A top U.S. intelligence official says the nation can't afford to lose congressional funding of Space-Based Radar, Global Hawk unmanned aircraft or the E-10 multi-sensor intelligence-gathering aircraft.
Powerful electronic pulses will be a key weapon in the battle against enemy command, control and communication networks, but they also threaten the U.S. systems that will launch these thunderbolts.
Like the fictional baseball field in the boondocks that attracts a large crowd--"Build it and they will come"--a new runway will breed airplanes eventually, if not during an industry downturn. That's the view of FAA and local officials as capacity-enhancing runways are opening in the next six months at three Midwest airports among the FAA's top 35 busiest. At each--Minneapolis-St. Paul International, Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International, and Lambert-St. Louis International--scheduled flights are, paradoxically, in decline.
I'd like to set the record straight, for all the NASA and space shuttle bashers. No NASA employee can say this, because it would be career suicide in a Republican-dominated leadership.
Pakistan is preparing to buy an undisclosed number of Swedish Erieye airborne early warning systems, under a $1-billion deal. The Ericsson radar system would be mounted on Saab 2000 turboprops.
Tom Byrd (see photos) has become director of program management for government business and Mike Turner senior manager of media relations for the Raytheon Aircraft Co., Wichita, Kan. Byrd was director of strategic customer solutions for BAE Systems Sensor Integration, Austin, Tex. Turner was an account strategist for Sullivan Higdon & Sink.
A contract dispute among its organizers has raised the question of whether Singapore will remain home to Asia's best-known air show. The 13th Asian Aerospace will take place as scheduled next Feb. 21-26 and has attracted the usual level of national delegations from the U.S., France, the U.K., Israel, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and, of course, Singapore.
Mechtronix Systems, a small Canadian company that builds flight simulators based on simplified microprocessor technology, has snared C$8 million ($6.8 million) in venture capital. The money is earmarked to expand its manufacturing facilities in Montreal and further extend its marketing to China, Latin America and Eastern Europe.
NASA's recent announcement that the space shuttle would make only 18 more flights to the International Space Station (ISS), leaving much of the hardware of our international partners on the ground, should be the death knell of this long-running boondoggle (AW&ST Oct. 3, p. 25).
The 22 members of the Latin American airlines association Aital reported carrying 6.9 million passengers in August, a 14.7% increase compared with August 2004 and 10.7% compared with July. From January to August, 4.2 million domestic and 2.7 million Aital carriers transported 51 million passengers, a 15.1% increase from the year-before period. Revenue passenger kilometers were up 12.8% to 81.0 billion. Year-to-date load factor reached 71%, 2.3 percentage points higher than the 2004 period.
The $30.8-billion Homeland Security Dept. appropriations bill signed by President Bush last week disperses $933 million to the Coast Guard to upgrade or replace aging ships and aircraft. The Fiscal 2006 spending bill also allocates $4.6 billion to the Transportation Security Administration for aviation security but cut funding for the TSA's Secure Flight computerized passenger-screening program to $56.7 billion. The spending bill also includes transfer of the Federal Air Marshals Service back to TSA from Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Linda A. Mills (see photos) has become vice president-operations and processes for the Northrop Grumman Corp.'s Information Technology Sector, McLean, Va. She was vice president-mission assurance/Six Sigma for Northrop Grumman's Mission Systems Sector. Mills has been succeeded by Kelley Zelickson, who was MSS vice president of ground-based midcourse defense programs.
American Eurocopter will convert 11 HH-65B helicopters to the HH-65C configuration for the U.S. Coast Guard. The work will center on installation of the Arriel 2C2 turboshaft engines with digital controls, and will be conducted at the company's facilities in Columbus, Miss.
Alan Doherty has been named vice-president-sales and marketing and John-Pierre Poulet commercial director for global component services for Messier Services International, Velizy, France. Dave Knight has become commercial director for Messier Services in Europe, based in Gloucester, England.
Michael R. Boyce has been appointed to the board of directors of the AAR Corp., Wood Dale, Ill. He is chairman/CEO of the PQ Corp. and Peak Investments.
John Patterson has been appointed a non-executive director of U.K.-based Cobham plc. He is executive director of development at AstraZeneca. Pete Rabey has been named director of group strategy and Martin Burgess group director of human resources. Rabey was a partner in the aerospace and defense practice of McKinsey and Co., while Burgess was vice president-human resources for the Flowserve Corp.
Nancy Jackson and John DeBassige, who work at the Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, N.M., have been selected for honors in the Second Annual Professional of the Year awards from the American Indian Science and Engineering Society. Jackson was named to receive the Professional of the Year Award and DeBassige the Most Promising Engineer/Scientist Award.
French arms maker TDA is becoming a wholly owned Thales subsidiary, after agreeing to buy EADS's 50% stake for an undisclosed sum. The deal should close before year-end. TDA had a turnover of 90 million euros ($108 million) last year, 50% from exports. Thales says the deal gives it "strategic independence" to cooperate with other European weapons makers. The unit will become part of Thales's Land & Joint Systems Div.
U.S. aerospace contractors have begun rolling out their earnings reports for the quarter ended Sept. 30, and Wall Street is not disappointed. Analysts' assessments were filled with phrases such as "classic quality performance," "the momentum continues," "another solid quarter" and "above expectations."
Getting close to targets--for example, with 2-ft.-wingspan UAVs carrying payloads sophisticated enough to monitor, jam, damage or infiltrate enemy communications--is less than a decade away.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last week finalized agreements with 24 U.S. airlines to implement new protocols for testing and disinfecting water on passenger aircraft. The protocols are aimed at protecting public health while EPA and other federal agencies step up efforts to develop new rules for potable water on aircraft. They include quarterly disinfection of water delivery systems, increased monitoring of water supply and alerting passengers when water does not meet EPA standards.
Frank Morring, Jr. and Michael Mecham (Fukuoka, Japan)
NASA may be getting itself into a cost bind down the road with its shuttle-derived back-to-the-Moon approach, critics say. Transportation costs alone to support a lunar outpost could reach $7-11 billion a year under NASA's current exploration plan, based on the cost experience with shuttle. And relying on a shuttle-derived heavy-lift rocket to put an entire lunar expedition, minus the crew, into low Earth orbit is riskier--if not cheaper--than breaking the mission into several launches.
There is a "high likelihood" the U.S. Army will have to abandon the Embraer ERJ 145 as the host platform for the Aerial Common Sensor, according to service acquisition chief Claude Bolton. This runs counter to recent hopeful statements by Army Secretary Francis Harvey, who told reporters earlier this month the program could still be executed within its $879-million development cost. Lawmakers, however, suggest that figure could more than double to $1.8 billion. The comments came Oct.
The Japanese government hopes for a breakthrough in so-called "2-plus-2" talks among senior defense and foreign-relations officials, set to begin Oct. 29 in Washington, on the contentious issue of a basing realignment for U.S. forces in Japan. The biggest sticking point has been relocation of the U.S. Marines helicopter base at Futenma on Okinawa. The Japanese want a civilian/military airfield at Camp Schwab at Nago, Okinawa, but the two sides have been hung up over where to locate the airport and base housing.
