RON WEIL "No Place To Land" Acrylic 24 X 36 inches A de Havilland DH-4 mail plane flies through a pass in the Rocky Mountains. The Liberty Engine growls and the pilot knows if the growl ceases, there's no place to land.
Precision Castparts has announced a deal to acquire GSC Foundries, a privately held manufacturer of aluminum and steel structural investment castings that has operations in Utah and Mexico. JSA Research analyst Peter J. Arment estimates GSC will add $75 million to Precision Castparts' sales.
The Australian Defense Ministry has signed a contract with a team of Boeing Australia and Israel Aircraft Industries to supply I-View unmanned aircraft. The system will be used by the army's 132 Battery, 20th Surveillance and Target Acquisition Regiment. Service entry is planned for late 2009.
Airbus received type certification for the A380 powered by Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines. The European Aviation Safety Agency and FAA issued the type certificate concurrently in a ceremony at Airbus's home base of Toulouse. Certification of the A380 with the Engine Alliance GP7200-powered aircraft was scheduled for the summer, but that could change as Airbus now reviews what's to come in the flight test program.
The American Society of Aviation Artists joins with Aviation Week & Space Technology for the seventh year in presenting the art in this annual special issue. Aviation Week has selected its "Best of the Best" award winner and top choices for honors in the categories of Military, Commercial, General Aviation and Space from ASAA's 2006 Annual International Aerospace Art Exhibition. ASAA's own annual prize winners also are identified, as selected by the organization's judges.
Telenor of Norway has issued a request for proposals for a spacecraft to replace Thor 3, a 15-transponder telecom satellite launched in 1998. The higher-capacity replacement unit is to be launched in 2009, a year before Thor 3 is due to be retired.
NorM Siegel "Blue Sunset" Oil on Canvas 30 X 40 inches Welcome to Mars, where the daytime sky is red(ish) and the sunsets are blue(ish). The rover Spirit rests for the night before resuming its uphill trek to the summit of the Columbia Hills. Looking back behind Spirit is the floor of Gusev Crater.
China expects to begin construction this month of its planned fourth major hub airport, at Kunming in the south of the country. The airport will have an annual capacity of 20 million passengers and 600,000 tons of freight, with provision to expand it to 60 million passengers and 1.2 million tons. Shanghai, Guangzhou and Beijing airports are the other hubs.
A Thales-led team has been selected to develop an integrated real-time crisis management service for Europe's new Global Monitoring for Environment and Security system. The service, known as Osiris, will be one of three fast-track services to become available in 2008 as a prelude to full-scale GMES operations. The €11-million ($14.5-million) project will cover accidental air pollution in urban areas, unexpected water pollution in drainage basins, and forest fires.
French police have searched the offices of EADS as part of an investigation into insider trading. The offices of EADS shareholder Lagardere also were raided. Paris prosecutors opened a formal investigation several weeks ago after company executives unloaded shares shortly before problems with the A380 mega-transport came to light.
The U.K.'s Office of Fair Trade will ask the Competition Commission to review in depth the supply of air services, specifically the situation surrounding BAA's control over the industry. OFT has found that BAA controls 90% of passenger traffic in the south of England without competition and that airport investments without competition could be inefficient.
HARRIS CORP. SAYS IT'S ON TRACK TO FINISH nearly all of the FAA's Telecommunications Infrastructure (FTI) contract by the original deadline of next December, even though the program has been given a new "official" deadline of December 2008. The FTI project, which started in 2002, initially developed more slowly than the FAA expected, and a new baseline was established in 2005.
Nearly three years ago, President Bush announced a policy decision by which NASA was to return astronauts to the Moon and, later, send them on to Mars. At the time, we noted that President Reagan had set the same course in 1988. We re-endorsed the decision but cautioned: "NASA can ill afford another false start on Moon-Mars."
Susan J. Thornton has been appointed director of the Air Force Research Laboratory's Directed Energy Directorate, Kirtland AFB, N.M., effective Jan. 1. She has been director of engineering at the Airborne Laser Program System Program Office, also at Kirtland. Thornton will succeed L. Bruce Simpson, who is now at Eglin AFB, Fla.
Dave Pflieger has become senior vice president/general counsel of Virgin America. He was acting general counsel/vice president-operations control center and had been vice president-operations for Delta Air Lines' Song.
Maj. Gen. Jeffrey R. Riemer has become executive officer for the F-22 program in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition. He was commander of the Air Armament Center/program executive officer for weapons for Air Force Materiel Command, Eglin AFB, Fla. Riemer succeeds Maj. Gen. Richard Lewis, who is retiring.
Airbus this week is set to receive type certification for the A380, an important marker considering the program was near termination mere months ago. Tom Enders, EADS Co-CEO, revealed last week that the company would have had to consider canceling the A380 if flight testing revealed significant technical problems. It's the first time EADS has acknowledged such a possibility. "Luckily it never got that far," he says.
The STS-116 Discovery crew is to rewire the International Space Station this week pending favorable launch weather and a safe ascent with new engine technology and external tank modifications. The mission was set for a night liftoff at 9:36 p.m. EST Dec. 7.
The new industry getting underway to deliver paying customers to space won't be limited to the companies that actually build and fly complete spacecraft. Also in the wings are the companies that supply parts and pieces for the businesses that may one day become "majors" in the personal spaceflight industry.
Kudos once again for William B. Scott's terrific over-the-top (no pun intended) story describing first-hand his experience of flying in the Diamond with the Blue Angels. From strapping in to engine shutdown, as he took us through the show routine, I felt I was with him in the back seat of Blue Angel 7--the two-seat F/A-18B--flying the slot position; one could almost smell the JP-7 and feel the acceleration and g-forces.
In another move, Virgin Atlantic is planning to return to Chicago, after an absence of more than five years, with daily round-trip London service starting Apr. 23. Virgin will operate Airbus A340-300s and pit its Upper Class Suite service against daily offerings by archrival British Airways and against American Airlines and United Airlines, which hub at O'Hare International Airport. Upper Class amenities to be offered include an onboard bar, spa treatments inflight and complimentary limousine service to and from the airport.
