The Asian discounter is starting to roar as increasingly nervous legacy carriers--burdened with high overheads, escalating fuel bills and shrinking margins--start to reengineer business models to adapt to the new cutthroat price arena. Looking to curtail costs, legacy carriers are mulling alliances in order to combine training and maintenance. Recently, Qantas and Singapore Airlines (SIA) held talks about sharing facilities, including hangar costs, simulators and training for the A380.
The Joint Helmet Mounted Cuing System has entered full-rate production following its combat-proven performance in Iraq, as U.S. military and contractors work on additional uses and upgrades. A two-seat fighter installation and new wide-view night-vision capability are being scrutinized.
USAF Brig. Gen. Ronald R. Ladnier has been appointed director of logistics readiness/deputy chief of staff for installations and logistics at USAF Headquarters. He has been commandant of the Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, Ala. He will be succeeded by Brig. Gen. (select) Randal D. Fullhart, who has been commander of the College of Aerospace Doctrine, Research and Education, also at Maxwell AFB.
America West has firmed up its May commitment to order 10 Airbus A320s and seven A319s. The Phoenix-based carrier will also lease four and either buy or lease a fifth aircraft from the A320 family. All America West A320s are to be powered by IAE V2500 engines, according to Airbus. Deliver-ies are to begin in late 2005 and continue through 2006.
Congress has approved $21 million for research and development of Polartec garments made of electronic textiles for providing remote physiological monitoring of soldiers in combat. Funding also will pay for programs such as Army's extended cold-weather clothing, Marine Corps mountain cold-weather clothing and Navy multi-climate protection gear. The R&D funding will be used to design clothes that monitor and transmit soldiers' pulse, blood pressure, body temperature and location to medics.
Raytheon Aircraft's T-6A will be part of the protective air mission at the 2004 Summer Olympic Games going on now through Aug. 29 in Greece. The T-6A, which serves the Hellenic Air Force as a primary trainer and also introduces students to weapons delivery, will patrol over Olympic venues. The T-6A is part of a worldwide flotilla of aircraft dedicated to security detail.
Boeing Rocketdyne technicians are preparing to ship the first space shuttle main engine (SSME) fully assembled at the Kennedy Space Center to the Stennis Space Center, Miss., for testing. Until now, all SSMEs were assembled at Rocketdyne facilities in Canoga Park, Calif. But now, to save costs, individual Rocketdyne and Pratt & Whitney SSME components are being shipped to Kennedy for assembly there before forwarding to Stennis for preflight static firings.
In an unprecedented move, Italian aviation officials are asking foreign carriers to stop undercutting Alitalia's intercontinental fares. Ente Nazionale Aviazione Civile (ENAC) has requested nearly 40 airlines to abandon "predatory" fares and align with Alitalia's prices. ENAC's primary goal is to ban so-called sixth-freedom low fares, such as British Airways' attractive prices on Rome-New York via London. Italian officials say the competition's low fares are further aggravating Alitalia's dire financial straits.
The A380's four electrical power generators and auxiliary power unit are being tested at Airbus' Toulouse facilities. The first power-on tests will be followed in the next few months by hydraulic and engine power-ups.The mega-transport is scheduled to fly in early 2005, and its first public appearance is planned for the June 13-19 Paris air show.
Applications engineer Jay Eastman observes the action of a laser weld-bond, a materials joining technology developed at the Edison Welding Institute (EWI) of Columbus, Ohio. The technology combines laser spot welding with adhesive bonding and has shown promise for use in aircraft manufacturing. The concept originated with Piper Malibu designer James Griswold. EWI research has been funded by NASA's Small Aircraft Transportation Systems (SATS) Program, specifically the Michigan MI SATS program.
Japanese researchers have tested two different thin films in a sounding rocket test of solar sail technology. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS) launched the experiment Aug. 9 on an S-310 sounding rocket from the Uchinoura Space Center, deploying two 7.5-micrometer thin-film configurations once the vehicle reached space. The first, roughly shaped like a cloverleaf, deployed after 100 sec. of flight at 122 km. altitude. It was jettisoned after opening, and a fan-shaped film was deployed at 169 km., after 230 sec.
