A decision by France to earmark nine helicopters and a logistics unit for a United Nations-sponsored peacekeeping mission to Chad and the Central African Republic appears to have been motivated by an agreement to expand the amount of hardware that can be funded jointly for the European Union undertaking. Although French defense ministry officials denied a direct link, they said a move to broaden the so-called Athena joint funding mechanism is expected to be set soon.
Bronnoysund Airport is using GPS guidance for precision approaches, and Northrop Grumman’s subsidiary Park Air Systems plans to equip 25 more Norwegian airports with the new system during the next three years. Technically speaking this is the first Ground-Based Augmentation System (GBAS)—as it is called by the International Civil Aviation Organization—certified for operational use anywhere in the world, asserts Park Air.
Armaments agency DGA has contracted with Thales and Sabca of Belgium to perform a partial modernization of 20 Alphajets operated by France’s advanced fighter training school. The upgrade is intended to enable pilots at the facility, which serves the French and Belgian air forces, to transition more easily to front-line fighters like the Rafale and F-16 MLU until Europe can agree on a new advanced trainer.
Anne Healey (see photo) has been named executive director of the Otttawa-based Assn. for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International-Canada . She was director of business management at EADS Canada and general manager of the Canadian Defense Industries Assn.
Your 2007 Person of the Year Award was like giving an Academy Award to a body double. The Chinese space program looks good in the shower, but it is 35 years behind real space programs and is composed of copied and stolen technology. If a huge nation such as China wants to accomplish something, it can, especially if it is willing to spend money on space that should be going to improve the living conditions for its people.
The most talked-about vehicle at last week’s Detroit Auto Show was a car unveiled halfway around the world. India’s Tata Motors Ltd. may very well upend the automobile industry with its new Nano, which will sell for the rock-bottom price of $2,500. In general aviation, Cessna Aircraft Co. is moving down a similar path with the Model 162 SkyCatcher, which will be built in China and sell for $109,500. And now comes word that the Eclipse 500, the $1.6-million personal jet equivalent of the Nano and SkyCatcher, soon may be rolling off an assembly line in Russia.
The NATO medium, extended air defense system (Meads) management agency awarded a $66-million contract to adopt the Lockheed Martin PAC-3’s segment enhancement missile as the new baseline interceptor for the tri-nation program. The benefits are to include an increased range, engagement and area defense envelope, and lethality which is added by more responsive control surfaces and a more powerful rocket motor. Meads is to replace the Patriot in the U.S., supplement Patriots in Germany and replace the Nike Hercules in Italy.
Canada’s Competition Bureau commissioner, Sheridan Scott, endorsed allowing foreign carriers to operate point-to-point services in Canada, in a report filed last week with the government’s Competition Policy Review Panel. She advised the panel to recommend improvements to international competitiveness, and increase the allowable level of foreign ownership of voting shares to 49.9% from 25. Scott angered the Air Transport Assn. of Canada by saying reciprocity is important in bilateral trade negotiations but expendable as it applies to the airline industry.
A British Airways Boeing 777-200ER, en route from Beijing to London, made an emergency landing at London Heathrow Airport at about around 12:40 p.m. local time on Jan. 17. Flight 38 landed short of the runway, and skidded across grass before coming to rest near Runway 27L. The undercarriage was torn off, and the aircraft and engines sustained major damage. Flight data and cockpit voice recorders have been recovered. All 136 passengers were evacuated, three with minor injuries, as well as three flight and 13 cabin crewmembers.
U.S. Special Operations Command has selected BAE Systems to provide an interim all-quadrant gun for the CV-22 Osprey. The gun, based on BAE’s Remote Guardian System, will be rapidly mounted under the belly of the tiltrotor aircraft, and will be remotely operated.
A compromise deal between the European Parliament and Council will harmonize air transport security arrangements throughout the European Union. It also spells out rules for the use of sky marshals, who can’t be armed unless special security situations apply. The new policy, which is embraced by airline and airport lobby groups, also means that transfer passengers from outside the EU may not have to pass through security a second time, if the standards at their departure point are deemed adequate.
