More and more North Atlantic routes are being flown by twin-engine transports operating under Extended Twin-engine Operations (ETOPS) approvals. Long-range twins such as the Boeing 757/767/777 and Airbus A330 now operate more than 75% of North Atlantic flights by U.S. airlines, according to Boeing. The figure is 55% if flights over the same route by European carriers are factored in. As of last Dec. 31, Boeing's 777 twin had accumulated more than 100,000 ETOPS flights with only one diversion resulting from an inflight engine shutdown.
The U.S. Navy plans to modify its air-launched missiles to withstand the harsh underwing environment they are exposed to when flown on the F/A-18E/F. One of the concerns with the F/A-18E/F is that weapons are subjected to much greater strains on those aircraft than on the F/A-18C/D. Fins and support structures were damaged during flight testing. But rather than trying to fix the F/A-18E/F, the Navy has decided to make the missiles tougher, says Navy acquisition chief H. Lee Buchanan.
The slow pace of F-22 testing is raising concern within the Pentagon and Congress that could cause the Air Force problems getting approval to enter production of the stealth fighter. The Air Force encountered an unexpected broadside last week when the Pentagon's Director of Operational Testing, Philip E. Coyle, told a Senate subcommittee that ``the rate of progress [in testing] continues to slip.''
General Electric and Pratt&Whitney have accumulated about 70 test hours on their GP7000 core demonstrator since the engine went to test earlier this month at GE's Evendale, Ohio, facility. The test program, now aimed at performance evaluation and variable stator vane schedule optimization, is about one-third complete and should wrap up in late May/early June. The 70,000-lb.-thrust-class GP7000 is targeted at emerging transports such as the Airbus A3XX.
The European Commission has granted conditional approval to a proposed merger of the space activities of DaimlerChrysler Aerospace and Matra Marconi Space into a new company, Astrium, that will be the No. 3 space contractor. As part of a get-tough stance on mergers announced last autumn, the EC launched a full inquiry into the planned merger to ensure that the move would not lead to a dominant position in certain European markets (AW&ST Dec. 13, 1999, p. 30; Oct. 4, 1999, p. 42).
There's hardly an industry today that isn't undergoing an upheaval in how it deals with customers and partners, organizes itself or defines its essential purpose. Aerospace is right in the thick of this change, as manifested in companies' seeming rush to embrace electronic business. As this process continues to gather momentum in coming months, as it surely will, remember this name: Enigma Inc.
As much pressure as Raytheon is under to improve its sagging financial performance, the defense contractor probably would be feeling the heat even more if it weren't for the company's six-sigma initiative. Sigma is a measure of quality, with six sigma equivalent to a minuscule 3.4 defects per million. The company claims that the benefits directly attributable to its six-sigma effort last year are valued at more than $100 million, slightly above management's target, according to Robert W. Drewes, vice president of productivity.
ESA has released the entire database of the International Ultraviolet Explorer for unrestricted access to scientists around the world. The IUE archive contains more than 110,000 spectra from observations that in most cases cannot be replicated. The archive will be available through a special distribution system, INES (IUE Newly Extracted Spectra), either through 17 non-ESA national hosts or directly from the Laboratory for Space Astrophysics and Theoretical Physics in Villafranca, Spain.
Cheryl D. Fells has been appointed vice president-organizational development and administration for the Brecksville, Ohio-based Performance Materials segment of the BFGoodrich Co. She was director of leadership and organizational effectiveness for the Rohm and Halls Co. of Philadelphia. Lynne M. Degand has become vice president-finance and business development for the Charlotte, N.C.-based Engineered Industrial Products segment of BFGoodrich. She was vice president-finance for the Quincy (Ill.) Compressor business of the Engineered Industrial Products segment.
Aerojet has completed a series of tests designed to optimize the low-speed segment of its air-breathing Strutjet engine's air-augmented rocket mode, a region where high thrust levels are critical. Conducted at the company's Sacramento, Calif., facility since early January, three tests explored multiple design refinements, cooling techniques and propellant mixture ratios. They were performed under a NASA contract that extends Strutjet rocket-based combined cycle engine development through 2001 (AW&ST July 5, 1999, p. 57).
Cynthia Halsey (see photos) has been named vice president-interior design and engineering and Craig Estep vice president-Aircraft Completion Center for the Cessna Aircraft Co., Wichita, Kan. Halsey was director of interior design and Estep director of assembly operations.
Just how much growth potential does China's air transport market have? In 1997, the latest year for which records are available, airlines in the world's most populous country enplaned only 2.8% of total world passengers and 1.1% of all those boarding international flights. Passenger numbers totaled only 7.4% of those carried by all U.S. airlines. Overall, the figures show Australia, with a population of around 17 million, has a larger aviation market than China.
