A slight ``tone'' detected during tests under abnormal flight conditions has prompted Boeing to reinforce the horizontal stabilizer on its new ``next-generation'' family of 737 transports. The change will delay FAA certification by several weeks and move the first delivery of the 737-700 to launch customer Southwest Airlines to the end of this month.
AW&ST: What should this nation be doing to push the boundaries of high-speed research? YEAGER: If you go back and look at what we did once we got beyond the speed of sound and uncovered the [benefits of the] flying tail--which took the rest of the world five years to find out--and using afterburners on jets, you'll see we started running into a little compressor stall problem once we got to Mach 2 in the F-104. The shock wave was being ingested by the inlet, so we solved that by going to variable-geometry intake ducts--like on the F-4 and F-15.
With a burgeoning order book, Saab Ericsson Space is looking to hire 100 new engineers this year. That would expand its workforce by 18% to 650 employees. The company also will start work on a new building at its headquarters in Gothenburg, Sweden, to accommodate its growing business. Sales have doubled in the past four years, to $61.5 million, with the largest increase coming in the commercial sector.
Congress last week paved the way for former FAA Administrator T. Allan McArtor to proceed with plans to start a new business-traveler oriented airline out of restricted Dallas Love Field.
Flir Systems Inc. of Portland, Ore., is successfully expanding its imaging technologies into the television news field. The company recently delivered its 50th UltraMedia unit since product launch in April 1996. FSI also introduced a compact version, the UltraMedia RS, last February. The UltraMedia and UltraMedia RS host long-range, broadcast-quality video cameras in 5-axis stabilized mounts, allowing news helicopters to operate at standoff ranges when airspace over a news scene is closed and to conduct covert investigations.
A conference on airline competition sponsored by Business Travel Contractors Corp. (BTCC), which represents 58 of America's largest corporations, is urging Congress to take action to assure airline competition. ``The airline industry is at a crossroads in its experiment with deregulation,'' BTCC President Kevin Mitchell said at a ``competition summit'' here last week attended by about 275 community, business, industry and government leaders.
Turkish Airlines will acquire 26 ``next-generation'' Boeing 737-800 transports through the year 2002 to renew its fleet, and has taken options to buy an additional 23 aircraft for delivery between 2000 and 2002. If all of the options are realized, the sale could be worth more than $2 billion to Boeing.
Military personnel planners seem to believe increased airline hiring of pilots is the primary root of their difficulty in retaining flight crews. It is far easier for these planners to blame their losses on the pull of the airlines, rather than their own policies and lack of insight. The normal attrition due to new careers or returning to school is being accelerated by burdens of increased operational tempo, less meaningful flying time and a ``politically correct'' military.
Daimler-Benz Aerospace of Germany has offered to codevelop an advanced AT2000 jet trainer with South Africa for local and export markets. The wide-ranging, cooperative deal also would include the purchase of Eurocopter EC-135 and AS 532 helicopters and coastal patrol aircraft based on the Fairchild-Dornier 328. The AT2000, on the drawing boards at DASA for some time, would cost $1.35 billion to develop and carry a per aircraft fly-away price of $16-20 million, depending on the version.
On the morning of Oct. 14, 1947, U.S. Air Force test pilot Capt. Charles E. (Chuck) Yeager became the first man to successfully fly faster than the speed of sound. Anniversaries often provide us with opportunities to reflect on the past, but they can also be used as benchmarks for assessing the future. In the following series of articles, an Aviation Week&Space Technology editorial team examines where we are--and where we may be going--in the realm of airbreathing, sustained high-speed flight.
French Education Minister Claude Allegre, who is also responsible for space, confirmed last week that he planned to scale down participation in the International Space Station and to reorient France's space policy toward space exploration and applications where necessary, independently of the U.S.
THE FRENCH REGIONAL AIRLINE Flandre Air has become the European launch customer for the EMB-135, Embraer's new 37-seat jet. Embraer officials said at the European Regions Airline Assn. meeting at Baveno, Italy, that they have secured another regional launch customer in the U.S. Embraer foresees a market for 500 of the new jets during the next 10 years.
