I read with amazement the letters belittling the accomplishments of Burt Rutan and SpaceShipOne (AW&ST July 26, p. 6). Rutan is destined to be remembered as one of the most talented aeronautical designers and engineers of his time.
As a 777 captain flying nonstop New York-Hong Kong and Tokyo routes, I read with interest your article on ultra-long-range ops (AW&ST July 5, p. 40). Economics is why my airline uses type-rated first officers to fill my seat while I rest in the crew bunk. At issue is the legal view you presented that I be held accountable for the errors that may occur while I engage in a legal rest period. Although I have the highest confidence in my crews, it seems incredulous that any authority could prosecute me for actions that occurred while I was sleeping.
USAF Lt. Gen. (ret.) Charles Coolidge, Jr. (see photos), has been named vice president-Air Force programs for EADS North America and U.S. Army Lt. Col. (ret.) Norbert H. Fortier director of Army transport aircraft programs for EADS CASA North America. Coolidge was vice commander of Air Force Materiel Command, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio. Fortier was rotary wing branch chief for the Maritime and Rotary Wing Program Executive Office of the U.S. Special Operations Command.
BAE Systems will begin system design and development of the Tactical Signals Intelligence Payload (TSP) for the U.S. Army. The $27-million, three-year contract is focused on developing a subsystem to be used on Shadow-200 tactical unmanned aircraft. BAE Systems says TSP will use a scalable approach that could be adapted to other platforms.
For all the naysayers of the Burt Rutan/Paul Allen SpaceShipOne, the impact of disruptive innovations should not be underestimated. The Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton Christensen summarizes well--"Generally disruptive innovations were technologically straightforward, consisting of off-the-shelf components put together in a product architecture that was often simpler than prior approaches. They offered less of what customers in established markets wanted and so could rarely be initially employed there.
American Airlines has agreed to pay a $3-million civil penalty to settle a U.S. Justice Dept. claim that the carrier violated the terms of a 1994 consent decree that targeted illegal fare signaling among airlines. Communications between airlines on fares and other competitive factors are illegal under antitrust laws, and the consent decree settled a 1992 suit charging that American and other carriers sent signals to each other through fare filings. The Justice Dept.
British Airways posted a 150-million-pound ($275-million) operating profit on 1.9 billion pounds in revenues for the first quarter of its 2004-05 fiscal year. "These are reasonable results," Chief Executive Rod Eddington says. However, soaring fuel prices are a concern despite a surcharge added to all long-haul fares. Nonpremium markets are highly price-sensitive, and lower yields in the next several months are expected to be "more than offset" by increasing traffic but further lowering costs is a prerequisite to sustainable profitability, BA executives stress.
Lockheed Martin delivered the first payload for the Space-Based Infrared System High (SBIRS High) program to Northrop Grumman for placement of payload sensors. The payload is intended for integration with a host satellite and eventual launch in a highly elliptical Earth orbit. SBIRS provides expanded capabilities for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (IRS) missions as well as tactical and strategic missile warning worldwide.
The Air Line Pilots Assn. says Northwest Airlines responded negatively toward its unique contract offer that would establish a new career path to the mainline cockpit. Northwest officials would not comment on either the airline's or the union's proposal. In recent weeks ALPA proposed an exclusive pay and benefits system for 70-seat-aircraft pilots and suggested that the 70-seaters serve as the career entry point for new-hires and affiliated pilots (AW&ST Aug. 2, p. 28).
The impact of high fuel prices on airline performance continues to worry Wall Street. As the oil futures price topped out at $44.60 per barrel, Michael Linenberg of Merrill Lynch started questioning carrier plans to boost capacity in coming months. He singled out weakened Delta Air Lines, which projected a 7% capacity gain in the second half of the year. Linenberg recognizes that legacy airlines such as Delta are trying to protect market share, fighting against the growing incursion of low-cost operators.
Tony H. Smith, Sr., has been named vice president-operations and finance for the Ohio Aerospace Institute in Cleveland. He was chief financial officer of Ideastream.
Testers from the Global Power Fighters Combined Test Force at Edwards AFB, Calif., have completed the first accelerated testing in qualifying the Block 30 F-16 to carry the GBU-38 500-lb. Joint Direct Attack Munition. The release of three inert bombs was made by the 416th Flight Test Sqdn. at the China Lake, Calif., range. Operational and developmental testing was completed in 30 days.
