The European Commission has informed IATA that its agreement to set tariffs--chiefly to facilitate freight interlining--restrains competition and is no longer necessary in light of the liberalized airfreight market and widespread bilateral and global alliances. The EC gave IATA two months to reply to the finding. The EC also extended by one year, until June 2002, a similar agreement applying to passenger flights, to allow additional time for comments.
Ryanair, Europe's largest low-cost carrier, has signed a power-by-the-hour maintenance contract with Israel Aircraft Industries' Bedek Div. for its fleet of 21 Boeing 737-200s. Under the five-year, $40-million contract, Bedek will provide maintenance for the aircraft's auxiliary power units, wheels and brakes, landing gear, avionics and other components. The airline began operations on Apr. 26 from its first continental European base at Charleroi, Belgium.
The Royal Australian Air Force is facing considerable volatility. Parts of its primary area of strategic interest are in turmoil, and in modernizing the force, the introduction of several new weapon systems won't be without hurdles. Two events have brought the situation into focus: the deployment of peacekeepers to East Timor, which highlighted several military needs, and last year's release of the Australian defense white paper allowing aggressive modernization.
Boeing has delivered the first 737-900 aircraft to Alaska Airlines, the launch customer for the largest of the four Next-Generation 737 models. The delivery aircraft is the first of 11 Alaska Airlines is scheduled to place in operation through April 2003. The 138-ft.-long 737 will carry 172 passengers in Alaska's two-class configuration. As to revising delivery schedules due to the sluggish economy, Boeing's Chief Financial Officer Michael Sears said the company has not seen any evidence of airlines moving scheduled delivery dates back, unlike in the past when the U.S.
Daniel Rappanello has been appointed director of human resources of Snecma. He succeeds Francoise Deschee Maeker, who has become vice president- communications. Rappannello was vice president-labor relations of Labinal.
Officials negotiating to get the Navy EP-3 off China's Hainan Island say they can't get an aircraft big enough to carry the boxed-up Navy surveillance craft off the short airfield with unreinforced runways where it landed. The U.S. had been negotiating for a Russian An-124 to haul the disassembled aircraft home. Beijing seems determined to make the U.S. destroy the aircraft to get it back.
Japan's NASDA has reiterated interest in cooperating with NASA and French space agency CNES on the Hope-X reusable launch vehicle project, but only after the project has been restructured into a combined effort between NASDA, ISAS and the National Aerospace Laboratory (AW&ST Apr. 9, p. 36). The restructuring will be facilitated by the decision in January to place the three agencies under a superministry of education, science and technology.
The U.S. Air Force has approved replacing the 1960s-vintage instruments in Lockheed U-2S reconnaissance aircraft with modern color displays. The old instruments are difficult to support, and Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. is installing off-the-shelf avionics under the Reconnaissance Avionics Maintainability Program (RAMP) awarded in October 1998 (AW&ST Apr. 12, 1999, p. 60). Production was approved in April.
France is moving ahead with plans to decrease the state's holdings in two major aerospace firms and to open up its defense market to foreign contractors.
The German Cabinet has approved a multiyear space spending plan that will ensure steady funding for domestic projects and international programs such as the International Space Station.
THE SOCIETY FOR INFORMATION DISPLAY WILL HAVE AN UNUSUAL SIDE-BY-SIDE DEMO WITH A NUMBER OF DISPLAYS, each will have an unusual side-by-side demo with a number of displays, each with the same images and test patterns, at its exhibition in San Jose, Calif., June 3-8. Among the products will be the first 3,200 X 2,400 LCD monitor, a 37-in. monitor comprising three LCDs in a nearly seamless array, and the first Taiwanese plasma display shown in North America. Sony will have its new 13-in.
In a major shake-up of the Scandinavian air travel market, Scandinavian Airlines System has agreed to acquire a majority stake in its Norwegian competitor Braathens from KLM and the Braathens family.
