Aerospace and aviation industries could barely survive without Mitsui Seiki, even though many professionals have barely heard of this none-too-profitable maker of the machine tools that create the most precise parts in engines and airframes. It’s astonishing how efficiency in aviation can come down to a skilled technician shaping metal by hand at Mitsui Seiki’s Tokyo plant. Imagine an airline that enjoys stronger profits because it has introduced efficient new aircraft, whose advantage over the competition lies mostly in engine design.
Gil Michielin, who is vice president/ general manager of Paris-based Thales Commercial Aircraft Solutions, has been appointed president of EUROCAE, a non-profit organization providing a European forum to establish reference standards for airborne and ground-based electronic equipment and systems for air transport.
Political sensitivity surrounding British involvement in military operations in Afghanistan, and required Pakistani support, has resulted in London and Berlin cutting a high-level government deal over which country will lead the Eurofighter Typhoon bid in India. The two governments were wrangling over which will take prominence in supporting the Eurofighter offer to meet India's Multi-Role Combat Aircraft program. Earlier this year, industry and government officials suggested the two sides had compromised on a joint approach.
The Atlas V Centaur upper stage that shut down early June 15, placing two National Reconnaissance Office ocean surveillance spacecraft into the wrong orbit, fell short in both altitude and inclination. Although the NRO and the U.S. Air Force are keeping the planned and actual parameters secret, it has emerged that the spacecraft were supposed to have been fired into a 1,000 X 1,200-km. (620 X 745-mi.) orbit inclined 63.4 deg. to the equator.
Don't look for Boeing to conduct a flight demonstration of the 787 in July 2008 at the Farnborough air show. If its schedule holds, Boeing should be delivering the new jet by then and it could arrange to put one on static display. But a flight demonstration, such as the dramatic ones Airbus routinely puts on with its A380, is out of the question. Boeing Commercial Airplanes President and CEO Scott Carson doesn't see any payoff. Airlines don't buy commercial jets based on such flights.
Eager to do its part to alleviate noise-related growing pains in the air transportation system, NASA’s restructured Fundamental Aeronautics program has aggressive goals for making future subsonic and supersonic aircraft quieter. But with its slimmed-down budget, the aeronautics directorate is looking to other parties to bring its technologies to flight test and fruition.
Low-cost carriers are transporting 18% of the world's air traffic and continue to grow as the sector moves toward maturity in Europe and North America. The next target group is business fliers; the next step, how to connect with them. But the way is not smooth. LCCs are trying to differentiate their operations while coping with the threat of increasing regulations, according to statements made at The Institute of Economic Affairs' recent summit on budget airlines.
The FAA has certified the Embraer 190 for Category 3A approaches, rollout guidance and low-visibility takeoffs with a dual Head-up Guidance System--the first commercial aviation use of dual head-up displays more commonly used on military aircraft. JetBlue Airways' Embraer 190s will be the first equipped with the Rockwell Collins Flight Dynamics HGS-5600 system.
Last week's Paris air show set new records with more than 2,000 exhibitors and 42 countries represented. The biennial event featured several aerospace newcomers, including the Bell/Agusta 609 civil tiltrotor, the Royal Australian Air Force's KC-30B tanker, and, at least as a model, the Israel Aerospace Industries Heron-TP large unmanned aircraft. Order intake was brisk, with billion-dollar deals in the commercial aircraft, engine and business jet segments.
Congressional Democrats are unhappy about President Bush's refusal to meet with them to discuss NASA funding, leaving the job in identical form letters to his science adviser, outgoing budget director and NASA Administrator Michael Griffin. Sen.
Cheryl A. Stearns, Fred J. Cone, Roger K. Parrish and the late Elgin Roy Newell have been inducted into the Arizona Aerospace Foundation's Hall of Fame in Tucson. Stearns, who is a pilot for US Airways, was the first woman member of the U.S. Army's Golden Knights parachute team. In 1977, she won the first of many awards for parachute jumping, including the U.S. National Championship. Stearns has won 65 national and world women's competitions and holds 30 world records. Cone, a U.S.
SpaceX plans to fix seven other anomalies discovered during post-flight analysis, in addition to the control problem that caused the most recent flight of its Falcon 1 to fall short of orbit. Only then will the company launch its next scheduled flight, which will carry the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory's TacSat-1 spacecraft. During the March flight, the upper stage began a corkscrew motion about 90 sec. after liftoff, resulting in fuel sloshing that caused an engine flameout nearly 8 min. after launch (AW&ST Apr. 2, p. 55).
