The crash of John F. Kennedy, Jr.'s, Piper PA-32R-301 Saratoga on July 16, 1999, near Martha's Vineyard, Mass., was caused by the ``pilot's failure to maintain control of the airplane during a descent over water at night, which was a result of spatial disorientation,'' according to the NTSB.
Despite procurement reforms introduced nearly two years ago, cost overruns on 25 major U.K. defense projects since their inception declined only slightly--from 2.9 billion pounds to 2.7 billion pounds ($4.38 billion to $4.08 billion)--through the year ended last March, according to a National Audit Office (NAO) report. The average in-service date delay rose by four months to 47 months. The NAO pointed to signs, however, that the Ministry of Defense's ``smart procurement'' initiatives were starting to yield results on several programs.
John W. Kilpatrick Jr., and W. Neill Myers have won NASA's Distinguished Service Medal, the agency's highest honor. Kilpatrick, who is deputy director of the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center's Engineering Directorate, was cited for leadership in the conception, formulation and implementation of a systems management oversight capability for the center.
Kevin C. Campbell has been appointed director of crashworthiness research, Rolf T. Rysdyk a research scientist with expertise in advanced flight control and Vicki S. Johnson associate director of research and development at the National Institute for Aviation Research at Wichita (Kan.) State University. Campbell was an aviation consultant, and Rysdyk a research engineer in the Aerospace Engineering Dept. of the Georgia Institute of Technology.
The U.S. Navy is at sea about what is needed from the fleet of unmanned aerial vehicles it wants to operate from ships, but there are a lot of ideas afloat.
The U.S. Congress is considering yet another NASA effort to dramatically increase the safety and reliability and drastically lower the costs of launching spacecraft into Earth orbit. The Space Launch Initiative (SLI) aims to begin the development of a commercially competitive, privately owned and operated, ``second-generation'' reusable launch vehicle (RLV) that would be flying by 2010. The Clinton Administration is proposing to spend $4.5 billion on this effort through Fiscal 2005.
Scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., have placed wireless sensor webs in two gardens in California to test planned solar system exploration strategies. The pod-based sensors collect data from the environment--in this case monitoring local temperature, humidity, soil moisture and light levels--and use a communication chip to share the information with other pods as well as move it to primary pods. The primary pods transmit the data to the Internet or an overhead satellite.
A group of industry specialists is forming an online electronic marketplace, the Aerospace Hardware Exchange, to streamline the low-end ``commodity hardware'' procurement process for aerospace manufacturers and distributors. Although hardware such as fasteners, bearings, connectors and electrical pieces represents about 5% of the cost of building a new aircraft, it accounts for a $30-billion a year global market, according to Nigel Duncan, chief strategy officer.
Maj. Gen. John F. Phillips (USAF, Ret.), former deputy under secretary of Defense and now vice president-aftermarket growth for Honeywell, has received the 2000 Logistician Emeritus Award from the Washington-based National Defense Industrial Assn. As principal adviser to the undersecretary for Defense for acquisition and technology, Phillips provided oversight and counsel on logistics including material management, maintenance, transportation and system development.
The sophisticated sensors, unfilled spaces and radar-evading potential of the Pentagon's two new stealth fighters are being reanalyzed with an eye to adding electronic warfare capabilities, thereby pushing their usefulness well beyond the primary air-to-air and air-to-ground missions.
To restock its largely depleted inventory of Conventional Air-Launched Cruise Missiles (Calcms), the U.S. Air Force plans to develop and field a new weapon without asking for major improvements in capability. Although the missile's range will be extended, upgrades such as greater survivability or in-flight retargeting will be deferred for a follow-on program around 2010.
U.S. airline service is still falling short of the targets each of the carriers agreed to last September, a move that forestalled a congressional mandate for a passenger bill of rights. A report issued last week by the Transportation Dept.'s Inspector General (IG) comes six months after the carriers' detailed plans to comply with the 12 provisions of the Airline Customer Service Commitment took effect. The IG will make a final report on airline service to Congress by Dec. 31.
