Raymond Deque has received the French air and space academy's Grand Prix, for achievement in heading the Aerospatiale engineering staff that developed Airbus Industrie's fly-by-wire control systems.
Divers recovered the digital flight data recorder (DFDR) of Kenya Airways' Airbus A310-300 that plunged into the ocean on Jan. 30, off the Ivory Coast (AW&ST Feb. 7, p. 43). Late last week, however, the DFDR had not been been read, and probable causes for the accident had not been determined. Divers are still looking for the cockpit voice recorder. A Kenyan navy diver died while searching the wreckage.
GKN Westland Aerospace is opening a new icing research wind tunnel at London Luton Airport that can accommodate small components and structures. The facility, built by GKN subsidiary Aerospace Composite Technologies (ACT), will be capable of producing ice crystals as well as supercooled liquid water droplets to simulate a wide variety of icing conditions in static air temperatures as low as -30C.
Despite an adequate supply of pilots retiring from Israel's air force, Arkia Israeli Airlines is having difficulty filling some cockpit positions. Israel's younger generation is looking for different careers such as the fast-moving, high-technology computer field, according to Israel Borovich, president and CEO. The airline provides domestic scheduled service and international charters. Although in past years, overseas travel opportunities were valued, they now are considered ordinary, he said.
Rolls-Royce Turbomeca has signed a five-year contract valued at up to $49 million for repair of RTM332 engines and modules for the U.K.'s Defense Helicopter Support Agency.
The FAA is close to clearing obstacles that have blocked it from tapping nearly $1 billion in President Clinton's budget for the agency for each of the last three fiscal years. Clinton's proposed $11.22-billion FAA budget for Fiscal 2001, which starts Oct. 1, calls for the agency to collect $965 million in user fees. Last year, his budget projected bringing in $1.5 billion in fees collected from those who use FAA services to certify and operate aircraft.
United Airlines has fundamentally changed and streamlined its pilot hiring process following years of record industry hiring that has thinned the pool of qualified applicants. The Chicago-based carrier has lowered vision requirements to the ``correctable to 20/20'' stipulated by Federal Aviation Regulations, dropped its $50 application fee and cut the period rejected applicants must wait to reapply from 12 months to six.
As Russia intensifies its efforts to end the fighting in Chechnya, its air force appears to be applying lessons learned from the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in conducting its second offensive against rebel forces in Chechnya.
Airbus Industrie plans to replace the A300/A310 twinjets, its original twin-aisle aircraft developed in the 1970s, with a shortened-fuselage derivative of the A330. No schedule has been determined for the program, which would use the A330's fuselage (including its fly-by-wire control systems and glass cockpit) and retain the A300-600 wing's basic design.
Marc Boonen has been named general manager of North American operations for Belgium-based LMS International. He was international sales and marketing manager.
British and American defense secretaries signed an agreement last week during a security policy conference in Munich pledging to improve industrial and defense equipment cooperation between the countries. They hope the declaration of principles will lead to specific, legally binding agreements on issues ranging from military requirements to export policies. Pentagon officials said talks for similar agreements were underway with Germany, Australia, the Netherlands and France, with Sweden soon to follow.
An advanced Progress spacecraft sent to support reactivation of Russia's Mir space station was paid for with NASA funds intended to help Moscow de-orbit the aging outpost. NASA had agreed to help scuttle Mir after Russian officials said they did not have enough Progress and Soyuz vehicles to supply both Mir and the new International Space Station. But the Progress M1 tanker/transport that NASA thought would be used for de-orbiting instead arrived at Mir on Feb. 3 to deliver supplies and re-boost the station's orbit.
A NASA/Boeing Rocketdyne team at the Stennis Space Center, Bay St. Louis, Miss., has successfully fired an XRS-2200 linear aerospike engine for 125 sec. at full power. This longest test to date included the first thrust vectoring of the engine where its individual combustion chambers were cycled providing differential thrust across the aerospike ramps. Two similar engines are eventually to power the X-33 reusable launch vehicle demonstration vehicle.
Composite liquid oxygen tanks are to be developed at Marshall Space Flight Center for evaluation in NASA's X-34 program. Two tanks are under a 50-50 cooperative agreement between the center and Lockheed Martin Michoud Space Systems. The first tank, currently under construction, will be used for ground testing, while the second structure it intended to be used on the third vehicle within the X-34 program, a demonstration effort to study technologies aimed at lowering launch costs.
Checkout has been completed on the three main instruments of the European Space Agency's recently orbited X-ray Multi-Mirror (XMM) spacecraft, clearing the way for the initiation next month of full science operations. European space officials last week unveiled several images taken by XMM after its doors were opened on Jan. 25. The $700-million observatory is designed to peer five times deeper into the universe than NASA's Chandra X-ray observatory, but at lower resolutions (AW&ST Dec. 20, 1999, p. 126).
ADP Management, a joint subsidiary of the ADP Paris airports authority and Groupe Suez, will acquire for $120 million a 9.99% stake in Beijing Capital International Airport (BCIA). Late last year, ADP Management concluded a five-year ``strategic partnership'' with BCIA, in an initiative set to boost the airport's overall efficiency and increase its non-aviation revenues. Recently, an additional terminal was completed to raise Beijing airport's capacity to 35 million passengers per year. BCIA was partly privatized on Feb. 1 and is now listed on the Hong Kong exchange.
The extensive use of airpower by Russia in the conflict in Chechnya is laying bare shortfalls in air force capabilities and spurring calls for greater modernization efforts.
Bertrand Piccard, who with Brian Jones completed the first nonstop round-the-world balloon trip, has been appointed goodwill ambassador for the United Nations Population Fund.
The new Spanish Hispasat 1C spacecraft now undergoing checkout in geosynchronous orbit is shown during prelaunch anechoic chamber tests at Alcatel facilities (right) in Cannes, France. It was launched from Cape Canaveral on Feb. 3 on board a Lockheed Martin/International Launch Services Atlas 2AS booster with four solid rocket motors (below). Two previous Hispasat missions were launched by Ariane 4s.
Boeing's engineers and technical workers went on strike last week after last-minute negotiations by the nation's top federal labor mediator failed to resolve an impasse in contract talks. An estimated 75% of Boeing's 22,000 engineers and technicians walked off the job on Feb. 9, the first day of the job action.
The apparent first-stage nozzle failure of a Nissan M-5 vehicle on Feb. 10 after its launch from the Kagoshima Space Center resulted in the loss of the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science's Astro-E X-ray observatory. The satellite separated from the launcher but appears to have burned up in the atmosphere. Officials said a camera mounted on the M-5 showed an apparent breach of the solid-rocket motor's nozzle by exhaust gases at 25 sec. and 41 sec. after liftoff.
The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) and China have approved an air services agreement that opens the way for future expansion between the two entities. Although Hong Kong is part of China, its SAR status gives it economic and regulatory independence, hence the need for the updated air services bilateral. The pact allows airlines of both sides to operate scheduled services. The effect is to open route rights for Hong Kong carriers equally with mainland Chinese carriers.
Russia's efforts to consolidate its aerospace industry into integrated companies covering all aspects of production--from R&D to customer support--are moving forward with the creation of the Tupolev Joint Stock Co., nearing completion. The company, with an initial capitalization of $277 million, combines ANTK Tupolev (more commonly known as the Tupolev Design Bureau) and Ulyanovsk-based aircraft production plant Aviastar. The Russian government holds a 51% stake in the company.
