As the House approved creation of a Homeland Security Dept. and the Senate moved to follow suit, the aviation industry found a couple of things to like. Not only did the House vote to extend Transportation Dept. third-party terrorism insurance for airlines through next Aug. 31 (at least) or Dec. 31 (at the administration's discretion), it also broadened coverage to include hull losses, passengers and crewmembers.
WORLD NEWS ROUNDUP European travel giant to set up venture in China Germany's TUI in move to overcome sluggish growth at home 24 WORLD NEWS & ANALYSIS Aerospace bids for help at home and abroad Problems turn horizontal, government stays vertical; panel wants major executive branch presence 28 Recommendations run gamut Among them is government commitment to facilitating private investment in the aerospace sector 29 Europeans embark on massive R&D effort
Airbus Industrie 20 Aviation Week & Space Technology Aerospace Source Book 2003 11** Aviation Week Conferences & Exhibitions MRO Asia 31 & Card AviationNow.com/oic Online Information Center 3 BAE Systems 42-43 Breitling 41 EADS North America 11* Eurocopter 18 GE Aircraft Engines 2nd Cover HydraElectric Co. 3 Lockheed Martin 26, 49, 4th Cover Messier-Dowty 7 Montreal International 13 OCLI 58 Oracle Corp. 15
Honeywell Aerospace President/CEO Robert D. Johnson, speaking recently before the Society of Automotive Engineers World Aviation Congress, called for the technical community to lead the effort to improve efficiency and viability of the air transportation system. He said the aerospace business needs to take a number of actions to revitalize the industry. "If we fail to do so, we will be having this conversation again when the next downturn happens in about 2013," Johnson said.
The U.S. government is offering Advanced Block 52 Lockheed Martin F-16C/D fighters to the Polish government's tender for 48 multirole aircraft for the Polish air force. Pratt & Whitney F100-PW-229 engines would power the F-16s. The aircraft would be equipped with the APG-68(V)9 radar for ground imaging and day/night weapons delivery, as well as the ALQ211(V)4 electronic warfare suite for countermeasures.
Inspired by the European Court of Justice's recent decision vetoing national bilateral agreements, Virgin Atlantic Airways CEO Sir Richard Branson vows he'll do "what it takes" to start up a low-cost airline in the U.S. Stirring up the competition in America would lower airfares and "benefit everyone," just as it had when his low-fare carrier Virgin Blue debuted in Australia, said Branson on a recent visit to New York.
The U.S. Aerospace Commission wants wholesale changes in the way the government deals with aerospace issues and an invigorated defense of American industry in what the commission portrays as an increasingly tilted international playing field. The final report of the Commission on the Future of the United States Aerospace Industry, being issued today after a year of fact-finding and deliberations, contains more or less predictable proposals for financial and other support for the industry (see box). But it also advocates:
The company has redesigned, improved and expanded its line of mobile maintenance and repair shop products called RollaBench. The product is equipped with a wheel system that provides a pushing or pulling effort of less than 8 lb. for each 2,000 lb. of gross vehicle weight. That makes it practical to move 2,000 lb. or more of tools, equipment, parts and supplies directly to the job site. A primary role of the RollaBench is for maintenance and repair of most types of production equipment in different types of factories.
U.S. Air Force officials are scrambling to determine how big a financial mess the F/A-22 program is, with the prospect of a massive cost increase hanging over the development program.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's idea for a Total Information Awareness (TIA) system is stirring up a hornet's nest. It is one of 15 projects at Darpa's "information awareness office" aimed at using information technology to prevent and preempt terrorist attacks. The gist of TIA is to use signal processing similar to that used in anti-submarine warfare to ferret out the signature of terrorist transactions in cyberspace.
Lockheed Martin Commercial Space Systems has delivered the NSS-6 multimedia communications satellite to Kourou, French Guiana, for an Ariane launch early next month. The spacecraft carries 60 high-power Ku-band transponders that can be assigned in orbit to any of six spot beams covering the territory between the Eastern Mediterranean and Southern Africa to Australia, Japan and the Korean peninsula. It also has 12 Ka-band uplinks for interactive Internet access. New Skies Satellites, based in The Hague, owns the satellite.
Bombardier Aerospace has chosen Goodrich Hella Aerospace Lighting Systems' LED technology for the internal and external lighting on its Global 5000 intercontinental business jet. Deliveries of the lighting system are scheduled to begin early next year.
