John Chambers, CEO of Cisco Systems, the Internet routing giant, uses the analogy of dog years in explaining the pace at which the Internet is developing. One Internet year, he says, is equivalent to seven human years. Under Chambers' timeline, it's already been more than two years since BAE Systems, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon announced in late March that they intended to form an independent electronic marketplace for the aerospace and defense (A&D) industry.
Fly Low, Fly Fast, Inside the Reno Air Races by Robert Gandt is the true story of the Reno National Air Races. It introduces you to the cockpit of the world's fastest propeller aircraft--and the rare breed of pilots who race them. The 1997/98 Unlimited Championships at Reno--the world of cool pilots with hot airplanes--is described in vivid, heart-racing detail. Screaming around the 9.125-mi. course for eight laps at speeds of more than 450 mph., there's a lot that can go wrong.
Primagraphics has introduced the Virgo Peripheral Component Interconnect board, a single-slot PCI radar input card for its new Metro range of PCI radar acquisition and display systems. The card allows the connection of a wide range of radar types to a standard PCI workstation. The Virgo PCI accepts 2,048 or 4,096 azimuths per 360 deg. There is no limit on radar range. The PCI is software-controlled to allow automatic or manual radar interface control.
RAYTHEON TRAVEL AIR'S FRACTIONAL OWNERSHIP PROGRAM has signed its 550th customer in fewer than three years of operation. When the business was launched in August 1997, Travel Air had 13 airplanes and 42 owners, but has grown to a fleet of 78 aircraft and 550 owners. The company also has begun selling shares in the new Premier I entry-level business jet, which is scheduled to receive FAA certification late this summer, and the Hawker Horizon, which features a cabin significantly larger than that on the Hawker 800XP.
Talk about egg on your face! The Defense Security Service presented one of its James S. Cogswell Awards for Outstanding Industrial Security Achievement to Loral Space&Communications last week only to yank it back the next day. ``Your company's superior execution of security responsibilities has contributed significantly to our country's national security needs,'' gushed the service's director, Lt. Gen. Charles J. Cunningham, Jr., (USAF Ret.).
The Coalition of Airline Pilots Assn. (CAPA) is petitioning the FAA to issue an airworthiness directive mandating replacement of circuit cards used to detect fires in cargo holds of Boeing 757 and 767 transports built before 1999. According to the petition, defective cards can render detection systems inoperative when one of the dual smoke detector systems fails. If a fire occurs, pilots may not be aware of the need to suppress it or to make an emergency landing.
Failure to issue a ``hold short'' order resulted in temporary decertification of a 17-year veteran controller assigned to Newark (N.J.) International Airport. On July 19 at 9:02 a.m. local time, an American TransAir Boeing 727 landing on Runway 4R was cleared to cross Runway 11-29 via the Zulu taxiway. The ATA aircraft proceeded left onto Zulu across Runway 4L as a Continental Airlines 737 departed Runway 4L, passing within 500 ft. vertically and 1,000 laterally.
Northrop Grumman chief Kent Kresa has maintained throughout the industry's consolidation of the last five years that he would not overpay for any property and destroy shareholder value, no matter how desirable the quarry. For better or worse, that philosophy cost the company the defense holdings of Texas Instruments and Hughes Electronics in the late 1990s and more recently Lockheed Martin Aerospace Electronics System, of which Sanders was the most coveted prize.
Sino Swearingen Aircraft Co. has begun assembly of three SJ30-2 business jets that conform to production configuration. All three will be used in the certification program. Serial No. 2 (left) has completed the wing mate procedure and the vertical stabilizer has been installed along with various subsystems, according to a company official.
THE FAA DEDICATED THE FINAL DISPLAY SYSTEM Replacement (DSR) at Washington Air Route Traffic Control Center last week. Lockheed Martin's DSR project replaces 20-30-year-old systems at 20 U.S. en route centers with a network of color workstations for controllers, improved software and infrastructure. DSR will improve the flow of information across center boundaries, and its improved processing capability will enable the FAA to implement planned system upgrades and decision support and software tools such as Conflict Probe.
Growing demand for flexible travel is fueling growth of fractional ownerships in Europe as private and public companies seek to expand business opportunities throughout the region.
Eurofighter partners are already pushing ahead with development of follow-on capabilities for the new fighter as they prepare to begin final assembly of the first production aircraft this autumn.
Bad bearings make noise. But figuring out which bearing is making the noise--or whether any bearing is making noise--in a noisy environment is not easy. CTRL Systems Inc. of Westminster, Md., has developed ultrasonic sensors that pinpoint the source of friction-induced noise. Besides detecting bearings that have gone bad, the sensors use sound feedback to detect bearings that will fail because they lack lubrication. Ultrasound also detects vibration that is a fault indicator before heat or noise indicators arise.
General Electric will maintain and overhaul CFM56-3C1 engines for Boeing 737-400s operated by Japan Airlines subsidiary Japan TransOcean Air under a 10-year, $140-million contract.
Petroleum Helicopters Inc. recently reached 9 million hr. of helicopter flight time, equivalent to 1,800 round trips to the Moon. The 50-year-old company logged its first million hours in 1970, according to Chairman and President Carroll W. Suggs. PHI provides helicopter transportation and related services to the oil and gas industry and air medical programs.
HN series RF connectors feature overlapping dielectric interfaces with long dielectric creep paths to achieve a 1500 VRMS rating. Slightly larger than standard ``n'' type connectors, they are offered as straight and right-angle plugs, jacks, receptacles and as in-series and between-series adapters for use with cables from 0.195-0.945 in.
Jean-Paul Bechat has been elected president of Gifas French aerospace industries association for a second two-year term. Bechat is chairman/CEO of Snecma.
Carl R. Roberts has been appointed general manager of the California Drop Forge subsidiary of Fansteel of Los Angeles. He was director of operations of the Pomona, Calif., casting facility of Allegheny Teledyne.
Polish airline LOT will buy $49 million worth of Rolls-Royce AE 3007 turbofan engines to power nine Embraer ERJ-145 regional jets. The airline converted six options to firm orders and will procure three additional aircraft.
EADmotors has introduced a family of low-inertia DC motors capable of achieving precision angular accuracy rates in severely dry environments and in uncommonly high-altitude applications. The design is nondependent on the commutation energy discharge ion layer between brush face and commutator. The motors feature a hollow ironless basket-wound armature over a stationary permanent magnet structure. High torque-to-inertia ratios up to 150,000-to-1 and start/stop capabilities up to 2,000 cps.
Soon after the U.S. Air Force was formed in 1947, senior officials realized the need for a special intelligence collection to help organize its fragmented covert activities and to develop the ability to build and support small numbers of specialized aircraft.
BAE Systems, already well on its way to integrating Marconi Electric Systems and gearing up to transfer its Airbus assets to the new Airbus Integrated Co. (AIC), has its eye set firmly on the next step--transatlantic consolidation. ``We've really done all we can do in Europe [in terms of consolidation],'' said Mike Turner, one of two chief operating officers at the company responsible for major business units, including Airbus. ``There is some tidying up to do, but sorting out Airbus was the real last step.''
Perhaps the most technically brilliant military stroke of the 1990-91 Persian Gulf war was the destruction of the sophisticated integrated Iraqi air defense system in the opening hours of the allied air offensive.
