Inflight training experts should recognize risks tied to habits and conditioned reflexes acquired by airline pilots, according to French air safety officials.
Flow time reduction efforts at Boeing's Everett factory have cut from 138 days to 83 days the time it takes to assemble a 777 transport. The aim is to further reduce the process, described as the period from starting assembly of the wings to airplane delivery, to 70 days by the end of 2001. Reduction efforts to date have saved $400 million a year, Boeing said. Many of the changes are being made in conjunction with external and internal suppliers, as late parts are a major source of program inefficiency.
The ``common missile warning system,'' which the Pentagon hoped would be deployed on many different types of U.S. aircraft to protect against surface-fired heat-seeking missiles, has fallen far short of these expectations.
Fred E. Saalfeld, executive director/ technical director of the U.S. Office of Naval Research, has won the Defense Dept. Distinguished Civilian Service Award. He was honored for contributions to national defense and security during his 37-year Navy career.
Robert W. Klein (see photo) has been appointed vice president-advanced systems and technology for airborne early warning and electronic warfare systems for Northrop Grumman Integrated Systems and Aerostructures, Bethpage, N.Y. He succeeds Richard Delasi, who has retired. Klein was director of engineering for AEW and EW Systems.
Navy testers have given Boeing's Standoff Land Attack Missile-Expanded Response (Slam-er) a passing grade and declared the weapon operationally effective and suitable. The verdict marks a turnaround for the missile that the Navy initially deemed operationally effective but not operationally suitable in part because of reliability problems. Pentagon testers found the weapon not even operationally effective, noting that only five of 11 missile launches were on-target. In the latest round of testing the Navy said it scored four hits in four flight tests.
US Airways claims the tentative contract recently reached with flight attendants will allow it to ``compete in the marketplace,'' but a skeptical Wall Street is reserving judgment on the merits of the new labor pact. ``The problem was work rules, not how much money flight attendants made,'' Goldman, Sachs analyst Glen Engel said. ``If management was unable to significantly change those rules, it will be an opportunity forgone.''
Applying crew resource management techniques--possibly even joint training classes--could improve pilot-mechanic interaction in maintenance discrepancy reporting. About 85% of all pilots and maintenance technicians believe miscommunication occurs between them at least half the time when reporting or attempting to resolve maintenance log entries, according to an interdisciplinary survey conducted by students and faculty at Purdue University, including some from the school's Dept. of Aviation Technology.
Pentagon officials still have worries about the growth of weight requirements imposed on the Pratt&Whitney F119 derivative engines that power the advanced short takeoff and vertical landing versions of the Joint Strike Fighter.
The biennial FIDAE International Air and Space Fair was held Mar. 27-Apr. 2 in Santiago, Chile. Exhibitors at this year's show totaled 300 companies and organizations from 26 countries. The number of companies was less than at the show two years ago, but organizers attributed the decline to the amount of consolidation in the global aerospace industry since 1998. Aircraft on static display included those from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, several European countries and the U.S. Flying displays each day included military, commercial and general aviation aircraft.
Trans World Airlines chief Gerald Gitner had some advice at FIDAE for his CEO colleagues at Latin American airlines. ``If you want to spot trends, keep your eye on the U.S.,'' he said. What did he have in mind specifically? Basically, it was that these carriers should brace themselves for more consumer complaints and a spreading of the passenger rights movement. ``Where will it all stop? Not at the borders of the United States,'' he said. ``If you are in, or plan to be in, an alliance with U.S. carriers, be prepared to meet U.S.
The European airline industry's robust growth and Air France's turnaround are reinvigorating debate about the need for an all-new major airport in the Paris area.
An analysis of 68 hubs by Solomon Smith Barney shows major differences in the role they play by continent. U.S. hubs, by far the most dominant, may have peaked in their importance. Growth for hub-and-spoke airlines was strongest in non-hub markets in 1999 (up 15%), while the percentage of seats flown out of hubs by hub airlines fell 0.5 points to 55.3%. In Europe, hub competition is drawn along alliance lines--and the Star Alliance is gaining relative to Oneworld.
As Latin American airlines struggle to turn a profit in an era of deregulation, many have been suffering in silence with steeply rising fees for second-rate aviation infrastructure. No more, the air carriers say.
Kollsman Inc. has won a two-year $2.8-million service contract from the U.S. Army to develop the Switchable Eyesafe Laser Rangefinder Designator for the Apache AH-64A and AH-64D Longbow attack helicopters.
To boost its ability to detect weapons proliferation, the Los Alamos National Laboratory wants to use reconfigurable gate array processors for more powerful signal processing on future satellite sensors. The lab is working with Xilinx Inc., which is making specially-processed radiation-hardened versions of its Virtex field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs).
If you are a farmer, water is everything. If it does not rain, crops will die. The grass will turn brown, and animals will have nothing to eat. All will be lost. The satellite industry is not much different. Spectrum is as important to the satellite industry as water is to the farmer. Without spectrum, the industry can die. Thus those with responsibility for protecting the spectrum must do so wisely.
India adamantly disputes the charge that foreign investment in its economic expansion is threatened by a nuclear arms race with Pakistan. No such race is in the offing for the simple reason that neither country can afford a nuclear arsenal, and both New Delhi and Islamabad have pledged to adhere to a policy of ``minimal nuclear deterrence,'' subcontinent authorities insist.
James H. Zrust has been named vice president-tax for the Boeing Co. He held the same position at Honeywell Inc. in Minneapolis. Zrust succeeds Denny Crispin, vice president-insurance and taxes, who has retired. Theodore Austell, 3rd, has become Washington, D.C.-based vice president-international policy. He was vice president-government relations for Tenneco. Frederick W. Sine has been appointed vice president of Boeing Airplane Services. He was vice president-line maintenance for US Airways.
Francis J-P Latapie has been named vice president-government and regulatory affairs at Astrolink, Bethesda, Md. He was vice president-government affairs at Iridium.
