Consolidation in the German air transport sector is progressing rapidly, as Air Berlin takes over rival DBA and strengthens its position in the competitive domestic market. The two carriers will comprise Germany's second-largest airline group behind Lufthansa. Air Berlin will also be able to significantly narrow the gap between it and Europe's leading low-fare airlines, Ryanair and EasyJet.
Portuguese carrier TAP has trimmed by 3 million euros ($3.85 million) its first-half losses over last year by improving the efficiency of its operations, but the airline still is solidly in the red with a 51-million-euro loss. Around 12 million euros of that is because of exchange-rate problems with the euro compared to the Brazilian real and the dollar. Nevertheless, airline management maintains its projection to be in the black by year-end.
U.S. aerospace industry orders, shipments and backlog are at record-setting paces, if trends set in the first half of 2006 continue. Toting up this year's data, the Aerospace Industries Assn. reports that civil aviation and defense products booked $116 billion in orders. Projecting this rounded number to an annual figure of $233 billion, the AIA says such a pace would exceed last year's record $219 billion. Similarly, first-half shipments of $88 billion could reach $177 billion if current rates persist. Last year's total shipments were a record at $162 billion.
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Market Focus 19 Embraer future bright as company secures niche News Breaks 26 Gulfstream G150 business jet enters service 27 Rollout in Taiwan for Boeing Large Cargo Freighter 29 First flight for EA-18G Growler electronic attack aircraft 30 Boeing pulling plug on Connexion inflight services World News & Analysis 32 Israel examines military's roles, missions and technology during lull
Gulfstream Aerospace Corp.'s G150 mid-size cabin business jet entered service Aug. 14 in Dallas. A second production airplane is scheduled for delivery next month. Powered by two Honeywell TFE731-40AR engines, the G150 is an upgraded version of the G100, which evolved from the Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI) Astra series. Gulfstream introduced the G150 in September 2002. First flight was in May 2005. Dual certification by the Israeli Civil Aviation Administration and the FAA was achieved last November.
Lufthansa Technik has inked a support-services agreement with Russia's Ural Airlines. The carrier next month expects delivery of its first Airbus A320. Two A320s are to go to Ural in September, followed by four more next year. The support arrangement for the six aircraft is to run five years.
With command of a third of India's domestic market and a growing number of regional routes, Jet Airways expects to open flights to the U.S. and China next year using Airbus A330-300s and Boeing 777-300ERs. The U.S. routes will make connections through such European cities as Zurich or Frankfurt, says Jet Airways CEO Wolfgang Prock-Schauer. Next April, Jet Airways will begin taking delivery of 10 A330-300s and 10 777-300ERs. The Boeing aircraft were financed via the U.S. Exim Bank.
The GOES-N meteorological satellite launched May 24, now called GOES-13, has transmitted its first visible and infrared images using ITT Space Systems primary payload instruments.
Raytheon is teaming with Rannoch Corp. of Alexandria, Va., in pursuit of the FAA's Automatic Dependent Surveillance Broadcast (ADS-B) contract, which one FAA official has described as the biggest game in town when it comes to agency agreements. Eric Rolfe, the Raytheon team leader, notes that Rannoch has a lot of experience with the technology and a large international presence in the ADS-B market. Rannoch recently completed a combination ADS-B and multilateration surveillance system to cover the airspace over the Taiwan Strait.
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Harken back to the Swissair MD-11 accident with cockpit smoke, off the coast of Canada (AW&ST Sept. 7, 1998, p. 77). The consensus after the crash was to land the airplane, rather than orbit and troubleshoot the problem. Now substitute the Airbus A380. Where does it land? If a passenger requires immediate hospital medical aid, how does that work out? Who wants a plane that cannot use the majority of airports and runways? This is akin to the U.S.
The Joint Planning and Development Office (JPDO)--the multi-agency organization that is trying to craft a 21st century aviation system for the U.S.--has made a persuasive case that the current air traffic control model of separating planes by hand is not scalable. Hence, without changing to a network-centric model, we will be unable to double or triple the system's capacity over the next 20 years. And if we don't at least double capacity, aviation faces a future of ever-increasing congestion and rationing.
