European regional airlines continue to see disappointing average yields as traffic begins its slow climb back to the heady numbers of the 1990s. Members of the European Regions Airline Assn. (ERA), assembled for their annual general meeting here, reported a 5.4% growth in passenger numbers for the first half of 2003 and a 7% growth in revenue passenger miles. In May and in June, the regional market began to recover from the impact of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) and the Iraq war on travel, with carriers posting passenger growth of 6.7%.
All aircraft spend most of their useful lives airborne. Maximum practical efficiency dominates all operations. If a replacement for the KC-135 is needed, an all-new supercritical wing with an aspect ratio of 12 or higher must be employed. The Boeing 767 wing, as good as it is, uses a 1960s low-aspect-ratio. The supercritical wing permits a 15-20% thicker unit for the same Mach number, a reduction in sweep or a combination of higher aspect ratio and reduced sweep.
RADAR RETURNS Powerful radar signals from the big radio telescope at Arecibo, Puerto Rico, may have detected liquid hydrocarbon lakes on Titan, possibly confirming theories about the nature of Saturn's largest moon. A team led by Cornell University astronomer Donald Campbell used the Arecibo dish to beam 1-megawatt, 13-cm.- wavelength radar at Titan, capturing the weak returns with the help of the National Science Foundation's new 100-meter (328-ft.) telescope at Green Bank, W.Va.
Robert P. Warren (see photo) has been appointed executive vice president of the Washington-based National Business Aviation Assn. He was senior vice president/general counsel/corporate secretary of the Air Transport Assn. of America Inc., which also is in Washington.
The quarterly earnings season is underway for U.S. airlines, and observers will be heartened to see generally favorable comparisons with the industry's sorry financial state of a year ago. Some of the traditional hub-and-spoke carriers are likely to post a net profit--as Continental and Northwest did (see p. 61)--and all of them will report higher revenues and lower labor costs.
NASA needs more direction from the President, Congress and ultimately the American people as to its mission, budget and goals rather than a simple fix of adding another layer of "safety" bureaucracy.
Loral Space & Communications goes into its Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection auction this week with at least two hefty satellite-manufacturing contracts under its belt. PanAmSat chose Space Systems/Loral to build its Galaxy 16 C- and K u-band spacecraft in a deal SS/L expects will produce $100 million in revenue. The satellite operator will make an advance payment of $25 million for Galaxy 16. DirecTV--like PanAmSat, a unit of Hughes Electronics Corp.--has also agreed to $25-million advances on the two satellites it ordered from SS/L earlier (see p. 17).
After Continental Airlines said it would shift some of its 11 orders for the 757 to the 737, Boeing said it will close its 757 production line in Renton, Wash., late next year. More than 1,000 of the single-aisle twinjets for 55 customers during the past 20 years were produced at that site. "This decision reflects the market reality for the 757," said Boeing Commercial Airplanes President and CEO Alan Mulally.
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Kenneth Dahlberg, who has been executive vice president-information systems and technology of Falls Church, Va.-based General Dynamics, has been appointed president/ CEO of the Science Applications International Corp. of San Diego. He succeeds SAIC founder J.R. Beyster, who will remain chairman until July. Dahlberg has been succeeded at General Dynamics by Gerard J. DeMuro, who has been president of General Dynamics C4 Systems, Taunton, Mass.
France says it will soon be ready to lead missions outside the European theater envisioned for the NATO Response Force. In an Oct. 9 briefing, French air defense/air operations chief, Gen. Jean-Patrick Gaviard, said France would be in a position by the summer of 2005 to provide the NATO Response Force with a full Level 2 command-and-control (C2) structure that would allow it to assume leadership of out-of-theater aerial missions.
FREIGHT WAYS AMB Property Corp. of San Francisco is significantly expanding its holdings of near-airport freight properties at key cargo centers (AW&ST Sept. 15, p. 82). AMB has signed a $481-million agreement with International Airport Centers to acquire IAC's 3.4-million-sq.-ft. portfolio comprising 37 airfreight buildings adjacent to seven airports. The first tranche closed Oct. 9 covering 25 buildings in Los Angeles, Seattle, Miami and Charlotte. The remaining portfolio is projected to close at year-end and by the third quarter of 2004.
Robert Wall (Washington), Michael A. Taverna (Paris)
With the NATO Response Force (NRF) now formally up and running, the alliance will spend the next three years turning the embryonic military capability into an effective tool that could be used globally on short notice.
An FAA move to begin work on setting noise standards for overland operations of a commercial supersonic aircraft is exactly what's needed and nicely timed, aerospace companies and trade associations told the agency.
