicopters flew too slowly to use it. Prior and Whatling were skeptical. “Let’s do some digging,” Whatling suggested.
The ICO G1 mobile communications satellite is being maneuvered to its checkout position in geosynchronous orbit, following launch from Cape Canaveral Apr. 14 on board a United Launch Alliance Atlas V with two solid rocket boosters. The Space Systems/Loral satellite is the largest commercial communications satellite ever launched, company managers say.
Regarding the letter from David Noland on Arthur C. Clarke (AW&ST Mar. 31, p. 10), Wernher von Braun’s many textbooks, works with diagrams and written visions of space travel have been well-documented since his early days in Germany and later in the U.S. After his death, these documents were exhibited in most major U.S. cities. As to the V-2 comment, remember that the German V-2 was the world’s first rocket. It reached the edge of space on Oct. 3, 1942, at a height of 84.5 km. (52.8 mi.) and five times the speed of sound.
USAF Maj. Gen. Dana T. Atkins has been nominated for promotion to lieutenant general with assignment as commander of the Alaskan Command of U.S. Pacific Command/commander of the 11th Air Force of Pacific Air Forces/commander of the Alaskan North American Defense Region, Elmendorf AFB, Alaska. He has been director of operations of U.S. Pacific Command, Camp H.M. Smith, Hawaii. Col. Kimberly A.
Michael A. Taverna (Noordwijk, Netherlands, and Paris)
The gradual retreat of NASA and French space agency CNES from space-based oceanography as it morphs into an operational activity is thrusting the European Space Agency and the European Commission—somewhat reluctantly—into a program leadership role.
The document the Air Force was planning to drop on the Government Accountability Office (GAO) late last week to rebut Boeing’s protest that the service acted unfairly in its selection of an Airbus A330-based tanker runs thousands of pages. Boeing says the Air Force changed its assumptions midstream in the competition and misunderstood the company’s 767-200LRF bid. The Air Force has already told the GAO that Boeing should have raised the concerns well before the Feb.
High fuel costs and a weak economy may have doomed Skybus, but the Total Support Package that the airline created for its A319 fleet is one for which Airbus sees potential. For the first time, Airbus agreed to provide TSP as a complete maintenance service for the startup as a part of the purchase contract. Dispatch reliability in the year the airline survived was better than 99%, highest for any member of the A320 family, says Airbus.
Within three years, the U.S. Navy’s fleet will have fielded the technology for precisely locating small, flying targets. The target set embraces some of the Navy’s latest nightmares, including the next-generation of stealthy—sometimes supersonic—cruise missiles.
Following close behind the NMT (NATO midterm) E-3A is the U.S. Air Force’s E-3B/C AWACS Block 40/45 upgrade. Based on the same building blocks as the NMT, the timescale of the Boeing-developed Block 40/45 is heavily dependent on funding. Initial operational capability for the first five USAF AWACS aircraft is scheduled for 2013, three years later than originally planned.
Pilatus management is anticipating difficult times ahead that could eventually translate into slowing growth for the Swiss aircraft maker. But for now, operational results remain strong.
China Eastern Airlines reports a 586 million yuan profit for 2007, compared with a 2.99-billion-yuan ($427-million) loss for the previous year, partly thanks to the appreciation of the yuan against the U.S. dollar, which is cutting its financing costs. Turnover grew powerfully, as is usual for a Chinese airline. The company’s operating turnover was 43.53 billion yuan, up 14% from 2006.
The crash of a DC-9 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo highlights the need for enhanced safety measures in Africa—a continent beleaguered by a fleet of aging aircraft, poor infrastructure, and lack of a skilled workforce. Investigators and United Nations workers late last week continued to seek clues to what caused the Apr. 15 runway overrun and crash of a Hewa Bora Airways DC-9 at Goma Airport. The U.S. NTSB plans to assist Congo authorities with the investigation as necessary.
Northrop Grumman’s E-2D—the world’s newest airborne early warning, command and control aircraft—looks familiar on the outside, but represents a new design inside including an electronically scanned array radar with a 360-deg. sweep. Articles beginning on p. 52 examine progress in airborne network-centric operations from the bottom up, plus thinking about changes in the top-down industry view of the future. Illustration by James Veccia of Northrop Grumman.
The instances of non-compliance with airworthiness directives (ADs) fall into three categories, FAA officials tell Aviation Week’s MRO Conference & Exhibition. The first, says John Hickey, FAA’s director of aircraft certification, is outright non-compliance, for which aircraft are grounded. In the second instance, airlines believe they have complied with the AD, “but the workmanship hasn’t been very good,” says Hickey. Frequently such cases involve wiring. “If work is below the AD, aircraft could be grounded,” he says.
Tony Spehar (see photo) has been appointed sector vice president/general manager for Kinetic Energy Interceptors program for the Northrop Grumman Corp. , Fair Lakes, Va. He has been the program’s vice president/deputy general manager.