Managers of the High Speed Research program have redefined and restructured a number of upcoming propulsion tests aimed at reducing the risks associated with developing an engine for a Mach 2.4 High-Speed Civil Transport, or HSCT.
Discussions underway among U.S. government and contractor officials could lead to new studies and flight tests aimed at mitigating strong wing downwash and vortices that can collapse parachutes of troops jumping from the Boeing C-17 transport. The problem occurs when in-trail elements of three aircraft fly over troops that had just jumped from lead C-17s. On training missions, trailing aircraft now maintain a spacing interval of almost 7 naut. mi., or 2.5 min., to avoid parachute interaction. Typical in-trail spacing for USAF C-141s, by comparison, is 2,000 ft.
After months of soul-searching and weeks of last-minute verification, Europe is poised to attempt the second launch of its Ariane 5 heavy booster, a flight with enormous implications for Europe's space program and European space contractors in the wake of the vehicle's failure on its first flight in June 1996. The European Space Agency and CNES French space agency have scheduled the second launch attempt for as early as Oct. 28.
United Airlines is evaluating an advanced weather depiction system installed in a DC-10-10 that has the potential to save airlines millions of dollars annually in fuel and time. Developed by NASA Langley Research Center scientists under the direction of Charles Scanlon, the Cockpit Weather Information (CWIN) project uses two Inmarsat satellites to continuously transmit data link images of national, regional and local weather conditions directly to a cockpit display.
In the next few weeks, the International Air Transport Assn. (IATA) is scheduled to issue a crisis management handbook that is designed to help airlines improve communications with the media and politicans after accidents. ``The first few hours are vital; an efficient crisis staff must immediately become operational. Information mishandling can have a lethal impact on an airline's image and fate,'' an IATA official said. The guidelines will include recommendations such as the need for factual briefings that should avoid speculation on possible causes of an accident.
Philip Odeen, the chairman of the National Defense Panel--the independent group that was to comment on the Pentagon's Quadrennial Defense Review and suggest alternate force structures--says forget it. Instead, the panel will study capabilities, publish a number of position papers looking out to 2015-20 and tag problem areas for increased Pentagon focus. For example, the panel will call for a reorganization of the national security apparatus.
Konrad J. Walter has been named director of program management for North America for Greenwich Air Services of Miami. He was senior program manager for aircraft and engines.
EXECUTIVE JET INC. PLANS to hire more than 200 pilots in 1998 to keep pace with growth of its NetJets fractional ownership program. The company has 350 pilots and will have more than 470 by the end of this year. Minimum requirements include an airline transport pilot certificate and at least 2,500 hr. total time, with 500 hr. in multiengine airplanes.
The success of NASA's Mars Pathfinder and the discovery of possible ancient life on the red planet have reignited excitement in Japan and Europe about Mars and other parts of the solar system. The new enthusiasm has bolstered hopes that cash-strapped space agencies in the U.S., Europe, Russia and Japan can pool their resources for a sample return mission to Mars in 2005 and, ultimately, a human landing on the planet.
PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON'S first use of the line item veto on the 1998 military construction budget hit aviation hardest--20 of 38 provisions worth $287 million. The size of the projects axed ranged from a $1.3-million runway extension to Whiting Field, Fla., to a $14-million theater air and flight simulation and training facility at Kirtland AFB, N.M. Administration officials said the projects were picked because they weren't requested in the President's budget, they wouldn't improve quality of life for families, and construction wouldn't begin in 1998.
Don H. Davis has become chief executive officer of the Rockwell International Corp., Costa Mesa, Calif. He remains president and succeeds Donald R. Beall, who will stay as chairman until February, when Davis is scheduled to become chairman.
THE NEW ECHOSTAR 3 communications spacecraft, the first advanced AX version of Lockheed Martin's A2100 design, is en route to its geosynchronous orbit station at 61.5 W. Long. following launch on an ILS Atlas 2AS booster Oct. 5. The 8,100-lb. spacecraft is the heaviest payload ever launched in the 30-year history of the Atlas-Centaur program. The A2100AX spacecraft is also the first spacecraft to be produced in Lockheed Martin's new Commercial Satellite Center, Sunnyvale, Calif. EchoStar 3 will beam TV and data services to the eastern U. S.
