National Reconnaissance Office Advanced KH-11 recon satellites imaged 60 trucks removing materials from a known Iraqi biological weapons facility about Sept. 25. NRO and the National Imagery and Mapping Agency passed the intelligence to the White House, Defense Dept. and Congress as more evidence the Iraqis are preparing to foil U.N. inspectors, and to disperse biological and chemical assets in the event of war. Three advanced KH-11s and three Lacrosse-type medium-resolution imaging radar spacecraft overfly Iraq daily, often on passes about 2-3 hr. apart.
India has taken delivery of the first 10 of its Sukhoi Su-30MKI multirole aircraft. One of the aircraft is shown being loaded for delivery from the Irkutsk manufacturing site in Russia. The Indian air force officially inaugurated the type into service on Sept. 27, the first time a thrust vector-equipped aircraft has entered any air force's operational inventory. The Irkutsk Aviation Industrial Assn. will deliver a further 12 Su-30MKIs during 2003, with the final batch of 10 to be delivered in 2004. The aircraft is also equipped with a passive phased array radar.
Unisys R2A Transportation Management Consultants said last week what the U.S. airline industry has known for quite awhile: Something must change with the business model of the major network airlines. What makes Unisys' message more compelling is that it also provided a carrier-by-carrier comparison of revenues, costs, profits and losses.
Shuttle operations and assembly of the International Space Station are back on track after a four-month hiatus following the successful launch of Atlantis and the installation by its U.S./Russian crew of the Boeing S1 truss on the ISS. The $390-million S1--with 15 mi. of wiring, thousands of components and unique ammonia cooling systems--is one of the more complex pieces of the ISS. It has taken Boeing and 12 subcontractors five years to build and integrate, and a duplicate port system will be launched by Endeavour about Nov. 10.
Pratt & Whitney and EREA, the association of European aerospace research agencies, have jointly recognized the research achievements of Onera's Isabelle Ribet, Von Karman Institute's David Vanden Beele and a group of Czech scientists. Ribet's work covered entangled-cavity optical parametric oscillators, while Vanden Beele studied computational models for inductively coupled air plasma flows.
Vought Aircraft Industries will build two redesigned wings for the U.S. Air Force's RQ-4A Global Hawk unmanned air vehicle. Alliant Techsystems is teaming with Vought on the project and will provide composite parts, according to the company. Initial deliveries of the wings are set for 2004. Vought also will manufacture three current-configuration wings for the Global Hawk program with options for six wings to be built in 2004. Also, Vought has been selected to produce 85 shipsets of horizontal stabilizers for the Air Force's F/A-22 Raptor fighter.
Most aerospace companies operate on the premise that if they produce high-quality products, price them competitively while keeping costs under control and deliver on time, they're doing all that is necessary to sustain profitable growth and subsequently improve shareholder value. To their credit, many businesses are doing these things on a fairly consistent basis.
Spot Image has signed an agreement with King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia for reception of data from Europe's new Spot 5 imaging satellite, and opened an office in Abu Dhabi to reinforce its Middle East presence. Saudi Arabia will be the third non-European country, after Singapore and China, to receive data from Spot 5; three more nations are expected to sign up by year-end. Earlier, the company concluded an agreement giving BSA of Mauritania exclusive rights to distribute Spot products and services in eight countries in West Africa.
In an expected move, the FAA has mandated a change to the rudder system on all Boeing 737s, using a design that the company has been developing for more than two years and that is to go into new production aircraft in January. Boeing is shouldering the $800-900-million cost of designing the system and providing hardware for about 4,200 737s worldwide. Operators should be able to accomplish the change during normal heavy maintenance and have until November 2008 to meet the airworthiness directive. Airlines will pay for labor costs.
Derek Kerr has been named senior vice president/chief financial officer of America West Airlines. He was senior vice president-financial planning and analysis. Kerr succeeds Bernie Han, who has become CFO of Northwest Airlines. Han, in turn, succeeds Mickey Foret, who has retired. Foret also was chairman/CEO of Northwest Airlines Cargo Inc. Doug Steenland will succeed Foret there and remain president of Northwest Airlines.
The final preproduction helicopter built under the U.S. Marine Corps H-1 upgrade program made its first flight at NAS Patuxent River, Md., Oct. 4. The AH-1Z Super Cobra joins four other AH-1Z and UH-1Y aircraft undergoing extensive flight tests for the Marines.
Keith Lawlor (see photo) has been named A380 program manager at Dunlop Aerospace Braking Systems, Coventry, England. He was product manager for regional aircraft.
Thomas E. Schick has been appointed non-executive chairman of the board of directors of Houston-based ExpressJet Holdings. He succeeds Continental Airlines Chairman/CEO Gordon Bethune, who will remain a director. Schick is a former executive vice president-commercial aviation services of the Boeing Commercial Airplane Group.
