The Pentagon is reaching out to foreign companies for help in a highly specialized area of signals intelligence, opening a door for overseas suppliers to become involved in an area that is usually off-limits. The Navy's Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center wants to initiate a Foreign Comparative Test program to improve throughput and performance of specific emitter identification systems that are able to analyze an electronic emission in detail and effectively fingerprint it to tell one source from another.
The discovery of guns and explosives in a car parked at Paris-Charles de Gaulle is reviving airport security concerns in France and around Europe. The French police last week arrested a baggage handler in a CDG parking lot while he was stashing arms in the trunk of his car. The investigation is focused on whether this is a terrorist-related incident. As of late last week, Abderazak Besseghir, a 27-year-old French citizen of Algerian descent with no criminal record, had not been linked to a terrorist organization.
Peter Beaulieu, vice president of Associated Aircraft Manufacturing and Sales, Fort Lauderdale, Fla., has been elected president of the Washington-based National Assn. of Aircraft and Communication Suppliers Inc. Other new officers are: vice president, Brian Cole, vice president of the United Aeronautical Corp., North Hollywood, Calif.; vice president, Steven Wilk, vice president of Dixie Air Parts Supply Inc. of San Antonio; and secretary/treasurer, Homer Garten, president of Camar Aircraft, Camarillo, Calif.
A new look at an old analysis has reenergized the FAA in its push to eliminate the decades-old threat of fuel tank blasts in thousands of aircraft in the commercial fleet. Speaking to reporters at the W. J. Hughes Technical Center in New Jersey on Dec. 12, John Hickey, the FAA's director of aircraft certification standards, revealed that the FAA had experienced a "remarkable breakthrough" in its effort to come up with an economically viable way to make fuel tanks explosion-proof through inerting.
A mid-December launch has propelled New Skies Satellites a step closer to the ranks of the major global satcom operators, just as an ongoing industry-wide shakeup threatens to render the transformation moot. The liftoff of New Skies' NSS-6 on Dec. 17, carried into orbit by an Ariane 4 booster, will allow New Skies to move beyond its present status, based primarily on over-ocean coverage, to that of a truly global operating company.
Benet Wilson has become senior manager of corporate communications for Rolls-Royce North America Inc., Chantilly, Va. She was director of corporate communications for the Mesa Air Group in Phoenix.
Jessie J. Knight, Jr., has been named to the board of directors of the Alaska Air Group Inc. He is president/CEO of the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce and was a member of the California Public Utilities Commission.
WORLD WAR II MEDAL OF HONOR WINNER JOSEPH J. FOSS DIED JAN. 1. HE WAS 87. CONSIDERED "OLD" AT AGE 27, FOSS HAD TO CONVINCE U.S. MARINE CORPS OFFICIALS HE WAS CAPABLE OF FLYING F4F FIGHTERS IN THE PACIFIC THEATER. IN OCTOBER 1942, HE SHOT DOWN FIVE JAPANESE AIRCRAFT IN ONE WEEK--THREE IN ONE DAY--TO BECOME AN ACE. A MONTH LATER, FOSS HAD DOWNED A TOTAL OF 19 AIRCRAFT AND BEEN SHOT DOWN HIMSELF. HE EVENTUALLY WAS CREDITED WITH 26 CONFIRMED KILLS AND 19 PROBABLE KILLS, EQUALING EDDIE RICKENBACKER'S WORLD WAR I RECORD.
Alcatel said it has delivered the imager for the Helios IIA reconnaissance satellite to Astrium in Toulouse, France, which is building the defense satellite. The second-generation instrument is designed for better high-resolution image quality and day/night detection with an infrared channel. The French, Belgian and Spanish defense ministries have joined resources on the two-satellite Helios II project, with Helios IIA set for launch late in 2004.
Mark B. Dunkerley has been appointed president/chief operating officer of Hawaiian Airlines. John W. Adams, who has been president/CEO, will become chairman/CEO. Dunkerley was COO of the former Sabena Airlines Group.
A Pegasus XL booster is scheduled to launch the NASA Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment (Sorce) spacecraft on Jan. 25. A series of technical issues--most recently wing bond and actuator problems--has delayed the launch repeatedly. Now the Orbital Sciences Corp. (OSC) space launch vehicle is set to be air dropped from the OSC Stargazer launch aircraft over the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Cape Canaveral. The Stargazer transported the Pegasus booster to the Cape from Vandenberg AFB, Calif., on Dec. 17.
