SES Americom is seeking to offer satellite TV and high-speed Internet access services to U.S. residential users in a move that could affect plans to consolidate the American direct-to-home satellite broadcast market. Americom, which is owned by SES Global of Luxembourg, petitioned the Federal Communications Commission for a direct broadcast service (DBS) license at 105 deg. W. Long. and a Ku/Ka-band license at 105.5 deg. W.
American Airlines retired its last Boeing 727s last week after the final four flights departed from Miami on Apr. 30. At one time American operated 182 of the three-engine jets. The airline is replacing the 727s with Boeing 737-800s, which carry about the same number of people higher and farther while consuming 60% less fuel per passenger than its predecessor, according to American. In addition, the 727 is the last airplane in American's fleet to use a three-person cockpit crew.
Ken Douglas, Jane Freeman, Warren Larsen and John McDonald have been appointed to the board of directors of Air New Zealand. They succeed C.K. Cheong, Bill Wilson, Jim Farmer and Elizabeth Coutts. Douglas is a former president of the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions and national secretary of the New Zealand Federation of Labor. Freeman is director of Publicis NZ Ltd. Larsen is former chief executive of the New Zealand Dairy Board, and McDonald is a former group commercial director and treasurer of Fletcher Challenge Ltd.
The FAA plans to fine American Airlines $247,500 for shipping an unmarked oxygen generator on a Federal Express aircraft in August 2001. The container was shipped from New York JFK Airport to American's maintenance base in Tulsa, Okla.
Why is there so much resistance from air traffic controllers to new technology? The controllers' quick response is ``safety,'' but the underlying issues are more complex. Controllers reflected on these and other issues at a recent forum here, sponsored by the European Guild of Air Traffic Services, and their insights are revealing. Persuading controllers to accept advanced technology in hopes of increasing efficiency is a tough sell.
Robert A.K. Mitchell, vice president-advanced systems development and leader of unmanned combat air vehicle initiatives for the Northrop Grumman Corp.'s Integrated Systems Sector, El Segundo, Calif., has received the Reed Aeronautics Award from the Reston, Va.-based American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Mitchell was cited ``for the development and international deployment of the Global Hawk system.''
Elbit Systems is considering taking a 24-30% stake in Israel's other main public defense company, Elisra. The Koor group, which owns Elisra, has been looking for an outside investor for several months. The arrangement could lead to Elbit taking an even larger share later as part of an Israeli government desire to see defense industry consolidation.
With the White House due to finish a homeland defense strategy by July 1, outside experts are urging the President to at least consider a cruise missile defense and a runway-alert perimeter defense to quell airborne terrorist threats. The costs are estimated at $20 billion for cruise missile protection (excluding up to $1 billion in annual operational costs) and $10 billion for air defense over a period of 10 years.
Cathay Pacific Airways says it will restructure its Air Hong Kong cargo subsidiary to focus on Asian markets. As of July 1, Air Hong Kong will halt services to Brussels, Manchester and Dubai. Two of the carrier's three 747-200 freighters will be returned to Cathay, which will use them in its long-haul freight operations. Cathay carried 73,018 metric tons of freight in March, up 11.4% over the previous year, reflecting a modest recovery in freight markets, particularly for long-haul operations.
A decade ago, 75% of the aircraft serving Tokyo's Narita airport were 747s. Times change. Recently J-AIR, a Japan Airlines subsidiary, became the first airline to use a regional jet at Narita, a Bombardier CRJ200, flying a route from Nagoya. The CRJ200's entry into service marks another trend--expansion of Narita now that it has a second runway (AW&ST Apr. 29, p. 22).
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope is ready for several more years of ground-breaking science after checkout of upgrades installed in March. All of the new hardware meets expectations, and spectacular first images collected with the telescope's new camera surpass them with their breathtaking clarity. The new Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) survived its rough ride to space intact to produce a set of demonstration images that portend another wave of discoveries from the 12-year-old observatory.
With Northrop Grumman in dogged pursuit, TRW Inc. was poised last week to begin sharing nonpublic information with parties who had expressed interest in one segment of the company and with whom TRW had signed confidentiality agreements. Meanwhile, Northrop was appealing directly to shareholders, urging them to keep the company's offer for TRW alive by voting for a proposal on May 3 that would authorize Northrop's acquisition of all outstanding TRW shares. Not to be outdone, TRW management was urging shareholders to reject the proposal.