Safran was able to surpass its 5% sales growth target for last year, booking a 5.9% increase in sales over 2006. But more important to its future, the aerospace company says it has fully hedged its 2008 dollar exposure. Safran had been criticized for not hedging aggressively enough. Sales growth was largely driven by aerospace propulsion, where orders in the CFM International joint venture with General Electric reached a record 2,704 CFM56s. Helicopter engine orders hit 1,065. Sales for the entire division were up 16.7% to €5.9 billion ($8.7 billion).
The first Tranche 2 Eurofighter Typhoon had its initial flight last week, from EADS Military Air Systems in Manching, Germany. The aircraft will be used for type acceptance trials for the first standard of the Tranche 2 aircraft, the so-called Block 8 configuration. Meanwhile a British Royal Air Force two-seat Typhoon suffered an unspecified “system failure” while at 40,000 ft. on Jan. 14. An emergency descent to 10,000 ft. was executed, during which the aircraft inadvertently went supersonic. The aircraft landed safely at RAF Coningsby.
As planning begins to remove U.S. forces from a key air base in Ecuador, the Pentagon is examining new arrangements with countries farther north, in Central America.
The U.S. Transportation Dept.’s proposal aimed at easing congestion by allowing airports greater flexibility in assessing landing fees is pitting some airlines against airports and opening an old wound over what the International Air Transport Assn. (IATA) calls an ineffective and inefficient tool: congestion pricing.
AW&ST: For several years, there was a feeling that your Defense Electronics business didn’t have critical mass. But so far not much has happened to change that. Why is that?
The F-35 Lightning II’s complex electronic warfare package is being designed for a broad spectrum of digital attack and surveillance missions and as the launch point for a new generation of small, powerful systems. It already offers some capabilities that are not available on the F-22. The Raptor, for example, has no other way, other than verbally, to send the detailed electronic surveillance data it collects to other types of aircraft or to ground-intelligence facilities.
David Copeland (see photo) has become vice president-sales and marketing for the Avidyne Corp. , Lincoln, Mass. He held the same position at the Mooney Airplane Co. Matt Cowan has been named Southeast U.S. sales manager. He was an accounts manager for Guaranty Bank Home Equity.
France is establishing a permanent base in the United Arab Emirates, to accommodate air, naval and land forces, and be used to support multilateral exercises with Qatar and Kuwait. France says the Abu Dhabi base will improve its ability to back peacekeeping and security activities in the region, particularly in light of a perceived growing Iranian threat. French officials refused to say whether Afghanistan operations would be supported from the base.
David A. Fulghum (Washington), Robert Wall (Paris)
China’s integrated air defenses—based on cheap, sometimes stolen digital technology—are now considered potentially more threatening to the U.S. than Russia’s. The wholesale use of commercial products has made Chinese networks flexible, easy to upgrade and tough to exploit.
British Airways is expanding its carbon offset initiatives, including simplifying how passengers can buy offsets for their flights. But the airline also is supporting research at Cambridge University to better understand the non-CO2 effects of aviation on the environment. BA hopes to have results by 2012. Additionally, the carrier is backing Brazilian efforts to halt deforestation.
USAF Maj. Gen. Dana T. Atkins has been appointed special assistant to the commander of Pacific Air Forces, Hickam AFB, Hawaii. He has been director of operations at headquarters of U.S. Pacific Command, Camp H.M. Smith, Hawaii. Maj. Gen. Douglas L. Raaberg has been named deputy combined forces air component commander, U.S. Central Command/deputy commander, Air Force Forces/vice commander, 9th Air and Space Expeditionary Task Force, Air Combat Command (ACC), Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar. He has been director of air and space operations at ACC Headquarters, Langley AFB, Va.
Engine uncertainties for the A400M military transport are far from over and will likely persist even once the powerplant finally takes to the air in April. The TP400 being built by a European engine consortium has been a major, though not the only, source of schedule delays for the A400M, which is already running six months late and is at risk of being fielded at least a year behind schedule. “We need to stabilize the program,” emphasizes Airbus CEO Tom Enders.