Thales Alenia Space will supply repeater payloads for Russia's Lutch 5A and 5B geostationary relay satellites, which are intended to serve the International Space Station and Russian Earth-observation spacecraft. The S/K u-band payload units, to be built by Thales's partner NPO PM, are to be launched in 2009-10. It's the first time the two companies have cooperated on a Russian government mission.
Australia has chosen the larger of two helicopter-carrying assault ships it was considering ordering for an A$3- billion (U.S.$2.5-billion) project. The design by Spanish shipbuilder Navantia displaces 27,000 metric tons and can carry 1,200 soldiers, eight helicopters and up to 150 vehicles. Australia plans to buy the Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II fighter, the version designed to operate from long runways, but not the F-35B version that will be capable of short takeoffs and vertical landings.
Aonix, a provider of solutions for mission-critical applications development, reports a Memorandum of Understanding between Fujitsu Ltd. and NRK Aviation America to provide products, service and support for applications related to real-time Java in Japan. Fujitsu is now considering applying Aonix Perc technology to future airborne computer systems.
Blended packages of sensors that can bridge the physics of intelligence collection and explore the far corners of the electromagnetic spectrum for new information are perhaps only five years away.
AVIATION WEEK writers have won seven 2007 Aerospace Journalist of the Year Awards. The awards were presented in Paris on the eve of the air show at Le Bourget. Aviation Week & Space Technology Contributing Editor James Ott won the Royal Aeronautical Society (RAeS) Award for Best Propulsion Submission for an article on new fuels, "Synthetics Soar."
The business announced at Le Bourget includes these commercial air transport orders: *GE Commercial Aviation Services: six Boeing 777 Freighters and 60 Airbus A320-family aircraft. *The Air France-KLM Group: nine 777-300ERs for Air France and seven 777-700s for KLM. *Lion Air: 40 737-900ERs. *Aeroflot: 22 A350XWBs and five A321s. *Aviation Lease Finance Corp.: 12 A350XWBs and seven A320s. *CIT Aerospace: seven A350XWBs and 25 A320-family. *Intrepid Aviation: 20 A330-200Fs.
Israel is planning to launch its TecSAR synthetic aperture radar satellite Aug. 22. The Israel Aerospace Industries satellite weighs less than 300 kg. (660 lb.) and will provide radar images. Launch is set to take place from India. Northrop Grumman and IAI announced this spring they are teaming to offer TecSAR to the U.S. Air Force as an interim capability for fielding advanced systems.
Ranald McGillis has been appointed president/CEO of Gallium Visual Systems of Ottawa. He was vice president-business development and government relations for Lockheed Martin Canada.
The British Defense Ministry is considering pursuing a radar-based reconnaissance satellite technology demonstrator, as London reconsiders the strategic impact of space. The ministry is in the throes of reviewing its Defense Industrial Strategy (DIS), and a widely anticipated additional chapter in the "DIS 2" is expected to focus on the military implications of space for the U.K.
The Pentagon doesn't know the number or value of the undefinitized contract actions (UCAs) in effect at any given time, and about half of them aren't being used as intended--to fill urgent needs quickly--the Government Accountability Office reports. Surveying seven buying commands, GAO found that information systems keep track of letter contracts but not a "potentially large" number of undefinitized task orders, delivery orders and contract modifications.
State-owned Garuda Indonesia will carry the code of Hainan Airlines on its Jakarta-Beijing services in return for the right to sell seats on the Chinese carrier's connecting flights to the big secondary cities of Harbin, Hangzhou and Nanning.
Turboprop-maker ATR will boost production output to 70 aircraft per year and hopes to see revenue reach $1.5 billion, says Chairman Filippo Bagnato. That's a stark turnaround from the 15 aircraft delivered in 2005. But more far-reaching changes may lie ahead. Finmeccanica CEO Pier Francesco Guarguaglini is interested in buying out EADS's 50% stake in ATR, but has "not received promising answers." But EADS Co-CEO Louis Gallois, although noting the ATR business has been good, pointedly does not say the turboprop maker is a core business and will be retained.
Using unmanned aerial vehicles and sensor pod-equipped fighter aircraft to find improvised explosive devices (IEDs) is a waste of time and resources, according to Air Force Gen. Ronald Keys, the outgoing head of Air Combat Command. The enemy network is what's important, "not the thing that's buried out there," Keys says at the Transformation Warfare 2007 conference and exhibit in Virginia Beach, Va.