A flight attendant sustained a broken arm and leg last week when United Airlines Flight 862 encountered clear-air turbulence about 3 hr. out of Sidney, Australia. The Boeing 747-400, en route to San Francisco with 269 passengers and 21 crew on board, was at 30,000 ft. when the event occurred. Six others suffered minor injuries. The aircraft diverted and landed without incident in Auckland, New Zealand.
A new U.S. congressional analysis suggests that the American and Russian military aviation industries share similar pressures; among them the need for continuing consolidation and the drive to sell more aircraft overseas. Russian aviation services in the forefront of international marketing efforts comprise airframe and wind tunnel tests, wind tunnel construction, aircraft control systems design, software development and flight simulator experiments.
Hubert G. Smith and Douglas P. Wolfe have been named senior vice presidents of the Metropolitan Nashville (Tenn.) Airport Authority. Smith was vice president-air cargo and Wolfe vice president-finance.
The Civil Aviation Administration of China and the Beijing government are studying the feasibility of building a second international airport for the capital city. The concern is that even with its recent renovations, Beijing's Capital International Airport will not be able to handle the huge crowds expected for the 2008 Olympics.
Prospects for on-time air travel this summer are fuzzier than usual, but there is one certainty: security measures will extend delays into the airport. As in the past couple of years, the FAA and the airlines have spent the winter trying to develop broader, deeper collaboration in management of the National Airspace System during the summer-travel crunch. And the FAA is continuing to field improvements to the system that increase capacity further, in small increments. A familiar scenario so far, but summer 2002 will be different. Eight months after the Sept.
Bryan D. O'Connor, a former astronaut and space shuttle program director, will return to NASA as associate administrator for safety and mission assurance. Administrator Sean O'Keefe named the 55-year-old retired Marine test pilot to replace Fredrick D. Gregory, who took over the Office of Space Flight in December.
Last year's economic downturn, the tragic events of Sept. 11 and a mild winter have resulted in a significant reduction in air traffic delays. But the economy and air traffic are rebounding. Unless demand remains lower than the experts predict, we will soon see a return to the gridlock that plagued air travelers in the summer of 2000. Recognizing the need to maintain an economic sector responsible for about 9% of GDP and 11.3 million jobs, Congress last year created the Commission on the Future of the U.S.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has selected Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman to refine their work on a quiet supersonic airplane, after reprioritizing the project's objectives to focus more on long-range military aircraft than reconnaissance. The U.S. Air Force already has begun several relatively low-level research and development projects that could give rise to its future bomber, the B-X, which isn't expected to enter service inventory until around 2037. However, the Darpa effort on quieting technology could feed the future bomber's design.
Hundreds of newly trained Transportation Security Administration (TSA) special agents took control of the security checkpoints at two of the five concourses at the Baltimore-Washington International Airport on Apr. 30, the first in a planned nationwide deployment of more than 60,000 passenger and luggage screeners the government says it will put in place at 429 U.S. airports by Nov. 19. The 220 employees, part of what the TSA is calling its national mobile screener force, will receive 60 hr.
After six months riding out the collapse of demand following Sept. 11, the big U.S. airlines are beginning to collect their first solid evidence of how long it will take them to become profitable again. Signals are mixed so far. In March, the Air Transport Assn.'s compilation of the industry-wide passenger load factor showed a year-over-year gain for the third consecutive month. The decline in yields, which predates Sept. 11, may be bottoming out (see graph).
Lockheed Martin is recommending additional flight testing of the F-22 Raptor to generate data that will be used to support a decision on how to address a possible vertical tail buffeting problem with the aircraft. In almost 1,900 hr. of flight tests, F-22s have little more than one-half hr. of data, total, collected in 10-sec. intervals, during which the buffet was present. This is because it is difficult to enter and then sustain the conditions necessary to generate it, program officials said.
U.S. Army Gen. (ret.) John H. Tilelli, Jr., has been appointed to the board of directors of the Raytheon Co., Lexington, Mass. He is president/chief operating officer of Cypress International Inc. and had been commander-in-chief of the U.N. Command and Combined Forces Command for the U.S. Forces Korea. John R. Galvin and Alfred M. Zeien have retired.
The Transportation Dept. ended a dustup among U.S.-Brazil carriers by preserving the status quo until 2003. Citing continued weakness in the market, the department extended waivers of dormancy for four Continental weekly frequencies (Newark-Rio de Janeiro) and two American frequencies (New York Kennedy-Rio) until Dec. 31 and Jan. 8, respectively. It extended indefinitely Delta's temporary allocation of four of the unused frequencies, which enables the airline to operate daily Atlanta-Rio round trips.