Steven Weinert has become division maintenance manager for flight services for the Keystone Helicopter Corp., West Chester, Pa. He was president of the Flite Tech Consulting Group, Vancouver, Wash.
As a result of Germany's reluctance to commit to earlier plans to procure 73 Airbus A400M airlifters, program go-ahead is now expected to be delayed until 2003. Service entry date would further slip to 2009. German Defense Minister Peter Struck is scheduled to submit an updated procurement plan by the end of the month. If Germany reduces its A400M order, he said, the aircraft price would remain unchanged--a key concern for other participating countries.
Raytheon has received a one-year, $74-million option on its Live Training Program from the U.S. Army Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation, to continue providing life-cycle contractor support for tactical engagement, instrumentation and range training devices and systems. The award is the fourth of seven one-year options under an eight-year $414-million contract awarded in 1999.
The Italian air force is poised to receive its initial Eurofighter Typhoon next-generation combat aircraft, as the government moves closer to remedying a funding shortfall. Executives from Alenia Aeronautica, builder of the twin-seat fighter, said the aircraft had undergone final assembly and ground testing and is due to fly shortly. Acceptance and compliance testing with the air force is expected to be completed before year-end.
David J. Gorney has been promoted to general manager of the Navigation Div. from corporate chief architect/engineer and general manager of the Office of the Chief Architect/Engineer of The Aerospace Corp., El Segundo, Calif. Harlan F. Bittner succeeds Gorney and has been promoted from principal director of the office's Systems Acquisition Support Directorate. Russell E. Averill has been promot- ed to principal director from systems director in the Electronic Programs Div. at the Chantilly, Va., facility; and Michael P.
Air Transat Capt. Robert Piche has received the Canadian National Assembly Medal of Honor for gliding a fuel-depleted Airbus A330-200 and its 304 occupants to a safe landing on Terceira Island, Azores, on Aug. 4, 2001. A fuel leak caused both engines to shut down when Flight 236 was over the Altantic Ocean, en route from Canada to Portugal.
Thales Group and SAS Flight Support have signed an agreement for the latter to acquire Aeronautical Services Group (ASG) of Thales Avionics Ltd. Based in Hersham, England, ASG provides navigation service packages to the aviation industry. Bjorn Alegren, president of SAS Flight Support, said the acquisition "will provide us with a complete product portfolio and a platform for further growth." The transaction is scheduled to be completed by the end of this year.
Noting that most U.S. airlines have rarely earned their cost of capital, former American Airlines Chairman and CEO Robert L. Crandall told Aviation Week & Space Technology he's skeptical that the industry will ever be competitive as long as there are so many carriers selling what has evolved into a commodity product, of which there is an excess for the sake of customer convenience.
Designing the Air Force's "smart tanker" to be smart and cheap isn't going to be easy, aerospace experts are telling the Pentagon. One imposing issue is antennas. "You'd like not to have to tear the superstructure apart to put a new antenna on," said an advanced concepts specialist. "The desire is to come up with conformal, thin, low-profile antennas that can be plugged in but still take the structural stresses and loads. For security reasons [the Air Force] doesn't want these aircraft to look like anything more than a Boeing 767. You want visual low-observability.
Philippine accident investigators late last week anxiously awaited the retrieval of the tail assembly--the last and most vital piece of wreckage from Laoag International Airlines Flight L-7585 from the murky waters of Manila Bay before confirming what caused an engine failure and the subsequent crash of the Fokker 27-600 on Nov. 11.
TRW Inc. has agreed to sell its automotive business to the Blackstone Group for $4.6 billion. If the transaction is completed, it would eliminate a major overhang to Northrop Grumman Corp., which expects to complete its purchase of TRW before the end of this year.
The 19-in. airborne VME rack RA2064x, designed to provide a compact off-the-shelf solution for avionics applications, meets the RTCA/DO-160D standard for avionics equipment and is suitable for use within a pressurized cabin. The convection-cooled rack has an operating temperature range of 40C to +65C (40F to +149F). The front panel of the new rack features output voltage indicators (+5V, +12V, 12V, +3.3V), an on-off switch with a protection mechanism to prevent accidental switching, and access to two internal SCSI 3.5-in. disk drives and a flash solid-state drive.
Michael Jacobs has become senior adviser on cyber and national security for SRA International, Fairfax, Va. He was director of information assurance for the National Security Agency.
