Boeing completed the upgrade of U.S. Army AH-64A Apaches to the Longbow configuration for U.S. forces in South Korea this month with the shipment of 17 rotorcraft from its Mesa, Ariz., facility. Their arrival completes the Army's drive to field a Longbow battalion in the region. The new unit joins one that arrived in late 2001 as the first international deployment of Longbows. A third foreign-based Longbow unit is in Germany. Personnel serving in Korea spent eight months at Ft.
The European Space Agency said its Soho solar observatory was expected to cease transmitting scientific data last week owing to a malfunction on the pointing mechanism of the satellite's high-gain antenna (HGA). The loss of capability will last about two and a half weeks. However, the low-gain antenna, responsible for spacecraft/payload data, was unaffected. Engineers are evaluating options to recover the HGA, or to minimize data loss. If the problem cannot be corrected, similar blackouts will reoccur periodically every three months.
Boeing's contract for new refueling tankers based on the dated-technology 767 has been lauded by its employees and local officials as a good deal. Halfway into those tankers' service lives, the basic 767 design will be more than 50 years old. Meanwhile Boeing has proposed to Britain's Royal Air Force to convert used 767s into tankers at a considerable savings. There are 2,000 airliners, some brand-new, parked on U.S. airfields awaiting service. If the U.S. Air Force requires additional tankers, why not convert parked airliners for the short term?
The Ontario Superior Court of Justice last week approved Air Canada's request for a 90-day extension of its bankruptcy-court protection to Sept. 30. The Montreal-based airline has developed the framework of its financial restructuring plan--including converting the existing unsecured debt into equity of the restructured Air Canada.
Aviation Week & Space Technology pilot Edward H. Phillips flies a Eurocopter EC130 B4 on approach to a wooded confined area west of Fort Worth, during his 2-hr. flight (see p. 48). The single-engine rotorcraft is well-suited to sightseeing missions thanks to its large cabin that can seat up to seven passengers. EC130s already are in service flying tourists over national parks in Arizona and Hawaii. Shannon Bower photo.
Bill Windle and Norbert Witteman have been named global co-leaders for the automotive and aerospace practice of A.T. Kearney, Southfield, Mich. Windle has been the leader of the North American automotive practice, while Witteman was European coordinator of the firm's global operations practice and leader of its Central European practice.
COLUMBUS LIKELY DELAYED... European Space Agency human spaceflight director Joerg Feustel-Buechl has pooh-poohed an estimate by EADS Space Transportation executive Stefan Graul that the grounding of NASA's space shuttle fleet will push the launch of ESA's Columbus laboratory back to mid-2005 from October 2004. Specific dates are "pure speculation" at this point, Feustel-Buechl said. "There will surely be a delay, but we don't know how long," he said, suggesting things might be clarified at the next ISS Heads of Agency meeting in Monterey, Calif., at the end of July.
Paul R. Lovejoy has been appointed senior vice president/general counsel/secretary of United Airlines. He succeeds Francesca M. Maher, who will rejoin the law firm of Mayer, Brown, Rowe & Maw. Lovejoy was a partner with the law firm of Weil, Gotshal & Manges in New York.
David M. North (Washington), Bruce D. Nordwall (Patuxent River, Md.)
The U.S. Navy has re-learned a lesson about commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) procurements--they're not necessarily fast or inexpensive. The upgrade to give the older F-14Bs a new head-up display (HUD) and Modular Mission Display Processor System was initiated in 1997, but it was soon realized that there was not enough money in the program to install the same HUD as was being put into the F-14D. A COTS product seemed to offer a cheap, fast alternative.
ELUSIVE GOAL The Air Force is about to embark on the development of an operationally responsive spacelifter, a launch vehicle that could be readied quickly to put a payload in space. Air Force Space Command has been looking at the problem for several months, but now is getting ready to award a few 5-6-month study contracts toward a system that would carry a relatively light payload, says Pentagon space czar Peter B. Teets. Depending on how much money is available, the service may finance two contractors to the point of flight demonstrations, he adds.
A320S FOR TRANSGULF EXPRESS The Middle East's first low-cost airline, Transgulf Express, earlier this month signed an agreement with GATX for the lease of three Airbus A320s, which it plans to operate this fall on new services to Middle East and India destinations. The airline, based at Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, plans to add three more leased A320s to its fleet at the end of the year. Each aircraft will be powered by CFM International CFM56-5 engines and seat 180 passengers in all-coach class.
SMARTER JAMMER EADS has begun testing a third-generation digital radio-frequency memory subsystem to bolster onboard self-protection jammers for combat and transport aircraft. The techniques generator receives a radar signal and modifies it before retransmitting it. The alteration is intended to spoof the radar into thinking the aircraft is somewhere else. The subsystem is software reprogrammable and designed to provide very high frequency accuracy and instantaneous bandwidth.
