Officially, the Air Transport Assn. (ATA), which represents major U.S. airlines, strongly backs the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS), the collection of ground stations designed to make GPS signals suitable for all phases of flight, right through Category I precision approaches. But privately, many member airlines see WAAS as a big waste of money, reports Aerospace Daily, an Aviation Week newsletter.
A camera problem scrambled many of the pictures of Jupiter's moon Io taken by the Galileo spacecraft in October, but they were saved by a clever Jet Propulsion Laboratory engineer and the graphical programming of National Instruments' LabVIEW software. The camera was supposed to average 2 X 2-pixel blocks into single pixels to cut radiation-induced noise, but instead it superimposed the left- and right-hand sides of the image, shifted odd and even lines and caused other problems (see top photo).
Boeing last week declared talks with its striking engineers and technical workers' union had reached an impasse and likely will try to impose its own contract terms on the workers. The union has several options to block the move, however.
U.S. officials are trying to salvage an open skies agreement with Argentina. Top State Dept. officials were in Buenos Aires last week, hoping once again to persuade the national government there to proceed in September with phasing out restrictions on the destinations served and flight frequencies offered by U.S. and Argentina carriers between the countries. The current treaty calls for the elimination of most flight restrictions by 2003.
Jaap Schijve, professor of fatigue and fracture, at the Delft (Netherlands) University of Technology, received the 1999 John W. Lincoln Award at the U.S. Air Force Aircraft Structural Integrity Program Conference. The award honors John W. Lincoln of the USAF Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio.
Bernie Cairns has been appointed materials director for the CTS Corp.'s Glasgow, Scotland-based interconnect systems business.He was planning and procurement manager for Compaq Computers' High Performance Systems.
National Transportation Safety Board metallurgists last week were examining witness marks on the gimballed nut and the lower mechanical stop from the horizontal-stabilizer jackscrew from the Alaska Airlines MD-83 that crashed Jan. 31 off the coast of California. They hope to determine if those parts failed prior to impact with the Pacific Ocean and whether that failure contributed to the crash, which killed all 88 on board.
Under a unanimously adopted Senate bill, Russia would lose U.S. payments for the International Space Station unless it halted the transfer of missile technology and weapons of mass destruction to Iran. Any entities under the Russian Aviation and Space Agency that assist Iran would be named in biannual presidential reports to Congress, and subject to a cutoff of U.S. funding if they violated the nonproliferation provisions set forth in the Senate language.
The Indian government will review proposed policy guidelines, issued in January, that would bar foreign airlines from holding equity stakes in Indian Airlines and other domestic carriers. According to senior officials in the Ministry of Civil Aviation, the government may decide to allow foreign investment on an ad hoc basis ``if there are good reasons for doing so.'' The Confederation of Indian Industry and private domestic airlines have slammed the draft guidelines, and urged that New Delhi allow up to 49% of stock to be held by foreign carriers (AW&ST Feb. 21, p.
Kollsman Inc. has been selected by the U.S Army for a $2.8-million contract to develop the switchable eye-safe laser range finder designator for the Apache AH-64A and D attack helicopters.
Pratt&Whitney, Singapore Technologies Aerospace and SIA Engineering have signed a memorandum of understanding to form an engine part repair joint venture in Singapore. The company will take advantage of Pratt&Whitney's Electron Beam Physical Vapor Deposition coating and Turbotip plating technologies for high-pressure turbine blade repair. The company will focus initially on repairs of PW4000 turbine airfoils. It will be colocated with the Turbine Overhaul Services Pte. Ltd. partnership between Pratt and STA.
Cassini spacecraft data has been used to determine that one side of asteroid 2685 Masursky, imaged earlier this year, is approximately 9-12 mi. across. The spacecraft made images of the asteroid at a distance of about 960,000 mi. using wide- and narrow-angle systems and various spectral and polarizing filters. The asteroid is too small to be measured from Earth. Program officials said it was the first use of the spacecraft's automated object-targeting capability and that the system operated successfully.
