Taking on Southwest, AirTran Airways launched nonstop round-trip service between Indianapolis and Los Angeles International Airport May 9 and announced Indianapolis-San Francisco flights will begin June 7. Southwest Airlines serves both markets, the latter at Oakland. AirTran will operate one daily round trip in each pair, adding a second to LAX June 20. The carrier's other destinations from Indianapolis are Atlanta and five points in Florida.
A new Eurocontrol study suggests that higher than expected business aviation growth, and development patterns different from those for the airline industry, may require a reassessment of air traffic management and regulatory plans for the bizav sector. According to the study, released at the European Business Aviation Conference and Exhibition here May 3, European bizav traffic could experience 5% annual growth over the next decade, corresponding to an extra 1,800 business jets flights a day--in large part due to expected heavy demand for very light jets.
A Senate panel's recommendation to slash more than $1 billion from the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program is being pitched by lawmakers as a prudent measure to reduce risk in the program, but Capitol Hill insiders contend it's another move to gain leverage for additional defense budget reductions.
The British Defense Ministry is looking to a private contractor to provide national search-and-rescue helicopter services from 2012. At present the Royal Air Force, Royal Navy and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency provide SAR helicopters. A unified provision, funded through the government's private finance initiative, would replace these. Military personnel would still fly as part of the SAR service beyond 2012, though with helicopters and support from the private sector.
A preproduction Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter will undergo modifications during the next 90 days aimed at preparing the jet for first flight this autumn.
Cutthroat pricing and low margins are dramatically slowing the expansion of Indian aviation, which grew 25% in 2005. Capacity is increasing--19 aircraft were put into service by startup carriers from last October through March--but the country's notoriously inefficient airport infrastructure isn't being improved. Rising oil costs are adding a double burden because of high fuel taxes.
Europe appears headed for further streamlining of its guided missiles, land systems and naval systems sectors, with Germany at the forefront, and Berlin and Paris jockeying behind the scenes. The German government--which has adopted a hands-on policy toward its defense industry since the takeover of KDW, now part of ThyssenKrupp, by a U.S. private equity firm in late 2003--favors a German solution to prevent its midsize contractors from falling into the hands of U.S. giants like General Dynamics. This view is shared by France.
Two compelling videos compiled with imagery and other data from the descent to Titan by the European Space Agency Huygens lander give the viewer a sense of what it would have been like to ride on the spacecraft as it descended to the surface of Saturn's moon. The spacecraft sweeps over flat terrain and river valleys carved by liquid methane nearly a billion miles from Earth (see photo). The videos were made from about 3,500 images returned from Huygens during its 147-min. descent.
The Armed Services committees of both the House and Senate want to make one thing perfectly clear to the Pentagon: They're buying fighter jets, not pieces, parts or promises.
Two bombers participating in the recent Joint Expeditionary Force Experiment 2006 at Nellis AFB, Nev., demonstrated the value of sharing real-time radar and targeting pod imagery over an Internet-protocol data link. The Integrated Battlespace Collaborative Communications software tool was used to compress B-1 radar data and video imagery acquired by a B-52's Litening AT targeting pod, enhancing data-link efficiency by reducing bandwidth demands.
Alenia Aeronautica has signed a memorandum of agreement with the Czech Republic's Aero Vodochody, for the latter to be a major supplier for C-27J tactical transport aircraft production. The final contract is to be signed by the end of May and covers up to 350 center wing boxes, for an estimated value of more than $200 millions. The Czech air force is evaluating the C-27J to fulfill its requirement for a transport aircraft to support troops involved in peace-keeping missions.
Regarding the Viewpoint entitled "Are Personal Electronics a Threat to Aircraft?" (AW&ST Apr. 10, p. 58), the results of the excellent work done by Bill Strauss and his team only strengthen the findings from similar tests conducted by the National Tele- communications and Information Administration, in conjunction with the FAA, in the past four years. These tests included broadband and narrow-band emissions that caused interference to GPS, radars and other navaids.
