George Foyo has become president of Galaxy Latin America, a subsidiary of Hughes Electronics, El Segundo, Calif. He also will be a vice president of Hughes. Foyo was president/managing director of Caribbean and Latin American operations for AT&T.
Turkey's proposed procurement of new airborne early warning aircraft is back on track. Long-standing problems with treasury officials over funding for the project have been resolved. The armed services will provide $600 million from their budgets with the remainder met by special government taxes and lottery earnings. A decision is expected in the next few months. A Boeing 737 platform equipped with Northrop Grumman's multirole electronically scanned radar, which was recently selected by Australia, is considered the favorite in the competition.
Lockheed Martin Corp. will restructure its aeronautical and space businesses, effectively immediately. Annual savings are expected to total $200 million--partly at the expense of about 2,800 employees.
When President Clinton issued a policy directive in 1994 clearing the way for the licensing of privately operated satellite imagery systems, he included a provision that allows the U.S. government to require companies to turn off their cameras over sensitive areas in times of crisis.
The first Orbital Suborbital Program (OSP) space launch vehicle was launched Jan. 26 from Vandenberg AFB, Calif., at 7:03 p.m. PST, the opening of its 3-hr. launch window. The booster used Minuteman II first- and second-stage motors combined with Orbital Sciences Corp. Pegasus XL third- and fourth-stage rocket motors. The U.S. Air Force Minuteman II was deactivated as an offensive weapon system by the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in 1991.
Investors and analysts trying to second-guess Hughes Electronics' canny managers have gone wrong before. Will they go wrong again as they chew over Hughes' latest bold move--selling off, outright, the satellite manufacturing operations to concentrate on services such as DirecTV? Some analysts and old space hands wonder if Hughes is sacrificing the technology base that has served it so well during the years, drawn in by the allure of the consumer businesses' high margins and relatively low exposure to government red tape and regulation.
The Republican Senate leadership is in no mood to accommodate the Administration's desire for an early vote on China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO), to keep it out of presidential politics. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) delights in pointing out the political heartburn Vice President Al Gore will suffer if White House impatience for legislative action riles up WTO opposition from labor unions and environmentalists, two key Democratic constituencies. The White House is said to be hoping for a vote no later than August.
You should be worried. Every time the communications industry becomes entangled in the political issues, bad things happen. The last time, just this past year, Congress dealt a body blow to the satellite industry by enacting ill-advised export control legislation.
Mineral and petroleum geologists who have used U.S. Landsat and other spacecraft for years to characterize terrain for potential exploration, are now keeping an eye on each other with the new higher resolution Landsat 7. The satellite was launched last April carrying a sensor suite that can provide up to 30-meter (98-ft.) resolution.
The year ahead will put U.S. airlines in a tighter squeeze than ever. Their costs are rising, the U.S. fleet has gotten bigger and traffic growth is hard to get. This combination means a tough year of competition for the carriers. As a consequence, there will be continued downward pressure on airline ticket prices. Consumers can expect some good deals, perhaps even a fare war or two.
After a month of testing, the curse of contaminated aviation gas that has afflicted two-thirds of the Australian general aviation fleet hasn't gone away. Just five of 6,000 aircraft tested were permitted back into the air last week, in part because hundreds of test kits failed to arrive at airports throughout the country. The fuel crisis has been traced to a toxic alkaline corrosive cleaning agent used by Mobil to clean its cracking plant in the southern state of Victoria.
Crossair is assembling an international team of experts to review ``operational and technical aspects'' at the Swiss regional carrier. The move, which follows the Jan. 10 crash of one of the carrier's Saab 340B turboprops, is designed to promote clear and open communications regarding flight operations and maintenance activities. The accident, in which 10 people were killed, is still under investigation.
The International Air Transport Assn., which annually updates a five-year air cargo forecast, predicts growth will average 5.5% through 2003. Earlier estimates put average growth at 6%, based on a pickup in traffic with the end of the Asian recession. IATA says growth will taper to just above 5% by the end of the period.
Italian space officials are mounting an 11th-hour effort to keep alive Europe's Vega light launcher project. Initially conceived as an Italian initiative, Vega is now proposed as a European Space Agency program. However, France's decision to withdraw support cost the project its second biggest backer (AW&ST Oct. 25, 1999, p. 40).
Domodedovo Airlines, one of the 10 largest Russian domestic carriers, has been forced to cancel most of its scheduled flights after regional government tax authorities froze the airline's bank accounts. The state-owned airline, which carries about 70% of the traffic between Moscow and Far Eastern destinations, has run up debts of $759,000 with the regional government. Other creditors are also pressing to be paid, including airports and fuel companies.
Runway incursions pose the most serious threat to safe air travel in the U.S., according to government and industry officials who are stumped as to how they can reduce that threat quickly.
German aerospace industry association BDLI is urging the government not to go ahead with a proposed stiffening of export controls for military hardware systems. Noting that German companies such as DaimlerChrysler Aerospace were in the middle of European defense industry consolidation, BDLI chief Eberhard Birke warned that such controls would only encourage industry executives to transfer plants and jobs to other countries in Europe.
India says it will create an aviation security force employing 20,000-25,000 personnel to put commandos on 37 ``sensitive'' domestic and international routes. The Civil Aviation Ministry acted in the wake of the Christmas Eve hijacking of an Indian Airlines Airbus A300 flying to New Delhi from Kathmandu, Nepal (AW&ST Jan. 1, p. 46). Civil Aviation Minister Chaman Lal Gupta said that, depending on the size of the aircraft, two to six National Security Guard commandos will be deployed on the routes, which his agency and the Home Ministry chose.
Despite the plight of two key competitors in trying to launch satellite-based telephone services, Globalstar has retained the confidence and support of Wall Street. Investors' faith in the $3.8-billion venture, which aims to offer worldwide voice service to industries and individuals with far-flung interests, is based in large measure on their faith in its leader. For more than 20 years as the head of Loral Space&Communications, Bernard L. Schwartz, guided the company to produce average annual returns of 27% to investors. Loral owns 45% of Globalstar.
When the aerospace industry gathers next month for Asian Aerospace 2000 in Singapore, it will step into a region emerging from one of the worst recessions since World War II. The crisis triggered the grounding of some airlines while freezing the plans of others. It precipitated riots and toppled a government, prompted military planners to rethink strategy and squelched nationalist plans for aircraft making.
Lockheed Martin is launching a new effort to sell F-16s to Saudi Arabia. The initial campaign is for 24 aircraft, said one source. Several years ago, Saudi Arabia was considering a major F-16 buy, but those plans ended with the drop in the price of oil. Even though oil prices have rebounded, Lockheed Martin's efforts to secure a new order are expected to take at least two years.
The U.K. is considering a U.S. proposal regarding the possible use of the phased array, early warning radar site at RAF Flyingdales in North Yorkshire as an element of a U.S. National Missile Defense (NMD) system. ``The U.S. has informed us of the role they'd like Flyingdales to play in NMD,'' Ministry of Defense officials said. The proposal is still under study and the U.K. has made no commitments, they said, noting the U.S. has yet to decide on proceeding with NMD deployment.
Scott Spangler has been named editor-in-chief of publications for the Experimental Aircraft Assn., Oshkosh, Wis. He was editor of Flight Training magazine and succeeds Jack Cox, who has retired.