An Ariane 44LP booster has successfully orbited the Superbird 4 telecom satellite. The 8,990-lb. spacecraft will be operated by Space Communications Corp.
Chester M. (Chet) Lee, chairman of Spacehab's Astrotech Space Operations unit and a veteran of NASA manned space programs, died on Feb. 23 in Washington, following heart bypass surgery. He was 80. Lee joined Spacehab in 1987, following a 23-year career at NASA. He was mission director for the Apollo 12-17 manned Moon landings and the Apollo-Soyuz U.S.-Soviet joint manned flight. A 1942 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Lee had also commanded a destroyer and been involved in the Polaris missile program.
Rockwell Collins and BFGoodrich Aerospace said they have formed an alliance to combine their industrial strengths for providing airlines with equipment, parts, maintenance and services. Rockwell Collins will emphasize avionics and inflight entertainment while BFGoodrich will supply specialty avionics and accessories, wheels and brakes, landing gear, thrust reversers and safety systems.
The U.S. Air Force has exercised single three-year options valued at more than $605 million of two support contracts to operate and maintain the Arnold Engineering Development Center, Tullahoma, Tenn. This action extends the current five-year contracts held by Sverdrup Technology Inc. and ACS.
Problems with FAA certification of special equipment installed in Legend Airlines' DC-9 fleet has forced the startup carrier to delay revenue operations until the issues are resolved.
US Airways, hit with the likelihood of a strike by flight attendants, indicated last week it will shut down when a 30-day cooling-off period expires on Mar. 25. The National Mediation Board has declared that the more than three-year-old contract talks between the airline and its 10,000 flight attendants are at an impasse, and the employees have declined binding arbitration. Management's rationale for shutting down would be to avoid losing customers' confidence in the face of the labor action.
Michael Hancock has been named senior vice president-American operations of U.K.-based Servisair following the acquisition of Global Group of Cleveland and Tri-Star Airline Services of Dallas.
Thomson-CSF and state-owned shipbuilder DCN plan to form a 50-50 joint venture in the area of naval programs and combat systems. The venture is intended to streamline management of the Franco-Italian Horizon frigate program, in which the two firms are involved, and make the companies more competitive in the international arena.
Bombardier Aerospace is scheduled to open a new business jet service center at Dallas' Love Field during the second quarter of this year. The 43,500-sq.-ft. facility, housed within Signature Flight Support's complex, will be used chiefly to provide maintenance and parts for more than 200 Learjets and Challenger airplanes based in Texas and Mexico. Service and support for the larger Bombardier Global Express is set to begin in 2001. Plans call for hiring about 30 maintenance technicians initially, although more could be added, according to Bombardier officials.
The Galileo spacecraft flew by Jupiter's moon Io at 124 mi. on Feb. 22, the lowest altitude yet. Initial telemetry indicates the event went well, but Galileo went into a ``safe mode'' on Feb. 24 after starting playback of encounter data to Earth. Engineers were diagnosing the problem late last week. The spacecraft computer had resets 5 hr. before and 11-12 hr. after encounter but on-board software prevented these from turning into full-blown safe modes, allowing scientific data collection to continue.
The Hong Kong Aerospace Forum thought the Singapore show would be a perfect venue for auctioning aerospace memorabilia to benefit Orbis International, which has benefitted millions of people with eye problems in some of the world's poorest nations. Orbis flies a DC-10 that provides complete surgical services without charge. But the Singapore taxman wanted a cut of anything the forum sold, no matter that the proceeds all went to charity. The solution: Hold the auction but do it online so it was out of Singapore's reach.
The U.S. Air Force's first hybrid launch vehicle--combining motors from deactivated Minuteman II ICBMs and Orbital Sciences Corp. Pegasus XL boosters--worked as planned, with orbit insertion numbers well within the target.