It's certainly not something anyone wants to advertise at a time when outsourcing looms as a hot-button election-year issue, but sending work outside the company--and outside the country, perhaps--appears to be one area in the aerospace and defense industry in line for strong growth. It's not the high-profile practice of shipping manufacturing work overseas that's at issue, it's more subtle outsourcing processes of large companies, such as enterprise-wide procurement, by which items that are deemed non-core are being shifted from in-house work.
Optimism among major European airlines for a quick recovery is fading, as stubbornly high fuel prices and falling yields continue to erode operating margins.
Like American Airlines 18 months ago, Delta Air Lines and US Airways are nearing the brink of a Chapter 11 bankruptcy-protection filing. And like American, which stayed solvent, the outcome at Delta and US Airways probably will turn on last-minute actions by their labor unions.
The U.S. government has awarded Arlington, Tex.-based VirTra Systems a General Services Administration listing for its proprietary immersive virtual reality (IVR) counterterrorism technology. The award, a first for the use of patented technology, will enable VirTra Systems' products to be sold directly to any federal agency without competitive bidding. The company is expected to deliver its latest IVR counterterrorism simulator to the U.S. Air Force at the end of this month.
Northrop Grumman has been chosen to provide support services to the RAF's Boeing E-3D Sentry airborne warning and control system aircraft for up to 21 years. The whole-life support program is anticipated as being worth 650 million pounds ($1.19 billion) over the length of the contract. Northrop Grumman, which recently lost out to Thales on the U.K.'s Watchkeeper surveillance UAV program, was competing with Boeing for the E-3D work.
Ryanair has no relationship with Singapore-based Tiger Airways (AW&ST July 26, p. 17). The airline advises it is the Ryan family that holds a stake in the low-fare startup.
CESSNA AIRCRAFT CO. HAS BEGUN PRODUCING tooling and detail parts for the first Citation Mustang entry-level business jet. More than 3,600 parts have already been made for the prototype and the ground test article, according to Cessna. Plans call for the airplane to make its first flight in the second quarter of 2005. A company official says 80% of the suppliers have been chosen and the remaining 20% will be selected by year-end.
THE NEW PIPER AIRCRAFT INC. PLANS TO OFFER the Avidyne FlightMax Entegra glass cockpit on the retractable-gear Arrow and the fixed-gear Archer III and the entry-level Warrior III piston-powered airplanes. The Entegra system features two high-resolution color displays--one for primary flight information and another that depicts a moving map with terrain information as well as engine systems status. The University of Oklahoma's aviation department recently ordered 13 Warriors for flight training, including two with the Entegra system.
International Space Station crewmen were due to receive a fresh load of supplies early Saturday after the Wednesday launch of a Russian Progress cargo vehicle from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Progress M-50 carried 3,086 lb. of dry cargo, as well as fuel, oxygen, air and potable water. The two-man Expedition 9 ISS crew--Commander Gennady Padalka and Flight Engineer Mike Fincke--had earlier cleared the Zvezda Service Module axial docking port by sending the Progress M-49 vehicle toward a controlled reentry over the Pacific.
Airbus has awarded Indian government-owned defense company Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. (HAL) an $84.4-million order for 1,000 shipsets of forward passenger doors for the aircraft in the A320 family. HAL is also manufacturing doors and other parts for the 737, 757, 767 and 777. By 2006-07, HAL plans to roll out six Su-30 MKIs with the raw materials and radars, stabilizers and wings of the aircraft outsourced and manufactured locally.
By the early summer of 1959, my friend Murray, an ex-F-86 fighter jock fresh from the Royal Canadian Air Force, and I, a furloughed Canadian C-46 copilot, were newly graduated crop-dusters.
Crews of two Avro regional jets operated by Lufthansa CityLine and Swiss International Air Lines had to declare emergencies earlier this month. On Aug. 7, CityLine's RJ85 flight LH 5388 from Frankfurt to Graz, Austria, was on approach to Graz when the first officer discovered that neither ailerons nor elevators reacted to his control inputs after disconnecting the autopilot. The captain took over and steered the aircraft normally from his side. After a while, the crew discovered that controls were back to normal on the first officer's side, too.
Virgin Blue was a pioneer in discount air services for the Asia-Pacific region, which is putting its own stamp on the genre. These low-cost carriers are not all the same in their levels of service, but they are all shaking up the airline establishment (see p. 40). Gavin Ashard photo.
