Pratt & Whitney and Honeywell are exploring the unique technologies needed to create an efficient, 500-shp.-class heavy-fuel engine that could be used to power future unmanned aerial rotorcraft. Under a 39-month U.S. Army contract awarded last month, Pratt is focusing on designing, developing and testing an integrally bladed high-pressure turbine rotor made of monolithic silicon nitride ceramic materials. The program's value to the company is about $2 million.
NASA is restructuring the $4.8-billion Space Launch Initiative (SLI) to give it a near-term focus on building a crew rescue vehicle for the International Space Station, shifting as much as $2.4 billion through Fiscal 2007 into development of an ``orbital spaceplane'' that would allow the station to accommodate a larger crew than the three currently authorized.
A Hunter unmanned reconnaissance aircraft, in two flights at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., dropped four Northrop Grumman brilliant anti-tank (BAT) missiles. The acoustic and infrared guided weapons struck four targets--in each test a BMP armored reconnaissance vehicle and a T-72 tank--on Oct. 9-11. After selecting their targets from an array of several vehicles, three of the BATs made direct hits. One of the weapons blew the turret off one of the T-72s.
Sergio Vetrella (see photo), who is chairman of the Italian space agency, has been appointed for a second term as president of the Italian Aerospace Research Center, CIRA. He is a professor of aerospace systems at the Engineering University of Naples and a senior academic member of the International Academy of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
The Pentagon wants to quickly improve its defenses against short-range ballistic missiles. ``We are looking at ways to accelerate the production of [Patriot] PAC-3 out of concern for near-term vulnerabilities,'' said Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. While Iraq and its inventory of ballistic missiles loom as a near-term threat, Wolfowitz also is increasingly concerned about a potential attack on the U.S. from ship-based, short-range missiles. Without identifying the country, he said ``we have observed an outlaw state'' developing a ship-launched capability.
Australia has completed negotiations with the U.S. on joining the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter development program. Earlier, Australia had verbally committed to the project to meet a U.S. government deadline, but last week the cabinet approved the memorandum of understanding that obligates Canberra to spend $150 million on JSF over the next 10 years.
United Airlines employees have launched a letter-writing campaign, trying to persuade the Transportation Dept. to choose their employer's Los Angeles proposal over six competitors for a single available daily round trip between Reagan Washington National Airport and a point beyond National's 1,250-mile perimeter (see p. 19). The letters started out slowly last week, with 33 in three days, most of them following one of two forms.
Greece has selected Sagem's Sperwer unmanned aerial vehicle for surveillance and target detection, identification and targeting applications. The units will be designed for operation in mountainous terrain and real-time data transmission, and have an operational radius of more than 200 km. The contract is valued at several tens of millions of dollars.
Radio-frequency-pulse energy weapons that emit short powerful bursts to damage electrical equipment and computer memories have so far been designed by U.S. and British researchers as relatively large systems that require at least a cruise missile-size platform to carry them. BAE Systems designers are eyeing much smaller energy weapons for inexpensive UAVs with a wingspan of a few feet.
Almost irrespective of Britain's defense industrial strategy initiative, the pace of aerospace and defense policy change in Europe remains slow--a concern underscored by European aerospace lobby group Aecma. The European Assn. of Aerospace Industries (Aecma) took the opportunity of its recent annual convention, to urge European governments to move rapidly to embrace the agenda for change outlined in its Star 21 initiative.
Russian industrial giant Basic Element and the Irkutsk Aircraft Production Organization (IAPO) are emerging as the most likely candidates for a takeover of bankrupt regional jet manufacturer Fairchild Dornier. The two companies have made a joint offer to acquire Fairchild Dornier from administrator Eberhard Braun. The proposal includes all divisions and would lead to continued production of the 328JET and the restart of the 728/928 program.
China Southern Airlines' 737 maintenance, repair and overhaul operations is moving to a dedicated engineering facility at Xinzheng Airport in Zhenzhou, a city in Henan Province in north China, from their base at the airport's headquarters in Guangzhou near Hong Kong. China's largest airline, China Southern operates 41 737-300/500s from Guangzhou, one of the country's three largest hubs. China Southern is a partner in Guangzhou Aircraft Engineering Co. (Gameco), an independent MRO operator, which built the CSN Henan Branch.
