I am amazed that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission is now acting as a broker for the Boeing commercial helicopter division, putting it up for sale to all comers. As a result, either U.S. technology will be sent abroad or the Boeing line will be shut down and American jobs will be lost.
Despite South Korea's negative economic growth, Samsung Aerospace and Lockheed Martin Tactical Aircraft Systems continue to get a green light for the supersonic KTX-2 advanced trainer/ lead-in fighter program and have begun preliminary design of the single-engine aircraft.
BEAL AEROSPACE HAS COMPLETED initial test firings of a subscale, first-stage bipropellant rocket motor at its McGregor, Tex., facility. A series of four tests, each lasting about 24 sec., were completed earlier this month and validated design of the injector and thrust chamber, according to David Baker, Beal's business development and government relations manager. The motor burns a mixture of kerosene and a hydrogen peroxide oxidizer.
Josef Felder, executive vice president/ head of product management at Crossair, is scheduled to become general manager at Zurich Airport in October. Felder will be succeeded by Richard Heidecker, former general manager of Deutsche BA.
Russell D. Turner has been appointed president/CEO of United Space Alliance of Houston. He was president/general manager of Boeing's Rocketdyne Power and Propulsion. Turner succeeds Paul B. Smith, who has resigned.
Safety investigators re-interviewed two AirTran Airlines pilots last week to clarify why their DC-9-32 flew through a hail-laden thunderstorm in early May.
William I.M. Turner, Jr., Howard L. Beck and Gregory A. Yeldon have been appointed directors of NovAtel Inc., Calgary, Alberta. Turner is chairman/CEO of Exsultate Inc., chairman of the Canadian Marconi Co. and a director of Bombardier Inc. Beck is chairman of Wescam Inc. and is a director of Canadian Marconi. Yeldon is vice president/chief financial officer of Canadian Marconi.
With technology making the Civil Air Patrol's primary search-and-rescue mission more efficient, the organization is using its resources to assist federal agencies in congressionally directed counter-drug efforts. In 1997, 5,000 specially trained adult CAP members flew almost 6,600 counter-drug flights and provided reconnaissance information that assisted in the confiscation or eradication of more than $2.6 billion in drug crops, according to Col. Glen Atwell, director of operations.
BOEING IS CONSOLIDATING the sales, marketing and overall management of its transport modification and engineering services into a single entity that will look for expanded commercial airplane business. The new unit, which will be part of Boeing Enterprises and have about 1,200 workers, is aimed at ensuring focused and coordinated efforts with customers. Called Boeing Modification and Engineering Services, it will be comprised of Boeing's main center in Wichita, Kan., and Douglas Products Div. Modifications Services in Long Beach, Calif.
Norman Y. Mineta, senior vice president/managing director of Lockheed Martin IMS Transportation Systems and Services, has been nominated as a member of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority by President Clinton.
Richard A. Black (see photo) has become director of national and theater missile defense programs for Boeing Autonetics Guidance, Navigation and Sensors, Anaheim, Calif. A recently retired U.S. Army brigadier general, Black was commandant of the Defense Systems Management College, Ft. Belvoir, Va.
Asia-Pacific's deep economic malaise and its severe impact on commercial aviation in the region will lead Boeing to scale back production of 747-400s later this year and 777s late next year, although not by much.
Frank Weaver (see photo) has become Washington-based director of business development for satellite services for Boeing. He was associate FAA administrator for commercial space transportation.
Could Motorola become a leading manufacturer of large commercial communications satellites? The company doesn't plan to go head-to-head with the likes of Aerospatiale, Hughes, Lockheed Martin and Space Systems/Loral in major satcom procurements just yet. But, fresh from its success in building and launching the Iridium network and winning the prime contractor role for the Teledesic constellation, Motorola clearly is eyeing such a future.
Japan's Transport Ministry is studying recommendations from the Aviation Council, a government advisory committee, that foreign aircraft be subject to ramp safety inspections beginning next year. The recommendation follows the 1994 crash in Nagoya of a China Airlines A300 and the 1996 crash in Fukuoka of a Garuda Airlines DC-10. Inspectors would look for safety-related certificates and maintenance records, as well as perform maintenance audits.
Teledyne Ryan Aeronautical's Global Hawk reconnaissance drone made its second and third flights recently from Edwards AFB, Calif., gathering airworthiness data and demonstrating control by satellite link with handoffs between two ground stations. The third flight was marred by a hydraulic failure on approach that caused the aircraft to veer off the runway at low speed, causing minor damage.
AFTER A REVIEW OF TWO ACCIDENTS, Transport Canada has imposed a requirement that all commercial aircraft be equipped with an emergency locator transmitter (ELT), which broadcasts a signal on a monitored radio frequency. The ELT in the Pilatus PC-12 that glided without power to a landing near Clarenville, Newfoundland, had been removed for maintenance on May 18, the day of the incident (AW&ST June 8, p. 37). Under the previous rule, aircraft were permitted to operate up to 90 days without an ELT while the device was being maintained.
Betting that it will be past the Asian doldrums after 2000, Korean Air placed orders last week for 22 Boeing 737s plus five options, to replace 12 Fokker 100s and 14 McDonnell Douglas MD-82s on domestic and Japanese routes. The $2-billion order includes 11 each of the 737-800 and -900; the options can be mixed from either model. Deliveries are scheduled from August 2000 through July 2005.
The substantial cost of insuring commercial satellites against launch and in-orbit failures has been plummeting, and it is expected to remain a buyer's market for the foreseeable future. But the favorable outlook also could change--abruptly, some insurance brokers caution.
Joe Vreeman has been named senior vice president-customer support of the Fairchild Aerospace Corp., San Antonio, Tex. He was vice president-engineering and fleet reliability of Northwest Airlines.
The 1,000th production Hawker business jet is in final assembly at Raytheon Aircraft Co.'s facilities in Wichita. The Hawker 800XP is scheduled to be delivered to the Gainey Corp. in Grand Rapids, Mich., late this year. The 800XP evolved from the de Havilland 125, which flew in 1962, through the Hawker 700 that debuted in 1976. The first Hawker 800-series jet was delivered in 1984. Raytheon acquired the program from British Aerospace in 1993 and modified the design to the 800XP configuration.
Dassault Aviation moved one step closer to launching an 8-seat supersonic business jet in 1999. The SuperSonic Business Jet (SSBJ) concept, which was unveiled at last year's National Business Aviation Assn. convention, recently evolved into a defined project, although company executives have not finalized development costs or the aircraft's price tag. A considerable amount of work still must be completed before go-ahead, Bruno Revellin-Falcoz acknowledged. He is Dassault Aviation senior vice president.
The European-U.S. Solar and Heliospheric (Soho) spacecraft observatory captured images of two comets plunging into the Sun's outer atmosphere on June 1 and 2. Shortly after the comets disappeared from view, Soho's Large-Angle Spectrometric Coronagraph observed an enormous coronal mass ejection of hot gas and magnetic energy (lower right in image). Scientists said the ejection was probably unrelated to the comets. They noted the timing of the two occurrences was highly coincidental, however. The comets were vaporized in the Sun's atmosphere by solar radiation.