DIFFERENTIAL CALCULUS The NTSB's review of its self-audit of safety programs could begin as early as this week--with the board's adoption of more effective ways of implementing safety recommendations soon to follow. The board unanimously voted in May for the review at the close of its 2003 Most Wanted meeting, and the programs under review include "the Most Wanted List"--the board's top-priority recommendations (AW&ST May 12, p. 39). At the meeting, NTSB Chairman Ellen G. Engleman emphasized that issuing recommendations alone is not sufficient to ensure safety.
BETTER LATE THAN NEVER The Australian Defense Ministry last week picked Tenix Defence of Melbourne, and an Adelaide-based unit of BAE Systems, to supply electronic self-protection equipment for Chinook and Black Hawk helicopters and C-130H transports. The A$250- ($168-) million Project Echidna had stalled several times, but "the government decided in May to accelerate enhanced self-protection capabilities for aircraft used to transport our troops in conflict," said Defense Minister Robert Hill.
NASA's space shuttle chief, and the head of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB), agree that shuttles probably can start flying again early next year, since the panel's final report will not recommend a major management and "cultural" overhaul in the agency--at least not before return to flight.
J. David Reck, a principal of Detroit law firm Miller, Canfield, Paddock and Stone, has been appointed director of its Aviation and Transportation Group. Donald L. Katz also has joined the group. He was vice chairman of the aviation practice at Jaffe, Raitt, Heuer and Weiss.
SPACE POLITICS The Defense Dept. is pressuring the Canadian government to decide in favor of participating in the Pentagon's ballistic missile defense projects, but Ottawa is not about to make any snap decisions. "[They] have made it clear they wanted us to make a decision yesterday," said a high-ranking Canadian government official at the recent Paris air show. Canada is ambivalent about participating in any program that "weaponizes" outer space, but Canadian officials are trying to take a pragmatic view.
AARGM GO-AHEAD The U.S. Navy has awarded Alliant Techsystems a $222.6-million system design-and-demonstration contract for a future anti-radiation missile. The Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile (Aargm), or AGM-88E, includes a multi-mode seeker (passive radar seeker and active millimeter microwave seeker) that should allow the weapon to find its target even after a radar has been turned off. Alliant will build 31 missiles for development and operational testing. The phase is to be completed by September 2008.
As for Colin Campbell's letter challenging the findings on the privatization of Australian air traffic control, the comments to which he referred--coupled with the failure reports on U.K. and Canadian exper-iences--provided support for Congress and the National Air Traffic Controllers Assn. to defeat privatization for American ATC (AW&ST June 2, p. 6; Apr. 14, p. 90).
AIR BREATHER Aerojet has demonstrated a hydrogen peroxide/JP-7 tri-fluid injector concept for the high-performance rocket section of an air-breathing rocket-based combined cycle (RBCC) flight test. In a hot-fire test at its Sacramento, Calif., facilities, Aerojet's engine hardware used HTP (decomposed peroxide)--created by a compact catalyst bed the company has patented--as an ignition source. It was injected through veins in the main injector into the main combustion chamber, where JP-7 fuel and liquid HTP (90% liquid peroxide) were introduced.
BALANCING ACT Bell Helicopter Textron's new CEO, Mike Redenbaugh, perceives a need to balance the company's priorities over the long term. Although he intends to pursue the MV-22 Osprey and BA609 tiltrotor programs, he said Bell has neglected the opportunity to improve the performance and reliability of nearly 6,000 helicopters. Upgrades would include aerodynamic fixes, weight reduction and reduced fuel consumption leading to lower direct operating costs. The improvements could be accomplished by Bell's extensive network of service centers, Redenbaugh said.
Eurocopter is studying the possibility of jointly developing a heavy-lift helicopter, perhaps with U.S. partners, to meet a German requirement to replace its aging CH-53s. Company officials said the requirement is expected to develop in 2010-15, and it could be complemented by new forward deployment needs in other countries such as France, which has no heavy-lift rotorcraft in its fleet.
Northrop Grumman has run 38 full-scale hot-fire tests of a peroxide/ hydrocarbon rocket engine as part of its work on the Missile Defense Agency's liquid booster target program. The tests are aimed at a 2005 risk-reduction flight of the environmentally friendly engine, which could replace solid-fuel rocket motors on missile defense test targets.
Northrop Grumman Chairman Kent Kresa asserted last week that, contrary to what some industry observers believe, no technology gap exists between the U.S. and Europe's leading aerospace industries. Both are comparable, he said. Rather, he said there is a "capabilities gap" that European countries could help narrow by spending more on research and development of new equipment and less on maintaining unnecessarily large numbers of military personnel.
Don Antonucci has been named president of Lockheed Martin Transportation and Security Solutions, Rockville, Md. He was president of Lockheed Martin Air Traffic Management.