Italy's Finmeccanica is expected to decide shortly between rival offerings submitted by BAE Systems and European Aeronautic and Defense Space Co. partners to form a military aircraft-driven joint venture with its Alenia Aerospazio subsidiary, the next major step in the fast-moving consolidation process in Europe. The Italian company is determining whether to cast its lot with the two major industrial groupings which have now emerged in Europe, each still in the midst of rationalizing their own operations along differing philosophical lines:
The U.S. Army has replaced all of its Patriot PAC-2 missiles kept in ready-to-fire status after finding that components, including the radio-frequency downlink, were deteriorating below specification. The degradation affects missiles maintained in the higher alert posture, which are heated and under power. The root cause for the problem is still being investigated. The missiles were replaced within about a week with PAC-2s from storage. Foreign Patriot owners were notified of the problem, but only after the U.S. replaced its missiles.
Exploiting Hong Kong as an Asian hub helped Cathay Pacific Airways pull out of an 18-month financial slump last year and begin thinking again about a fleet renewal. The airline, now in its 54th year, reversed a $70-million 1998 loss--its first in 36 years--to post a 1999 profit of $285 million, largely because of a strong second half. Flights into North America and Europe made up for weakness in the Asian market, where Cathay most often makes its profits.
Strong demand for heavy maintenance has managers at Hong Kong Aircraft Engineering Co. Ltd. talking about expansion--but not in Hong Kong. The maintenance affiliate of Cathay Pacific Airways, Haeco has invested $180 million in a 476,500-sq.-ft. maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) facility at Hong Kong International Airport. It has room to expand there but land prices and overhead are far too expensive, Engineering Director Andrew Hoad said.
The discussion on how to make up for the Milstar satellite lost last year is on the verge of erupting into a fight between Pentagon acquisition officials and military planners. Military officials are asking for an EHF satellite to be built soon to avoid a long gap in EHF coverage starting around 2003. In response, the competitors for the Milstar follow-on--Hughes and a Lockheed Martin/TRW team--are proposing to join forces to speed deployment of the first Advanced EHF satellite by 18 months. But Pentagon acquisition czar Jacques Gansler wants none of that.
Air Chief Marshal Sir Peter Squire will become chief of the air staff at the Royal Air Force in April, succeeding Air Chief Marshal Sir John Richard Johns. Air Marshal Sir Anthony Bagnall, who is being promoted to air chief marshal, will succeed Squire as commander-in-chief of Strike Command.
United Airlines and SNCF French railways have agreed to expand their pioneering multimodal code-sharing agreement to eight additional French cities. Initially limited to Lyons, the agreement, signed in July 1998, will now also feed passengers from Nantes and Rennes in Brittany, Tours, Poitiers, Angers and Le Mans in the Loire Valley, Bordeaux in the Southwest and the northern city of Lille via high-speed train to United flights at Paris Charles de Gaulle airport.
Honeywell also is studying the addition of runway specifics, such as length, slope, and displaced threshold and overrun parameters, to its EGPWS terrain database. This data would help detect and prevent potential runway overrun and other landing accidents by warning pilots who are continuing to fly an unstabilized, fast or high approach. How to most effectively convey and distinguish such a critical advisory in the busy pretouchdown cockpit environment is under discussion. One half-joking suggestion was to have the box say: ``Stop it. You're scaring me!''
Japan's Meteorological Agency said it will turn to the U.S.' NOAA weather satellites as a fill-in if the GMS-5, whose design life ends this month, quits before it can launch a replacement. The GMS-5 was to be replaced by MTSAT-1 which was lost last November in an H-2 launch failure. Last week, Japan's Ministry of Transport named Space Systems/Loral over Mitsubishi Electric to build MTSAT-1RA as the replacement. Delivery is set for 2002 and launch for mid-2003.
Titanium Metals Corp. (Timet) is taking one of its most important customers--the Boeing Co.--to task for allegedly breaking a long-term agreement (LTA), a charge the airframe manufacturer vehemently denies. In a lawsuit filed last week in state court in Denver, Timet formally accused Boeing of repudiating and breaching the 10-year titanium purchase-and-supply agreement between the companies. Under that contract, Boeing was required to purchase, directly or indirectly, certain minimum volumes of titanium products from Timet in each of those years.
Boeing plans to aggressively expand its aircraft maintenance, modification and logistics businesses and ``bundle'' some or all of these services to promote new aircraft sales.
Miami International Airport's new, $18-million control tower is undergoing a design review and may face a redesign, the FAA says. Air traffic controllers complain that four roof-support columns in the 320-ft. tower's cab obstruct their view and could threaten safe operations at the airport. Controllers have said they will not staff the tower unless the problem is corrected. FAA officials say the columns are needed to meet hurricane-survival requirements of Miami's building code.