After years of studying whether to equip satellites with self-protection equipment, the Pentagon is putting money and technology into proliferating such equipment beyond the most crucial systems that already feature a rudimentary electronic warfare suite. Electronic countermeasures for spacecraft are expected to be a major growth area in the coming years, although the military's uncertainty regarding its needs continues to be an impediment. Critical questions such as identifying a threat and defining the area a satellite must monitor to be effective remain unanswered.
As United Airlines made what it hopes will be crucial advances last week in its attempt to stay out of bankruptcy protection, three of its major competitors expressed varying degrees of concern about whether they have enough cash--or access to cash--to ride out commercial aviation's deepening financial crisis. America West, with the industry's first government-guaranteed loan and $422 million in cash and equivalents on Sept.
As part of its continuing effort to interest the Army in novel lift aircraft, Boeing is mulling development of a vertical takeoff and landing aircraft that could move equipment around the battlefield and would use a pulsed-ejector thrust propulsion system. The concept, called the Light Aerial Multipurpose Vehicle (LAMV), would take off and land vertically using the pulsed-ejector thrusters, which burn a fuel-oxidizer mixture explosively rather than at a constant rate. For forward flight the aircraft would rely on two turbofans.
EADS subsidiary American Eurocopter is opening a second facility in the U.S. situated at the Golden Triangle area in Mississippi. Establishing the site will cost about $12 million, including the lease, equipment and training, says new American Eurocopter President Marc Paganini. The company will produce parts for its AS350, AS355 and EC130 helicopters, conduct final assembly of AS350s, and perform customization. The move is part of EADS' growth strategy in the U.S. The other American Eurocopter facility is in Grand Prairie, Tex.
Thomas J. Amrhein (see photo) has become a managing director within the aerospace and defense practice of Colbaugh & Heinsheimer Consulting Inc., Newport Beach, Calif. He was president/general manager of the Engineering Services Group of SM&A.
Cargo shall point the way--at least that seems to be the signpost for liberalization of airline trade between China and Taiwan. A senior official of the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC), who didn't want to be identified, said the Chinese government is willing to approve the start of official talks to start direct commercial passenger and cargo flights between the mainland and Taiwan.
Canada-based low-fare airline WestJet has used U.S. Export-Import Bank loan guarantees to help it secure funding for the purchase of 15 Boeing 737-700s. The first has been delivered, the other 14 are to come in 2003. The aircraft are part of a 30-plane order placed in 2000; the remainder are due by February 2006.
John Schildroth has been appointed executive vice president-operations/chief operating officer, Philip O'Connor senior vice president-human resources and communications, Mark Barry senior director of operations and Ron Anderson sales director, all for EADS Aeroframe Services, Lake Charles, La.
The French defense ministry has agreed to develop a further upgrade of the MBDA Exocet antiship missile and is preparing to start work on a Block 2 upgrade of the Aster 30 anti-air missile with an anti-theater ballistic missile capability. According to program manager Philippe Cotier, the Exocet upgrade, designated Block 3 MM40, will have a 180-naut.-mi. (333.3 km.) range, up from about 90 naut. mi. now. In addition, the missile's overall efficiency will be largely enhanced by an all-new Turbomeca/Microturbo turbojet.
Britain is quietly trying to tear up the present rigid route-map for acquiring future standards of the Eurofighter Typhoon, and persuade its three partner nations to do likewise, in favor of a more flexible technology insertion approach. The Typhoon is currently envisioned as being bought in three ``tranches'': Tranche 1 is now in production, but Tranche 2 and Tranche 3 have yet to be fully defined in terms of capability.
A launch customer for the podded Cobra fire-control radar for AH-1Z attack helicopters hasn't materialized, but Northrop Grumman officials say they are making progress. Turkey, whose negotiations with Bell Helicopter Textron for AH-1Zs are slowly winding up, is a potential candidate. The aircraft wasn't initially offered with the radar, but it is being proposed as an upgrade and has received strong interest from some areas of the Turkish military, said Tony Cannon, business development manager for the Northrop Grumman/Lockheed Martin radar.