Israeli security specialists maintain that the most important thing in preventing terrorism attacks on civil aircraft is to interview the passengers. "That's the only possibility of direct contact with the source to define his level of suspiciousness and danger. This is the basis of all human intelligence work," says Leo Glesser, president of the Israeli security consultancy ISDS Ltd. Glesser was one of the first sky marshals to work on Israeli airline aircraft, and he notes he was trained by Americans many years ago.
Boeing's 50-50 joint venture with VSMPO-Avisma for machined titanium forgings will not run afoul of the State Dept.'s sanctions against the Russian company's new owners because of arms sales to Iran, according to a company official. Boeing Commercial Airplanes has been buying from VSMPO for nine years. The Russian company is Boeing's single largest titanium supplier, providing some 40% of its forgings. VSMPO is also a major supplier for Airbus.
The Pentagon has switched control over its operations related to Lebanon from the U.S. Central Command, which oversaw evacuations of U.S. personnel last month, to the U.S. Euro- pean Command. Eucom is establishing Joint Task Force-Lebanon, which will be headquartered on the USS Mount Whitney. The move frees up Centcom capacity to focus again on its primary missions--Iraq and Afghanistan.
Thomas Reiter of Germany, the first European Space Agency astronaut to join a long-duration expedition on the International Space Station, has set a new European space-endurance record. On Aug. 4, the 30 days he had spent on the ISS, plus the time he spent in 1995-96 on Russia's Mir space station, pushed Reiter over the record of 209 days, 12 hr. and 25 min. held by Jean-Pierre Haignere, also of ESA. Reiter already holds the distinction of being the first ESA astronaut to conduct an extravehicular activity from the ISS (AW&ST Aug. 7, p. 22).
Rolls-Royce says its Trent 900 engines powering the Airbus A380 withstood the severe environment during recent hot-weather trials in Abu Dhabi. The week-long test period included takeoffs at temperatures up to 47C, at thrust levels up to 80,000 lb., the maximum certified power output, the engine maker says. The company logged 120 engine hours during the course of the 12 flights. The Trent 900 will be used to power the first in-service A380 to be delivered to Singapore Airlines this year.
Over the next four years astronauts and the engineers and controllers who back them up from the ground will try to double the size of the International Space Station, adding as many as five pressurized modules and three more large solar arrays to power them. It won't be easy, but the lessons learned in the process probably will be applied on the Moon and Mars one day.
Pentagon plans to take manned aircraft from Air National Guard units and replace them with UAVs are expected to become a reality by year's end. An initial group of crews from the California ANG's 163rd Air Refueling Wing, which has operated KC-135s, has been flying missions in Iraq from cockpits at Nellis AFB, Nev. The 163rd has sent 13 crews, each comprising a pilot and a sensor operator, through MQ-1 Predator training at Creech AFB, Nev. They are now flying combat for the 15th Reconnaissance Squadron.
L-3 Communications will purchase Cincinnati-based Nova Engineering for about $45 million in cash, plus an additional sum up to $10 million, based on the company's future performance. Nova, which produces network-centric warfare systems, expects to post annual sales of about $40 million in 2006.
Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) engineers are making final preparations at the Uchinoura Space Center near Kagoshima for the planned Sept. 22 launch of the Solar-B spacecraft on an M-5 solid-propellant booster. Solar-B is a sophisticated observational satellite equipped with three advanced solar telescopes. Its solar optical telescope is designed to have unprecedented 0.2 arc-sec. resolution for observing solar magnetic fields. With this capability, it could resolve 50-cm. features if pointed toward Earth instead of the Sun.
James J. Duffy has become executive vice president-human resources for the New York-based CIT Group Inc. He was senior vice president-human resources for Citigroup's Global Consumer Group.
A shift in Defense Dept. focus and the development of advanced airborne sensor packages just might provide the U.S. military with a platform that has eluded the Pentagon for decades--a dedicated aircraft fleet mix especially designed and deployed for counter-insurgency operations.
All business-class airline MAXjet is moving closer to expanding its transatlantic network after reaching an agreement in principle to acquire two additional Boeing 767-200ERSs from Air Mauritius. When they are added to the MAXjet fleet, the airline will have five 767-200ERs operating in scheduled and charter service (AW&ST July 31, p. 50). The airline has two aircraft operating to London Stansted from New York-JFK and Washington-Dulles. The third is to start flying in MAXjet's charter service next month.