A tiny microthruster designed for use on micro-, nano- and pico-satellites has had a successful hot-fire test on a suborbital sounding rocket. Based on micro-electromechanical systems that use silicon chip fabrication technology to create tiny structures, the microthruster is smaller than a small coin (see photo), yet was able to fire more than 20 1-sec. bursts in tests on board a Scorpius rocket launched from White Sands Missile Range, N.M.
Eumetsat is evaluating the possiblity of ordering backup flights for the European Polar Orbiting System (EPS). The EPS Metop satellites are slated to be orbited by Starsem Soyuz-ST boosters in 2005-07. The Starsem Soyuz-ST launcher is a new version of Soyuz to be test-flown next year. A third optional launch is planned starting in 2010. The weather organization is also considering purchasing a fourth launch and two options for three follow-on second-generation Meteosat (MSG) satellites.
A Boeing Delta II carrying the National Reconnaissance Office TRW GeoLITE laser communications demonstration spacecraft lifts off May 18 from Complex 17B. The Geosynchronous Lightweight Technology Experiment spacecraft is now undergoing checkout before initiation of lasercom tests and operational NRO communications using its UHF system. Overall cost of the mission, including the booster, is about $200 million. Ten Delta IIs are scheduled for launch this year, and the flight was the 41st Delta II success since a failure in 1997.
KLM posted a net profit of $68 million for the fiscal year ending Mar. 31, an increase over the previous year but lower than market expectations. The Dutch carrier said it experienced a weakening in demand in the fourth quarter which it attributed to the global economic slowdown. KLM is planning for ``conservative capacity growth'' this year and is still searching for a European partner after failed attempts with British Airways and Alitalia.
NASA managers have approved a $279-million mission to blast a hole in the comet Tempel 1 and study the resulting debris, including pristine material from the comet's interior. Dubbed ``Deep Impact,'' the project will send a 770-lb. projectile hurtling into the comet at some 22,300 mph. A sister craft will gather data on the debris blasted from an expected crater the size of a football field and seven stories deep, using a camera and an infrared spectrometer. Ball Aerospace will build the spacecraft, which is scheduled to reach Tempel 1 in July 2005.
Adm. James O. Ellis, commander-in- chief of U.S. Naval Forces/Europe and Allied Forces Southern Europe, has received the James H. Doolittle Award from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Security Studies Program, in recognition of his service to aviation. He spoke in Cambridge at the Annual Doolittle Aviation Conference on ``The Use of Airpower in the Kosovo Intervention.''
EADS' French unit and Finmeccanica/Alenia Aerospazio are scheduled to form ATR Integrated this week to replace the Avions de Transport Regional industrial grouping. ATR's restructuring is expected to further increase the Franco-Italian joint venture's overall efficiency, executives said.
BAE Systems Australia has signed an agreement worth $200 million with Boeing to provide subsystems for the Royal Australian Air Force's Wedgetail airborne early warning and control aircraft. The company will be responsible for development and supply of electronic warfare self-protection systems, an operational mission simulator and other support functions. The first two of four Boeing 737-based Wedgetail jets are scheduled for delivery in 2006.
Southwest Airlines plans to begin serving Norfolk International Airport in October, using two gates. The low-fare carrier also intends to serve Richmond International Airport, Richmond, Va., but not until terminal expansion projects at several destination cities are completed and capable of accepting more flights from that airport. At present, US Airways and Delta Air Lines each account for about 35% of the commercial traffic at the airport.
Pratt&Whitney F100 and F119 engines have completed a set of aggressive operability and durability tests that fully demonstrate the robustness of the powerplants and their ability to meet their operational requirements, company officials say. F100 trials supporting these conclusions wrapped-up about a month ago, while F119 accelerated mission tests were expected to end late last week.
Unsupportable--that's what senior Royal Australian Air Force officials have concluded regarding their small Boeing 707 tanker fleet. Service planners are trying to assess how best to bridge the operational gap between the retirement of the 707s, which has already begun, and a new refueler coming into service around 2006. The 707 quandary is only one of several areas where RAAF officials are having to come up with a strategy to transition smoothly from the aircraft in inventory to the capabilities slated to be fielded over the next 10-15 years.