China is signaling its intent to become an international space power by planning a visible and significant presence at the World Space Congress in Houston this week, the single largest international gathering of space managers, researchers and companies in 10 years. American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics officials organizing the WSC said the Chinese participation is noteworthy.
The Pentagon is projecting foreign military sales this fiscal year will top totals during the past 10 years, in part because of confidence that an aggressive technical and financing proposal will help secure a win in Poland's fighter competition. Foreign military sales (FMS) experienced a sharp decline in the mid-1990s, dropping below $9 billion a year, after a spike following a post-Persian Gulf war surge of weapons purchases in the Middle East. In recent years, the level has ``jumped back up rather nicely,'' and in the fiscal year ended Sept.
Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta and House aviation subcommittee Chairman John Mica (R-Fla.) don't always see eye to eye, but they are of one mind on the urgent need for a next-generation explosives detection system (EDS). In remarks at the Chamber of Commerce meeting, Mineta said his department has money to develop a new EDS, but it will take two years.
Luce Veilleux has become Toronto-based vice president/chief marketing officer and Marc Girard Montreal-based vice president/chief financial officer for Air Canada subsidiary Aeroplan. Veilleux was vice president-marketing for retail and commercial banking at the RBC Royal Bank. Girard was vice president/treasurer at Quebecor and Quebecor Media.
Thai Airways International expects a profit of 12 billion baht ($300 million) for fiscal 2002, which ended Sept. 30. That's more than a six-fold increase from the 1.93-billion-baht profit it posted last year but slightly below an earlier projection of 12.2 billion baht. An airline spokesman said foreign currency fluctuations, particularly strengthening of the baht, accounted for the difference. The baht has recovered 25% of its value since its devaluation led the first wave of the Asian financial crisis of 1997-99.
Nine days into Fiscal 2003, House and Senate appropriations conferees agreed on a defense spending bill, only the first of 13 that Congress normally would enact for the budget year that began Oct. 1. The appropriators issued their report while defense authorizers were still stalled, marginalizing the work of the oversight committees. The appropriations compromise provides the Pentagon with $355.1 billion, only $1.6 billion short of what the administration asked.
Attempts to rescue Fairchild Dornier are entering a critical phase. Russian investors might be the last chance for the German aircraft manufacturer's regional twinjets. Basic Elements, a major Russian group formerly known as Sibirsky Aluminium, and Irkutsk Aircraft Production Organization (IAPO) were expected to submit a bid for the company last week, according to Fairchild Dornier Administrator Eberhard Braun. Moreover, Switzerland-based Aircraft Finance Consulting (AFC) is mulling an unrelated proposal and is expected to submit financing documentation this week.
Charles E. Webb (see photo) has won the Society of Flight Test Engineers' 2002 Kelly Johnson Award for Outstanding Achievement in Flight Test Engineering. Webb retired in 2001 as a flying qualities and performance engineer at the Naval Air Warfare Center, Patuxent River, Md. He was recognized for his planning, execution and reporting of test programs.
BAE Systems has been forced to further delay, by up to 12 months, first flight of its Nimrod MRA4 maritime patrol aircraft, provoking the Defense Ministry into a review of the impact of the latest problem on the $4.2-billion program. The company had been looking to fly the MRA4 by November or December. This in itself was almost a 12-month slippage on an intended January 2002 first flight. BAE now says that will not occur until the latter half of 2003. Some sources suggest late 2003 as the most likely.
Sino-Swearingen Aircraft Corp. replaced its top management in an attempt to expedite certification and production of the SJ30-2 business jet. Carl Chen has been appointed president/CEO, and Gene Comfort has been named senior vice president-sales and marketing. Financing to achieve FAA certification is available, and a second flight test airplane is nearing completion. The SJ30-2 is tentatively set for certification late in 2003.
The Transportation Security Administration and the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Assn. plan to launch a U.S. aviation watch system in December. The TSA has developed a toll-free hotline and centralized reporting system to bring AOPA's Airport Watch program to a national level. The move enables about 550,000 genav pilots to report any suspicious activities that might compromise security.
Meanwhile, European satellite makers continue to streamline as they struggle to stay afloat in the turbulent economic environment. Astrium, in the midst of a corporate-wide restructuring effort, confirmed union reports that it would lay off more than 500 people at its Toulouse and Velizy, France, sites next year, and an equivalent amount in the U.K. and Germany. The company has received orders for only four spacecraft in 2002, compared to two in 2001 and six in 2000. Earlier, archrival Alcatel Space had announced 400 new layoffs of its own (AW&ST Sept. 30, p. 18).