Senior Space Technology Editor Frank Morring, Jr., (right) levitates on NASA's KC-135A reduced gravity aircraft during a flight dedicated to experiments designed by college undergraduates. With him is John Yaniec, lead KC-135 test director at Johnson Space Center in Houston. NASA will retire the KC-135A this fall and begin using a modified U.S. Navy C-9 to test hardware designed for microgravity, train astronauts and offer students a chance to sample one of the more exciting aspects of a career at NASA (see p. 31).
An unseasonably mild Washington summer will give way to a hot September and beyond for NASA on Capitol Hill, where the agency faces tough questions on several fronts. Hearings are tentatively scheduled on whether the International Space Station is safe enough for human occupancy, and on exactly how the agency plans to get the surviving space shuttles back in orbit.
The Pentagon is making a major push to advance the technology for very small unmanned vehicles that would support platoon-size ground elements. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is initiating a multi-year development of an Organic Air Vehicle (OAV), a 112-lb., ducted-fan unmanned aircraft that could operate even in cluttered airspace. The effort is a follow-on to a three-year demonstration program of a smaller system.
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There are "no showstoppers" in using the Soyuz launch pad planned for the European Space Center at Kourou, French Guiana, to send astronauts and cosmonauts to the International Space Station.
Northrop Grumman has named its team to compete for the five-year, $9-billion Netcents program that is to provide the U.S. Air Force, Defense Dept. and other federal agencies with information technology services. Among the 10 large and 24 small partners are Computer Sciences Corp., SAIC, Dell Inc., Verizon Communi-cations and AT&T in the U.S., and Siemens AG and T-Systems in Germany. The award is scheduled to be announced next month.
Scientists and engineers at the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory are examining technologies that could result in the development of supersonic combustion ramjets 10 times larger than existing ground test demonstrators. "We know how to make our current two-dimensional scramjet work, and it seems that it's good enough to fly and validate our technologies. It's also the right size for the hypersonic cruise missile mission," Bob Mercier said. He's the deputy for technology in AFRL's aerospace propulsion division here.
AT THE ABYSS: An Insider's History of the Cold War By Thomas C. Reed Presidio Press; a Ballantine Books Div. 368 pp., Hardcover ($25.95) From nuclear weapon designer to U.S. Air Force secretary and national security policy advisor for President Ronald Reagan, Thomas Reed was an inside player throughout the Cold War. In At the Abyss, he recounts many previously untold stories about a multi-decade, toe-to-toe standoff with the Soviet Union--and just how close the world came to all-out nuclear war.
German CH-53 heavy-lift helicopters operating in Afghanistan will be fitted with an EADS missile warning system. The German military procurement agency is initially buying six AAR-60 Missile Launch Detection suites. A decision on whether to expand the program to more of the CH-53 fleet is expected in the near future, according to EADS.
Air Line Pilots Assn. President Duane E. Woerth and ALPA Inter-national President-Canada Kent Hardisty have requested a fall meeting with the new Canadian transport minister, Jean Lapierre.
There is surely deja vu for European and American airline executives reading our stories this week about the growth of "the Southwest effect" in the Asia-Pacific region (see p. 40). But just as the European model for low-fare carriers was only an adaptation of what America pioneered, so the Asia-Pacific model will find its own way. To begin with, one will talk about discount markets--plural--in Asia far more than in Europe and the U.S.
I can't agree more with Ray Erikson and Philippe Cauchi (AW&ST Aug. 2, p. 6) encouraging Boeing to start selling its model 717 more aggressively. As a frequent-flier, my schedule is framed around avoiding the smaller, cramped regional jets of Bombardier and Embraer. These RJs were made to bring speed and comfort to replace the Metroliners, Saab 340 and others on 1-hr. flights from outlying cities to major hubs. Instead they are becoming aircraft de jour flying between major cities and sometimes on nearly transcontinental runs.
Experiments in the Nevada desert are using unmanned aircraft to find the exact location of enemy electronic emissions, such as the mobile phone of a terrorist in a fast-moving auto. U.S. Air Force researchers say they've been able to locate such targets, as well as mobile missile systems, within tens of meters and often in less than a minute, which makes them vulnerable to attack before they can flee surveillance.