France, Germany and the Netherlands will cooperate more closely on wind tunnel facilities management. The Dutch National Aerospace Laboratory (NLR) and German Aerospace Center (DLR) already were working together, and now their French counterpart (Onera) has joined to create the Aero Testing Alliance, which will be based in Noordoostpolder, The Netherlands, where NLR has a site. The three, along with the U.K., already cooperate on the European Transonic Wind Tunnel.
FlightSafety International will use two full-flight, electric-motion simulators for the initial phase of pilot training in the Cessna Citation Mustang jet, plus two avionics training devices for the Garmin G1000 package. One simulator will be delivered to FSI's Cessna Learning Center in Wichita, Kan., in the second quarter of 2007. The second device will be installed at FSI's London Farnborough Training Center, according to the company. A critical part of the overall training program will focus on a proficiency index that will be used to evaluate each pilot.
Nick Geer has been named chairman of Ottawa-based Nav Canada, succeeding R.A. (Sandy) Morrison, who is retiring. Geer is a former president/CEO of the Insurance Corp. of British Columbia. Also appointed were six new board members: Paul Brotto, Ernie Caron, Jim Gouk, John Lawson, Pierre Robitaille and Joel Whittemore.
Japanese space agency JAXA is recruiting Japanese companies and universities to build mini-satellites from 1-50 kg. (2-110 lb.) for launches on the H-IIA beginning in fiscal 2008. Launches will be free for spacecraft that either contribute to Japan's space development efforts or are educational. They won't be available for commercial experiments. The application deadline is Aug. 31, with a list of eligible candidates expected by Sept. 30.
Robert Wall (Paris), Michael Mecham (San Francisco)
After years of often difficult negotiations and several false starts, Russian entities are starting to emerge as productive suppliers to aerospace giants such as EADS and Boeing, fulfilling some of the promises Western companies foresaw when they began pursuing contacts in the region.
A Hybrid Launch Vehicle will be the subject of $2.5 million in studies and analysis programs awarded to Lockheed Martin and Andrews Space Inc. by the U.S. Air Force. The concept will be examined as part of the Operationally Responsive Space Initiative as a way to provide an affordable, quick, reliable and simple-to-operate system for launching tactical space assets and conventional satellites into low Earth orbit. Later, USAF will select two contractor teams to design demonstrators. A full-scale HLV is expected to be operational by 2018.
Jean-Louis Gergorin, vice president for strategic coordination at EADS, has asked to be relieved of his duties so he can defend himself in a graft inquiry scandal that is rocking the French government (AW&ST May 8, p. 28).
Aircraft engine technology efforts in the next couple of years will be instrumental in determining whether Europe will be able to meet stringent performance targets established for future generations of powerplants. The continuous stream of engine enhancements that emerged during the past decade suggests some of the ambitious European targets may be attainable, but maybe not all.
AirTran Holdings Inc. Chairman/CEO Joe Leonard has been named to receive the 2006 Tony Jannus Award by the Tony Jannus Distinguished Aviation Society. The award is named for the pilot recognized by the Smithsonian Institution as the founder of the world's first scheduled airline, which began flights on Jan. 1, 1914, and flew round trips daily between Tampa and St. Petersburg, Fla.
Pentagon acquisition chief Kenneth Krieg has signed off on a new program plan for the Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS), a family of interoperable, software-defined radios capable of mobile ad hoc networking on the battlefield. The program was restructured following technical delays and cost overruns that last year nearly cost Boeing its JTRS "Cluster 1" prime contract.
The start of the investigation into the May 3 crash of an Armavia Airbus A320 was hobbled by continued poor weather around the accident site. All 113 on board, including eight crew, died when the aircraft impacted the Black Sea about 6 km. (3.7 mi.) from the Russian Adler airport at the Sochi resort.