Richard D. Rosen has become assistant administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research and Colleen Hartman deputy assistant administrator of NOAA's Satellite and Information Service. Rosen has been vice president/chief scientist of Atmospheric and Environmental Research Inc., Lexington, Mass. Hartman was director of the Solar System Exploration Div. of the NASA Office of Space Science. USAF Brig. Gen. (ret.) John Kelly has been appointed deputy undersecretary of Commerce for oceans and atmopshere.
I applaud EADS in continuing its pursuit of an airborne tanker but disagree on one major point in the Airbus A330 vs. Boeing 767 comparison. One of the U.S. Air Force points against the A330 is its size. It has a footprint that is 81% larger than that of the KC-135E, while the 767 is only 29% larger. The A330 would take up more ramp space, so would require virtually all new infrastructure and support equipment. This could significantly increase the cost of an A330 buy. The 767, on the other hand, can use much of the existing KC-135 infrastructure.
SATELLITE BUSINESS Loral Space & Communications has rejected what it termed an "informal offer" from EchoStar Communications Corp. to buy its assets for $1.85 billion. That leaves standing a formal offer from Intelsat to buy Loral's six North American satellites for $1.1 billion as the only bid before a bankruptcy auction scheduled for Oct. 20. Meanwhile Space Systems/Loral, the company's manufacturing arm, has received orders for two more DirecTV satellites in a deal worth $220 million that will also be a factor in the bankruptcy proceedings. Bernard L.
GOING TOGETHER Embraer has completed mating of the first fuselage for the Embraer 190 jet, which is designed to accommodate 98-108 passengers using either a four-abreast or single/two-class seating arrangements. The twin-engine airplane has a projected range of 2,200 naut. mi. The Brazilian airframe manufacturer reports having more than 240 orders and more than 300 options for the 70-110-seat Embraer 170/190 family of jets.
WORLD NEWS ROUNDUP 18 Aeroflot takes delivery of its first A319 18 Mesa ups pressure in bid for Atlantic Coast Airlines 19 Fraport seeks $425 million in Manila airport cancellation WORLD NEWS & ANALYSIS 22 Chinese manned spaceflight spawns management reforms 26 China now looks to in-orbit intelligence gathering 28 Chinese invest in programs to compete in space 30 New crew prepares for six- month stay on ISS
SCIENCE SOLIDARITY EADS has inaugurated a technology office in Moscow, and concluded an agreement with the Russian Academy of Sciences to explore possible avenues of scientific and technology cooperation. The technology office will coordinate research and development between EADS and Russian partners, who are already working together on advanced materials, process engineering, software development and mathematical computation. Additional partners could be added through the agreement with the Academy of Sciences.
WHEEL ESTATE JetBlue Airways CEO David Neeleman said recently that he is threatening to halt his airline's planned expansion at Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood (Fla.) International Airport if plans for a second, longer runway do not materialize. Airport expansion is a controversial issue locally, and a final report on the proposed runway is scheduled to be issued next month.
APPEAL DENIED A Japanese middle court has dismissed appeals by two Fuji Heavy Industry (FHI) executives--former Chairman Isamu Kawai and former Managing Director Yasuyuki Kogure--of their convictions for bribery of former Deputy Defense Minister Yojiro Nakajima to assure Fuji of subcontract work on the ShinMaywa US-1 rescue amphibian. Nakajima, a grandson of the founder of Nakajima Aircraft Corp., predecessor of FHI, admitted taking a bribe of $45,000, and committed suicide after being convicted.
The U.S. Army has activated its first Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) brigade at Peterson AFB, Colo., marking another step toward President Bush's goal of an operational missile defense system by the end of 2004. The Colorado Army National Guard brigade will provide command and control of the missiles at Ft. Greely, Alaska, while the Alaska Army NG Missile Defense Space Battalion, to be activated in December, will handle launch of the interceptors.
Mike Turner has been elected president of AECMA European aerospace industries assn. He is chief executive of BAE Systems. Turner succeeds Bengt Halse, newly retired president/chief executive of Saab. Pier Francesco Guarguaglini was elected president-elect. He is chairman/CEO of Finmeccanica.
SUBPOENA SOLUTION The outside panel set up to investigate the nation's preparedness and response to the terrorist attacks of September 2001 has made an example of the FAA in warning other agencies its requests for information are not to be ignored. The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the U.S. reevaluated its practice of making simple requests for information after discovering "serious deficiencies" in the FAA's submission of documents.