Protracted contract negotiations have been concluded between the U.S. Army and Lockheed Martin to allow engineering and manufacturing development of the Theater High-Altitude Area Defense (Thaad) ballistic missile defense system to begin. The $3.9-billion contract is supposed to allow the Army to field an initial defensive capability by 2007.
Officials from Brazil's Embraer recently demonstrated the company's 45-passenger ERJ-145 regional jet to Chinese airline and government officials in Shanghai. The demonstration tour also made similar stops at Chinese airline hubs Beijing, Chengdu, Kunming, Shenzhen and Urumqi. China wants to use regional jets to improve domestic feeder service as well as open new routes to remote western regions it has targeted for development.
Two British-built satellites were launched piggyback atop a Russian spacecraft on a Russian Cosmos 3M booster fired from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome June 28. The primary payload was the Russian Nadezhda-M navigation spacecraft, which also has the capability to relay transmissions from emergency locator beacons. The two small British piggyback spacecraft were built by Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd.
Countering a Russian maneuver to split NATO on missile defense, the Pentagon has assured Europe the U.S. will cooperate with Moscow on theater missile defense and boost-phase intercept technology. ``We're fully prepared to work with the Russians on [TMD],'' Defense Secretary William S. Cohen told a gathering here last week of European NATO, military and diplomatic officials.
Carroll W. Suggs, chairman/CEO of Petroleum Helicopters International, has been selected to receive the National Aeronautic Assn.'s Katharine Wright Memorial Award. Suggs will be cited for the ``encouragement, support and inspiration she provided to her husband in the successful development of Petroleum Helicopters International, and for continuing contributions to the advancement of aviation safety, service and community relations.''
Despite jet fuel prices hovering at levels about 75% above where they were a year ago, the U.S. airline industry is experiencing one of its best operating environments in years, according to Merrill Lynch analyst Candace Browning.
Anear brush with bankruptcy two years ago molded Asiana Airlines from a once brash upstart challenger to Korean Air into a more conservative carrier. Now, instead of chasing market share around the globe, Asiana pursues high-yield regional routes. As 1999 ended, the carrier was again experiencing the double-digit growth rates to which it was accustomed prior to the collapse of Asia's economy in July 1997. ``In some months we achieved 15% growth,'' said Senior Vice President of Marketing Young Yoon Duk.
The PanAmSat PAS-9 spacecraft has been fueled and is ready to depart for the equator within about two weeks on Sea Launch, the first of three launch attempts planned this year by the international consortium. PAS-9, the first mission for Sea Launch since loss of the ICO Global Communications F-1 satellite last March, is set for liftoff late this month. The ICO mission, with a total value of approximately $200 million, was the third Sea Launch campaign and the system's first failure (AW&ST Mar. 20, p. 36).
Eric J. Speck has been appointed president of the Travel Marketing and Distribution Group of the Sabre Holdings Corp. of Fort Worth. John Stow is now president and Ellen Keszler senior vice president of Travel Agency Solutions. Nancy Raynor has become general manager of Sabre VirtuallyThere and Scott W. Smith general manager of Sabre Business Travel Solutions (SBTS).
A new Pentagon study of the Chinese military details the country's extensive modernization efforts ranging from obtaining a space-based reconnaissance capability to electronic warfare, cruise missile and surface-to-air missile upgrades. But analysts disagree about the validity of the report's final conclusions.
Mars Global Surveyor (MGS)--which provided images released last month showing possible evidence of liquid water on the Martian surface during the recent past--is scheduled to continue its mapping operations through February 2001. Project officials said they are putting together a proposal seeking an extension of the mission that would possibly continue operations through at least February 2002. One concern regarding extending operations has been MGS' hydrazine supply to provide spacecraft stability.
