John P. Nahill has become CEO of Flight Options of Cleveland. He was vice president-corporate strategy and development for the Raytheon Co. and had been a director of Flight Options since its merger with Raytheon Travel Air.
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Jeff Griffith has become vice president-air traffic management for The Washington Consulting Group, Bethesda, Md. He was deputy director of air traffic for the FAA.
Charles A. Kick has been appointed president of the Gaithersburg, Md.-based Signia-IDT division of Integrated Defense Technologies. He was vice president-operations.
CTT Systems has received an order from England's Air 2000 to equip up to six Airbus A321 aircraft with its CTT Zonal Drying System. The order is firm for two aircraft, with options for another four.
Theo Staub (see photo) has been named interim chief operating officer of U.S. operations for Zurich-based Jet Aviation. He succeeds Terrance P. Kelley, who has resigned as president/COO of U.S. operations.
HELP LINE Some Iraqi troop commanders are phoning their counterparts in U.S. and coalition units in Kuwait, trying to arrange quick surrenders as soon as any invasion starts, according to a senior Pentagon official. There also have been contacts at much higher command levels, leading to speculation that actual combat with Iraq might be forestalled by senior-level defections. Cynics say any such move, if at all possible given Saddam Hussein's periodic, Gestapo-like purges of senior officers, would have happened before now.
SETI@HOME RESULTS Researchers plan to use the Arecibo radio telescope this month to take another look at some 150 celestial radio sources identified as likely targets in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) by a unique distributed computing project that takes advantage of home-computer downtime around the world.
Emirates Airlines, nearing the end of what it believes will be its most profitable year ever, thinks it would be affected only mildly and briefly by a war in Iraq.
NASTY BREAK Fiber-optic cables protect critical military communications from interception by electronic eavesdroppers, but recent U.S. Air Force tests show that general purpose bombs dropped on connector boxes, where lines enter and emerge from the ground, "shatter fiber-optic cables for a couple of miles," said a senior Air Force official. "It distorts the fiber optics and leaves them hard to repair." Iraq has spent nearly a decade rebuilding its air defenses with fiber-optic cables to make them more secure.
Eumetsat has approved the acquisition of a fourth new-generation MSG geostationary weather satellite to provide Europe, Africa and Asia with expanded meteorological and extreme weather forecasting. The 391-million euro spacecraft will complement the first MSG, launched last year, and two others currently on order (AW&ST Sept. 9, 2002, p. 86).
General Electric's propulsion candidate for Boeing's 7E7 aircraft will incorporate new technologies that should boost component efficiency, decrease noise, reduce emissions, and simplify maintenance and support.
An agreement between the Allied Pilots Assn. and American Airlines on concessions is expected by June, according to an industry analyst. An agreement with the airline's pilots would be a crucial step in helping the airline avoid filing for protection under Chapter 11 bankruptcy rules. But any concessions probably will come at a price: union leadership will demand that American management precisely define the carrier's business plan for recovery, including how it intends to compete with low-cost carriers such as Southwest Airlines.
111WORLD NEWS ROUNDUP 16 First flights for Bombardier G5000 business jet . . . 17 . . . and Bell/Agusta BA 609 tiltrotor RUN-UP TO WAR 20 Converging forces jeopardize weakened U.S. airlines 22 Airlines outline case for im- mediate government relief 23 Airlines coax reluctant trav- elers with relaxed fee policies 24 Emirates chief sees little disruption, looks to growth 25 European airlines confront strategic choices
JAPAN CARRIERS MULL DAMAGES SUIT Japan's major carriers are considering claims for damages from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport from losses they suffered Mar. 1 when the flight data processor system at Tokyo Air Traffic Control Center shut down and the carriers had to cancel 149 flights, grounding 41,000 passengers. All Nippon Airways was the hardest hit, losing 109 flights, and figures it lost some $5.2-6.9 million by having to arrange hotel rooms, ground transportation and refunds for 35,000 passengers.
SONG FOR GEORGIA Delta Air Lines is adding two daily flights to the 68 it now operates between New York region airports (JFK, LaGuardia and Newark International) and Atlanta. Delta's low-fare subsidiary, Song, on June 1 will begin operating two flights with Boeing 757 aircraft between New York JFK International Airport and Atlanta Hartsfield. Song's 757 fleet will have a one-class, 199-seat configuration. The low-fare carrier will initially fly Northeast-Southeast services, and by October plans to offer 144 daily flights with 36 757s.
The Bell/Agusta Aerospace Co. BA609 commercial tiltrotor flew for more than 1 hr. on Mar. 11 following its 36-min. first flight four days earlier. The aircraft is the first of four tiltrotors scheduled to enter the flight test program in the next few years. FAA certification is tentatively scheduled for 2007, according to BAAC officials. Senior test pilot Roy Hopkins and co-pilot Dwayne Williams were at the controls during both flights, which followed seven weeks of extensive ground tests before the aircraft was cleared to fly.
Marc Henderson has been named interim manager of public affairs for the Miami-Dade Aviation Dept. He succeeds Lauren Stover, who was associate public affairs director and has become public affairs manager for the Southeast U.S., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands for the U.S. Transportation Security Administration.
Chris Danner has been appointed director of product support for the Ae270 turboprop program for Ibis Aerospace, Kerrville, Tex. He held a similar position at the Sino Swearingen Aircraft Co. of San Antonio.
Russian aviation and space agency Rosaviakosmos has selected a consortium led by Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Co. to build a new regional jet to replace the country's aging fleet of short-haul aircraft, essentially composed of Tupolev Tu-134 trijets and Antonov An-24 turboprops. The decision, announced on Mar. 12, will base design on a family of 60-95-seat twin-jets, dubbed the Russian Regional Jet, proposed by Sukhoi in cooperation with Boeing, Ilyushin and Yakovlev.
DON'T RUSH ME Boeing keeps predicting that a Pentagon deal for leasing 100 767-based tankers is only a week or two away. But Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld says don't hold your breath. "I'll decide when I decide," he said. "I don't need to set arbitrary deadlines as to when that might be." Rumsfeld says that his advisers and analysts still don't agree on the idea. "Gen. [Richard] Myers [chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff] and I both listened attentively, and I've asked for some more information."
Beset by a bleak commercial space market and a crisis in Europe's launch sector, EADS has presented plans for deeper job cuts in its space arm in an attempt to turn around the troubled business unit. Hefty provisions for the restructuring plans and for continued amortization of goodwill pushed the company into a 299-million euro ($329-million) net loss in 2002 in results announced here last week. Operating earnings dropped 16% to 1.4 billion euros, from 1.7 billion euros a year earlier.
Erik Blachford has become CEO of Seattle-based Expedia. He has been president of Expedia North America. Blachford succeeds Rich Barton, who has resigned.
