Virgin Nigeria has begun a thrice-weekly Airbus A340-300 service between Murtala Mohammed International Airport in Lagos and London Gatwick. The airline previously operated a service to London Heathrow. Virgin Atlantic holds a 49% stake in the airline; the remainder is held by Nigerian institutional shareholders.
Program excellence and product innovation took center stage at Aviation Week & Space Technology's recent Aerospace & Defense Programs & Productivity conference in Phoenix, where several hundred industry and government executives gathered to examine the state of aerospace/defense industry--including critical acquisition, budgetary and technology trends.
Despite fuel prices, El Al Israel Airlines reports a $52.2-million net profit in the third quarter, compared to $47.4 million for the same quarter in 2004. Revenues for the quarter increased 17% to $485.2 million. The carrier's net profit of about $63 million for the first nine months was the highest compared with similar periods in the last decade. El Al had a cash balance at the end of the quarter of $249 million. Compared to 2004 results, North America revenues increased 19% in the quarter and 13% in January-September.
The first Brazilian sounding rocket launched from Sweden's Arctic range dropped its payload about 10 km. inside Norway, but otherwise performed as expected in a Dec. 1 microgravity experiment mission. Controllers aimed the Texus-EML rocket, based on a Brazilian VSB-30 motor, farther to the west than normal to avoid a reindeer herd. That, and the fact that the rocket flew about 8 km. higher than planned, sent the payload into an uninhabited region of Norway, where it was recovered.
Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. engineer Tim Towell checks the segmented glass mirror of a one-sixth-scale optical testbed designed to mature critical subsystems prior to a 2013 launch of the James Webb Space Telescope. Developed as a risk-reduction measure, the approximately $6-million testbed will help validate software and hardware associated with remotely "phasing" and actively controlling an 18-segment beryllium primary mirror once the telescope is in Earth orbit (see p. 64). Ball photo by Ken Hutchison.
An agreement between EADS Text & Services and Beta Air will reinforce EADS's ties with Russian industry. In an extension of a previous accord signed in 2004, the companies will jointly develop and market test systems and services based on Beta Air's ATE-200 and EADS's ATEC Series 6 to airlines in Russia and the CIS, who are increasingly turning to Western-built aircraft. Beta Air, formerly involved in the Be 200 amphibian aircraft program, claims to be the leading test supplier in Russia.
Information technology contracts awarded by the U.S. government were off 20% in 2005, even though overall IT spending increased slightly. The drop was due in part to the fact that more government departments are using existing contract vehicles for indefinite delivery and quantities to fill their IT needs. That means there were fewer open-market contracts this year, and thus less competition in the fast-moving government computer marketplace.
The Russian government is merging its helicopter industrial base in an effort to streamline operations. A watch is on to see which programs will emerge from the industrial shakeout. This partial re-nationalization of the industry has been brought about by shareholders in defense enterprises looking for government involvement to ensure the future of their business.
You can now register ONLINE for Aviation Week Events. Go to www.AviationNow.com/conferences or call Lydia Janow at +1 (212) 904-3225/+1 (800) 240-7645 ext. 5 (U.S. and Canada Only) Apr. 5-6--U.S. Defense Dept. Budgets and Programs Conference, Arlington, Va. Apr. 25-26--MRO Military Conference, Phoenix. Apr. 25-27--MRO USA Conference & Exhibition 2006, Phoenix. May 16-17--MRO Military Europe, in conjunction with ILA air show, Berlin. Sept. 19-21--MRO Asia Conference & Exhibition, Xiamen, China.
FAA Administrator Marion Blakey's call for federal mediation in contract talks with air traffic controllers is something their union says ignores the progress being made.
It was only a matter of time before Boeing selected the industry's other big supplier--Panasonic--to provide inflight entertainment (IFE) for the 787. Now comes the hard part for the Japanese electronics giant: delivering sufficient bandwidth for wireless audio, video and Internet services. Instead of wiring each seat to support IFE systems, Boeing wants the 200-300 seats in each aircraft unwired to save weight, reduce maintenance headaches and make it easier for airlines to change cabin configurations.
A U.S. government and contractor team is developing a novel wake-vortex detection system employing laser beams that "listen" to the acoustic signals generated primarily by aircraft wingtip vortices.
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NASA's Cassini probe has taken another look at Saturn's moon Enceladus, this time from a position that gives an idea of the scale of the fountains of pure-water vapor and ice particles erupting through vents at the tiny moon's south pole. Collected over the weekend of Nov. 26 with Cassini's narrow-angle camera, the views show several plumes of different sizes rising above the surface cracks dubbed "tiger stripes" noted in early images that cross an area about 20C warmer than expected.
James H. Tate has been named executive vice president/ chief administrative officer/chief financial officer of Timco Aviation Services Inc., Greensboro, N.C. He was senior vice president/CFO of the Thermadyne Holdings Corp. of St. Louis.
China's Civil Aviation Flight University in Guanghan has selected the Ascent FFSX full-flight simulator from Mechtronix Systems of Montreal for its Boeing 737NG pilot training services.
SES Americom's AMC-23 telecommunications satellite is set to launch on Dec. 6 on an ILS Proton Breeze M rocket. The 20 K u-band transponders on the C/K u-band spacecraft, to operate over the Pacific, will serve the Connexion by Boeing inflight broadband service.
EADS Space Services will supply K u-band satellite communications for the French navy under a new deal that marks the first time the navy has resorted to commercial capacity for its broadband requirements. The agreement, which covers the training vessels Jeanne d'Arc and Georges Leygues, is the third issued under a framework contract with EADS earlier this year, including at least one from the air force (AW&ST June 13, p. 192).
The James Webb Space Telescope--an infrared follow-on to the Hubble Space Telescope--won't launch until 2013, but Ball Aerospace & Technologies is accelerating critical work related to focusing the satellite's huge 18-segment, beryllium primary mirror in orbit.
The South African National Police Service is planning to beef up its air wing to handle border and sea patrol duties--assigned to the service last year--and prepare for the country's hosting of the 2009 Fed Cup and 2010 World Cup. A. H. Lamoer, who heads the force's operational response arm, says the air wing wants to add two helicopters and one fixed-wing aircraft per year through the end of the decade. Last week, the service took delivery of the first of four new AS 350 B3 Ecureuils--the 3,000th single-engine Ecureuil to come off the assembly line (see photo).
We love "little engine that could" stories from space, even though JAXA's Hayabusa odyssey to the asteroid Itokawa may not have a happy ending. We applaud the audacity of sending a spacecraft 200 million mi. to set down just long enough to take samples from a revolving asteroid and then bring them back to Earth. Who else but the Japanese, champions of the miniature, would build Minerva, a robot weighing just 21 oz., to sprint from Hayabusa, hop along the asteroid's surface and take pictures and temperature readings?
Delta Air Lines stands between a rock and a hard place. The pilots union will not meet the airline's plea for more concessions, and the airline will not accept the union's counteroffer. Now it's up to bankruptcy court to decide if Delta will void the pilot contract and impose its demands.
Recriminations are flying over the "failure" of the British Defense Ministry's Defense Aviation Repair Agency as senior politicians ponder the breakup of the six-year-old organization. The ministry's military aircraft and helicopter repair and maintenance agency's sites are either being shut or are under consideration for sale to the private sector (AW&ST Nov. 14, p. 30).
Eutelsat Communications is again poised to reenter the ranks of publicly traded satellite operators, following an unexpected relaunch of an initial public offering on the Paris Euronext stock exchange last week.