Six European nations finally signed the Meteor contract on Dec. 23, covering full-scale development of the radar-guided air-to-air missile. Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Sweden are participating in the program. The first air-launched firing is planned for 2005 with the missile entering service around 2011-12.
The envisioned restart of Fairchild Dornier's 728 regional twinjet program is becoming increasingly unlikely. The bankrupt German manufacturer's aerostructures businesses will be acquired by Switzerland's Ruag Aerospace while Russia's Irkutsk Aircraft Production Organization (IAPO) and Basic Element are expected to abandon a plan to buy the regional aircraft unit. Their joint decision is expected to be announced in the next few days.
Finmeccanica is further advancing the Italian aerospace/defense industry's consolidation by acquiring a controlling majority in Aeronautica Macchi, Aermacchi's parent company.
It's still not a done deal, but Air Force officials expect the Bush administration to seek additional funding in its Fiscal 2004 budget request for Boeing's and Lockheed Martin's financially strapped Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle programs. With the commercial satellite launch market nearly wiped out, the two companies have turned to the government to help sustain the Delta IV and Atlas V programs. The Air Force is obliging, arguing it needs to maintain the launch capabilities for "assured access" to space. Each company would receive about $100 million in indirect aid.
Israel's military had planned to conduct the 10th test of its $2-billion Arrow ballistic missile defense system on Jan. 5. According to Israeli officials, instead of interception accuracy this test was to focus on the sequential launch of multiple missiles against multiple targets. Arrow tests are conducted at Palmachim AB south of Tel Aviv. Israeli intelligence officials contend that Iraq has six mobile Scud launchers and 20-60 missiles. U.S. and British estimates are 6-12 launchers and 12-20 missiles.
Rocky Mountain Bureau Chief William B. Scott straps-in prior to takeoff for a C-130 Low-Level Awareness Training flight through Arizona's Dragoon Mountains. Flown by a crew from the 198th Airlift Sqdn. in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the mission was part of a nine-day "basic course" offered by the Air National Guard/USAF Reserve's Advanced Airlift Tactics Training Center (see p. 46). The school teaches air transport crews a number of maneuvers and tactics designed to thwart attacks by enemy fighters and ground-launched missiles.
An interagency working group is to report next month on how to respond to a radiological dispersal device, a so-called dirty bomb. The group is looking hard at ground transportation, since such a device probably would be delivered by van or truck. Major concerns include the dearth of good means to detect such devices and the possibility of public panic.
Lockheed Martin is expected to join Japan's Galaxy Express (GX) program to develop a medium-sized launch vehicle. The company is scheduled to contribute about 10% of the cost of boosting the GX's capital account to $4.1 million from $3.2 million. Lockheed Martin Space Systems already has received U.S. government permission to export the Atlas III first stage for the GX (AW&ST Dec. 2, 2002, p. 29).
In 1935, Sen. Bronson Cutting of New Mexico was among four people killed in the crash of a TWA DC-2. Investigations spurred by infuriated members of Congress found that aviators had been well aware of the inadequacy of the safeguards for tracking aircraft and protecting them in foul weather, but that no systemic corrective action was embraced. They also found that the people responsible for operating the aviation system were also responsible for guarding its safety--an arrangement rife with conflicts of interest and destined to fail.
William F. Mitchell, president/CEO of the Environmental Tectonics Corp., Southampton, Pa., has been elected chairman of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers International Industry Advisory Board.
The major airlines brought on their own problems. Most of them had flawed business plans--trying to get more and more passengers at lower and lower fares, and to subsidize the below-cost fares at the expense of those they thought they could exploit. Remember when it was illegal to sell your product to different people at different prices. Fighting competitors with ever lower fares for ever greater numbers of passengers contributed to their unsustainable growth and inability to survive dips in the economy. Many seasoned businessmen predicted this outcome.
Gregory Feith has been named chairman of the Flight Safety and Design Integration Board of Denver-based Aviation Technology Group Inc. He was a senior air safety investigator with the National Transportation Safety Board.
