Japan's National Space Development Agency and Japanese industry are involved in major tests on two of the agency's largest programs. Flying testbed (FTB) tests for the Selene lunar lander are underway at the Multipurpose Aerospace Park at Taiki on Hokkaido. The $200-million Selene mission is being managed by both NASDA and the Institute of Space and Astronautical Sciences. The mission is set for launch to the Moon in 2005 (AW&ST Dec. 7, 1998, p. 60). The 800-lb. testbed measures 11.5 ft.
The turboprop will be around for many years to come, according to BAE Systems and some market forecasters. Underscoring BAE Systems' long-term commitment to the ATP turboprop, the company's Hatfield, England-based Asset Management arm last week announced new business for the turboprop: Palma, Majorca-based Air Europa Express, Air Europa's regional subsidiary, signed a long-term lease for another ATP, bringing its fleet to 17 aircraft.
The Joint Strike Fighter's small radar cross section and reduced infrared signature are expected to make the new fighter design impervious even to the generation of antiaircraft weapons expected to follow the emerging S-400 family. JSF's low radar cross section (RCS) is not as small as the F-22's, which is marble-size or smaller. JSF's RCS has been described as golf-ball size, but its real advantage will be that ``it is 10 times easier to maintain than the signature of the B-2,'' said Frank Cappuccio, Lockheed Martin JSF program manager.
David Olschansky has been appointed director of NASA and civil programs and Frank Garza program development specialist for Spectrum Astro, Gilbert, Ariz. Olschansky was director of the Mars Surveyor Program 2001 at Lockheed Martin Astronautics. Olschansky succeeds Stan Dubyn, who has resigned. Garza was the senior marketing executive at AlliedSignal Aerospace.
Flight delays, which are increasingly infuriating travelers, are believed to increase the European airlines' operating costs by as much as $5 billion per year. But French air traffic controllers claim the European Commission's effort to restructure and unify air traffic management--and stem delays--is really an attempt to privatize air traffic control, a move that would place their jobs in jeopardy. In a show of their determination to deter privatization efforts, they staged a ``preventive'' 24-hr.
Jim Albaugh, president of Boeing Space and Communications; Albert E. Smith, executive vice president of the Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co.; and Jaleh Daie, director of science programs at the David and Lucille Packard Foundation, all have been elected to three-year terms on the board of directors of the Colorado Springs-based Space Foundation.
All signs point to Airbus Industrie being able to launch the A3XX by December, including the imminent formation of the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Co. and progress toward establishing the Airbus Integrated Co. by year-end. The real question is how much of a trade controversy will erupt between the U.S. and Europe over the $12-billion project.
A majority of Canadian Auto Workers Union members have approved a three-year contract with Bombardier Aerospace. Wages will increase 2% annually and pensions have been improved, as have benefits for retired workers, according to the union.
Jean-Luc Doublet (see photos) has been appointed vice president-industrial operations and Pierre-Emmanuel Gires general manager of the Saint-Quentin production facilities of Snecma Services.
Sue Lyons, Rolls-Royce managing director for defense (Europe), has received an honorary doctorate in science from the University of London's Imperial College.
Michael Barth, manager of Burke Lakefront Airport in Cleveland, has won the National Air Transportation Assn.'s Airport Executive Partnership Award. It recognizes efforts to foster relationships between aviation businesses and airport operators.
Taiwan needs to improve its military. That's the quiet recommendation the Pentagon is communicating to Taipei in a new study on Chinese military capabilities (see p. 32). Among the steps Taiwan should take, the Pentagon indicates, are establishing better pilot training, sufficient logistics support and better maintenance. Furthermore, the Taiwanese air force needs to learn to integrate its disparate aircraft types ``into a cohesive, operational fighting force.'' Other problems the country faces are recruiting and retaining technically qualified personnel.
A financially resurgent, more aggressive Boeing is regaining market share and picking up key sales with less expensive derivative transports, while Airbus is preoccupied with launching the 550-seat A3XX.
The U.K.'s National Air Traffic Services (NATS) is calling in an independent specialist to participate in a review of software problems in its flight data processing system that led to chaos at U.K. airports early last week, just seven days after a previous failure of the same system.
A Wuhan Airlines Y-7 twin turboprop crashed June 22 in central China during a thunderstorm after being struck by lightning, according to the Associated Press. All 42 people on board died in the accident near Wuhan. One of two flight data recorders has been located. Xian Aircraft Corp. began making the aircraft in the 1980s, and there are about 130 operating in China.
IHS Engineering has launched TechSavvy.com (www.techsavvy.com) to provide technical and engineering information to small- and medium-size companies that can't afford its traditional subscription services. TechSavvy can search databases that contain more than 90 million parts, including U.S. government procurement history, as well as standards, historical data, a directory of companies and lists of useful Web sites. The service is either free or fee-based. One use is to input part numbers from old blueprints to find original or alternate suppliers.
Joseph A. Patti (see photo) has been appointed director of marketing for Sextant In-Flight Systems, Irvine, Calif. He was senior marketing manager for Sony Trans Com Inc., also in Irvine.
A Rolls-Royce Trent 500 engine successfully completed its first flight on an Airbus A340-300 flying testbed in Toulouse, France, on June 20. One of seven development Trent 500s, the 56,000-lb.-thrust engine was mounted on the inboard left wing, in place of one of the aircraft's four CFM56-5C4s. The test flight lasted 2.5 hr. and the pilots were able to explore the aircraft's flight envelope up to the maximum 345-kt. operating speed.
RESEARCHERS AT STANFORD UNIVERSITY and Bell Laboratories of Lucent Technologies are using inelastic X-ray scattering (IXS) to study fundamental properties of matter. Earlier knowledge of the electronic states of matter led to the development of semiconductors. The IXS studies started with Mott insulators, which are transition metal oxides. From their small energy gap, conventional theories would predict these materials should be semiconductors, but instead they are strong insulators.
Sikorsky Aircraft and Bombardier Aerospace have teamed to offer the Sikorsky S-92 helicopter as a replacement for Sea King aircraft currently in service with the Canadian Forces. Under the agreement, Sikorsky will assemble the aircraft while Bombardier will have responsibility for aircraft completion including interior installations, mission equipment checkout and exterior painting. The Canadian company also will be responsible for final acceptance and delivery support.
The Joint Strike Fighter is going to be competed on a winner-take-all basis, but in a move widely anticipated by Pentagon insiders, no options for changes at a later date have been foreclosed, essentially tossing a final decision to the next Administration. But, the Rand Corp. has been asked to make an independent assessment to validate the Pentagon's decision.
Rickenbacker International Airport in Columbus, Ohio, is continuing its focus on freight with construction of a third air cargo terminal. The 40,000-sq.-ft. building is scheduled to be completed in November and will be located adjacent to Air Cargo Terminal No. 2, a 57,600-sq.-ft. building now under construction. The airport's 67,200-sq.-ft. Terminal No. 1 was constructed in 1999. Rickenbacker, which has twin 12,000-ft. runways, also has an ``airside'' foreign trade zone.
The June 12 near collision of an arriving US Airways Airbus A320 and departing King Air aircraft at New York's LaGuardia airport (see diagram) drew sharp focus as industry prepared for this week's summit meeting.
Fred Hutchison and Mireille Gerard have become senior partners of the Washington-based Plexus Consulting Group. Hutchinson has owned a government relations and public affairs consuilting firm, and Gerard was head of international business development for the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
Kaman Aerospace Corp. has received a follow-on, $2.7-million contract from the U.S. Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory for further development of the remotely piloted K-MAX helicopter.
