THE U.K. PLANS TO USE TWO GROUND-BASED tracking radars from Tracor Services Corp. during the test and evaluation of Eurofighter 2000. The Defense Evaluation and Research Agency is procuring the transportable G-Band RIR 799 range instrumentation radars under a $16-million contract. Tracor will install them at the Aberporth Range in Wales and the Royal Artillery Range in the Hebrides, where they will be used to automatically track a variety of airborne objects.
Eurocopter unveiled here a full-scale mockup of the EC 635, a proposed multipurpose military variant of the new EC 135 light twin helicopter. First presented last month at the Aerospace Africa 98 defense show in Pretoria, South Africa, the EC 635 mockup was shown in Paris with a full panoply of weapons--air-to-air missiles, rocket launcher, external gun pod, swivel-mounted guns--and EW suite, which were absent from the African display.
Joseph P. Duggan (see photo) has been appointed senior vice president of the DCS Group Inc. of Washington. He was vice president/director of media relations at Powell Tate.
Growing demand for its jet engine components has prompted the Delvan Gas Turbine Products Div. of Coltec Industries to turn to SynQuest supply chain software for help in scheduling and tracking its manufacturing work. ``We were running hard to respond to demand,'' Jim Baker, president of the West Des Moines, Iowa, firm, said. Delvan makes fuel injectors, flow control valves, fuel manifold and afterburner spray bars (see photo). Increased workloads, frequent rescheduling demands and change orders prompted the switch from paper-based scheduling to an infotech solution.
U.S. Navy officials have decided to retire their fleet of ES-3A Shadow intelligence-gathering aircraft ahead of schedule. They elected to phase out the aircraft rather than pay a multi-million dollar bill to overhaul the aircraft's signals intelligence (sigint) systems.
Israel Aircraft Industries President Moshe Keret expects his company to reach $2 billion in sales by late 1999, with its primary export customer, the U.S., accounting for $650 million. Keret was in town for the delivery of the Israeli-built C-38A to the D.C. National Guard. The financial turnaround for IAI came last year, and the company logged a profit of $10 million in the first quarter of 1998. Keret predicts the Israeli government will move toward privatizing the company, but offers no specifics as to timing or ownership split.
THAAD'S TROUBLES WORSENED last week. A House Appropriations subcommittee voted to slash the Fiscal 1999 budget for the Theater High-Altitude Area Defense antimissile missile system to $406 million, from the $820 million requested.
In the age of computer-aided design and manufacturing, paper on the shop floor remains a costly and time consuming part of building an aircraft. It is measured in thousands of assembly orders, an army of support staff and the chance that a penciled-in change order might be misunderstood or missed altogether. But as anachronistic as paper may seem, getting rid of it is easier said than done.
Frank C. Hughan has been appointed director of technical services for Avitas, Reston, Va. He was manager of technical services for the Aviation Sales Co.
Momentum continues to build behind the execution of US Airways' game plan to exploit the carrier's dominant East Coast franchise, reverse five consecutive years of downsizing and firmly establish the company as a serious competitor against the likes of Southwest Airlines and Delta Express.
SOUTHWEST AIRLINES HAS SELECTED Smiths Industries Aerospace to upgrade the flight management computers (FMCs) for 208 aircraft of its older 737 fleet, which will standardize the fleet to the same systems being delivered on new 737-300 and -700 aircraft. The new FMC, half the size of its predecessor, includes GPS navigation software and an aircraft communication and reporting system (ACARS) data link. Sources estimate the Southwest contract could be worth $20 million, and the retrofit potential for older aircraft could exceed $400 million.
Boeing is preparing to hand over the first of eight MD-11F freighters ordered by Lufthansa Cargo, with delivery scheduled by the end of this month. Four of the remaining seven aircraft are due to enter the fleet by the end of the year, to be followed in 1999 by three others that were recently transformed from options to firm orders. Lufthansa still holds options on three freighters for delivery by 2000.
COLORADO SPRINGS-BASED NAVSYS CORP. is testing production prototypes of its GPS Phone that will let a user summon police, fire or roadside assistance to a GPS location with the push of a button. The device integrates a cellular phone and Navsys' Tidget technology, which the company developed as a low-cost sensor, not a full GPS receiver (AW&ST Nov. 30, 1992, p. 52). It transmits a compressed sample of GPS data over the cell phone to a central facility, which will compute GPS coordinates and route the message with digital location to the appropriate dispatcher.
BOEING IS IN FINAL NEGOTIATIONS with an unnamed buyer for its MD Explorer helicopter line. A sale is expected to be completed by midsummer. Boeing decided to exit the commercial helicopter business earlier this year after inheriting it in the mid-1997 acquisition of McDonnell Douglas. A sale to Bell Helicopter of the MD-500 and MD-600 light-single-turbine helicopter lines is pending. The twin-engine MD Explorer seats eight and has a gross weight of 6,250 lb.
BRITISH AEROSPACE IS LOOKING to reestablish itself in the satellite business while at the same time deepening its ties with Lockheed Martin. The two firms have agreed to jointly bid on a U.K. program to develop a next-generation, military communications satellite system to replace the current Skynet 4 system starting in 2005. Matra Marconi Space is also bidding for the project, called Skynet 5 National, which is being considered by the U.K. in parallel with a separate trinational effort.
Engineers here have begun operating an interim modeling, simulation and analysis facility that should provide U.S. Air Force procurement officials with an effective tool to lower weapon acquisition costs.
NETWORK WAFFEN UND MUNISTIONFABRIKEN GROUP of Santa Fe, N.M., will display an information warfare tool at TechNet that uses a new approach to detect and defeat intrusions by hackers and more serious attacks on critical infrastructures. The Blitzkrieg system uses ``digital microbes'' to detect intrusions and act defensively, or even retaliate, and can run on any server, according to inventor Laurence F. Wood, of Future Vision Group Inc., NMW's parent company.
Boeing last week was scheduled to roll out its 757-300 derivative, and the on-time and on-budget program will help put some of the Seattle-based manufacturer's production woes behind it.
PRESIDENT CLINTON IS REDUCING the size of American forces in the Persian Gulf region to the levels maintained prior to the crisis earlier this year over U.N. weapons inspections in Iraq. The F-117s and B-52s in the area will be withdrawn along with one aircraft carrier battle group. About 20,000 U.S. troops will remain in the region as will the aircraft carrier USS Stennis and 250 USAF combat aircraft used to help monitor the no-fly zone over southern Iraq.
UNIONIZED EMPLOYEES WORKING for Rockwell International in Coralville, Iowa, struck the company last Thursday, and organized labor at Rockwell's Newport Beach, Calif., site was expected to follow later in the day. The businesses affected are Rockwell Collins and Rockwell Semiconductor Systems. The units planned to continue operations, and management anticipated little or no trouble in meeting customers' needs. Bargaining unit employees at the company's Dallas and Cedar Rapids, Iowa, facilities ratified their contracts earlier.
On July 1, 1999, passengers traveling within the 15-country European Union will no longer be authorized to buy duty-free goods. The European Finance Ministers have rejected last-minute attempts to maintain duty-free sales advocated by airport authorities, the airline industry, sea ferry operators and trade associations. According to the Airports Council International (ACI), the abolition of duty-free trade in the European single market will eliminate more than 100,000 jobs and increase airport charges up to 30%.
