Philippe Richard has been appointed director of strategy and commercial affairs of the Onera French aerospace research agency. He was managing director of the Vaisala Thunderstorm Business Div.
Southwest Airlines announced its final big service expansion for 2004, 13 daily nonstops out of its newest destination, Philadelphia, and nine more in other existing markets, all starting on Oct. 31. The Philadelphia growth brings total service there to 41 flights per day, essentially reaching the capacity of the four gates it currently controls only six months after adding the point to its route map. Three destinations from Philadelphia are new--Hartford, Conn., with five flights per day, and Jacksonville, Fla., and Oakland, Calif., one apiece.
The NASA Messenger spacecraft is ready for launch to Mercury on a mission researchers hope will unravel why the closest planet to the Sun is so dramatically different from its siblings--Earth, Venus and Mars--all born from the same solar nebula 5 billion years ago. The NASA/Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) spacecraft is to lift off here Aug. 2 at 2:16 a.m. EDT on a Boeing Delta II Heavy booster.
Eurocopter and Tusas Aerospace Industries of Turkey will expand cooperation to make TAI the center of excellence and sole source of supply for selected aerostructures intended for the EC225/727 Cougar/Super Puma upgrade. The Turkish company is already delivering fuselage sections, tail booms, canopies, cargo floors and cowlings for Cougar models under the previous Phenix 2 program.
The Registrar Accreditation Board has authorized National Quality Assurance, an Acton, Mass.-based provider of management systems registration services, to certify companies to the new AS9003 standard. AS9003 applies primarily to aerospace subcontractors that receive outsourced orders from primes. Companies represented in the task group for the standard include Boeing, Rolls-Royce, Vought and Honeywell.
Fuel costs and low yields are hurting all the big U.S. network airlines, but labor concessions--in effect, in negotiation and not yet in play--will shape the carriers' attempts to survive and recover.
The Carlyle Group has signed an agreement with General Electric to acquire Garrett Aviation Services. Plans call for combining Garrett, which specializes in aftermarket engineering, maintenance, overhaul and avionics services, with Piedmont Hawthorne, a major fixed base operator in North America. The transaction is scheduled to close in the third quarter of this year. Frank Klaus, president of Garrett, will become CEO for the joint company.
The answers to one mystery have raised another for the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). Tests with a solid rocket motor originally assembled for the eighth mission of the H-IIA confirmed JAXA's hypothesis that a defective nozzle design caused the booster-casing burn-through blamed in the launch failure of the sixth H-IIA last year. Tests at the Tanegashima launch center showed a burn-through 51 sec. after ignition that punched a hole 35 in. long and 3.5 in. wide in the nozzle wall.
ALL NIPPON AIRWAYS has ordered 45 shipsets of 737-700 winglets from Aviation Partners Boeing for delivery beginning in October 2005. The winglets are designed to improve fuel efficiency and reduce takeoff noise.
The FAA needs better management controls to improve its safety enforcement and compliance efforts, and the safety of airline passengers hangs in the balance, according to a General Accountability Office analysis. The GAO reported that the agency closed 53% of nearly 200,000 enforcement actions in the 1993-2003 fiscal years through administrative actions, such as warning notices, and 28% through legal sanctions, such as fines. Administrative actions included those made in response to airline and pilot self-reported violations under FAA partnership programs.
Pressing the case for airline tax relief, Continental adds to its quarterly financial reports a total of taxes and fees it paid out, in effect reducing its revenue. CEO Gordon Bethune thinks it will take a public outcry to move Congress on the issue, and disclosing the tax/fee data is an attempt to foment one. He dismisses Sept. 11 grants, security-fee refunds and other aid--Continental received more than $338 million in 2001-03--as "lead life preservers," and he notes that when airlines lose money the taxes and fees are due nonetheless.
L-3 Communications' Space & Navigation Div. has been awarded a $14-million contract by Boeing for the Delta launch vehicle avionics program. Through April 2008, L-3 S&N will manage design, production, testing and delivery of a total of 566 units in 10 different part types.
Snecma Morocco Engine Services is expanding its Casablanca airport repair and overhaul facilities to serve customer airlines based in the region. SMES is a joint venture of Royal Air Maroc and Snecma Services.
BarcoLeyard, a joint venture of Belgium-based Barco and Beijink Leyard Electronics, has sold multiple LED display solutions in China, including a signage network for the Guangzhou airport.
Congress is moving President Bush's ambitious space exploration plans to the back burner while it pays a growing bill to get the space shuttle flying again. This marks the first step toward a sharp cut in the Fiscal 2005 NASA spending plan--jeopardizing some serious money earmarked for deep-space exploration.
Air Canada, in concluding all labor agreements, has taken a critical step closer to meeting its Sept. 30 target for emergence from creditor protection. The mainline's last outstanding labor contract, with subsidiary Air Canada Jazz flight attendants, was ratified this month. The pact enabled Air Canada to satisfy labor cost conditions outlined in the Deutsche Bank Standby Purchase Agreement and GE Capital Aviation Services Global Restructuring Agreement and forward its business plan to creditors, who will vote on it on Aug. 17.
The article "Looking Ahead" (AW&ST July 5, p. 25) incorrectly stated the facilities that will refine concepts for long-term NASA "Vision Missions." The Integrated Design Capability at Goddard Space Flight Center and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory will do the work.
Some early reports say the Mariner unmanned aerial vehicle test in Alaska is not going as smoothly as hoped, which is causing some grumpiness among U.S. Coast Guard officials. Cold weather and teething problems with new sensor payloads are creating a falloff in operational readiness. Only about one flight in three is getting off on schedule, according to a report last week.
HONEYWELL'S new RDR-4000 DIGITAL WEATHER RADAR avoids the use of energy dissipating waveguides by mounting the radio frequency components--synthesizer and solid-state transmitter/receiver unit--on the antenna drive for the flat-plate, X-band antenna. Digital signals from the radar processor to the synthesizer are carried by coaxial cables, with only a short waveguide from the T/R to the antenna.
THE BRITISH DEFENSE MINISTRY is aiming to have an interim combat readiness capability with its Astor Sentinel Mk 1 surveillance aircraft by 2007. This would be based around the availability of three trained crews. Five Sentinel Mk 1 aircraft are being purchased with delivery to begin in late 2005.
Catherine J. Steele (see photos) has been promoted to general manager of National Space Systems Engineering, Systems Planning and Engineering in the Rosslyn, Va., office of The Aerospace Corp. from principal director of the Communications Systems and Information Engineering Directorate of the National Systems Group in Chantilly, Va. Rodney Lochmann has been promoted to associate principal director in the Communications Systems and Information Engineering Directorate from systems director in the Communication Systems Development Directorate. John S.
Sweden's SaabTech received a $2.2-million contract for adaptation and flight trials of the BOL countermeasure dispensing system for RAAF's F/A-18 Hornet. The air force will be the first customer to evaluate BOL on the F/A-18. The configuration is four BOLs per aircraft, comprising two conformal mountings on weapon pylons, to increase the amount of expendables carried. Flight trials are scheduled for fourth-quarter 2004.
Singapore-based Tiger Airways expects to launch its discount services by year-end, pending operational approval from aviation authorities. The new carrier last week took delivery of its first of four Airbus A320s. The remaining three are to be delivered this year. Tiger plans to add four leased aircraft to its fleet each year to reach its goal of a 12-aircraft fleet by 2006. Singapore Airlines and Irish discount carrier Ryanair hold a 49% stake in the carrier and the Singapore government, 11%.
