Pentagon acquisition and technology czar Paul Kaminski is calling for the troubled Theater High Altitude Area Defense program to be restructured. After four attempts, Thaad has yet to intercept a target. In a chat session on the Internet with reporters, Kaminski also said that further tests of the missile should be put off for up to six months while the Pentagon studies the issues raised by two Thaad review teams. They concluded the Thaad design is sound, but issues about quality remain.
Ruth Harkin has been appointed Washington-based senior vice president-international affairs and government relations of the United Technologies Corp., Hartford, effective June 1. She will succeed William F. Paul, who will retire. Harkin has been president/chief executive officer of the U.S. Overseas Private Investment Corp.
An FBI expert gave scientifically flawed testimony against a man accused of bombing an Avianca Airlines 727 and ``selectively omitted'' information that might have implicated another individual who confessed to that crime, according to Justice Dept. investigators.
Lockheed Martin Corp., the $30-billion defense-electronics giant forged out of the crucible of massive industry consolidation, may no longer be a company in transition but its management team soon will be. Effective Aug. 1, Chairman and CEO Norman R. Augustine will relinquish his job as chief executive and turn those duties over to Vance D. Coffman, who currently is president and chief operating officer. Succeeding Coffman will be Peter B. Teets, who heads up the corporation's information and services sector.
Dick Turner has been appointed assistant manager of FlightSafety International's Seattle Training Center. He was program manager of FSI's Training Systems Div. in Florida.
Arthur B. Pyster has become chief scientist for software engineering for the FAA. He was vice president/chief technical officer/chief technologist for the Software Productivity Consortium.
F119 ENGINE configurations slated for use in the competing Joint Strike Fighter designs have completed a preliminary design review at Pratt&Whitney's West Palm Beach, Fla., facilities. Prior to the PDR, engineers completed preliminary aerodynamic and structural definitions for all F119 components needed to support the various JSF configurations. The company expects to begin testing versions of all the F119 configurations for the JSF between spring and summer of 1998.
JUERGEN WEBER, CHAIRMAN of Lufthansa German Airlines, charged that Boeing's plan to enter the airline maintenance business was ``bad business behavior'' and could affect its future procurement of Boeing aircraft. ``If Boeing sets up in competition to us, it will have an impact on our future procurement,'' Weber was quoted as saying. ``After all, we don't build airplanes.'' Lufthansa Technik, the airline's maintenance division, contributed about $26 million to Lufthansa's pretax profits in the third quarter.
A system of passenger profiling is emerging as the critical centerpiece of a $9-billion U.S. aviation security program that bristles with innovation but still lacks funding. The profiling system, under development for more than a year at Northwest Airlines, will enable the airlines to adopt measures to thwart all-but-suicidal terrorists. The system is based on information, already in airline computer reservations systems, that identify individuals, their employment, their frequent itineraries and how they paid for tickets.
Kent T. Scott has become vice president/chief operating officer of Emery Worldwide Airlines. He succeeds Willard H. Scherrer, who has retired. Scott was chief executive officer of AirSpace International Airlines.
The ability to rapidly update and transmit maps and satellite imagery is creating revolutionary changes in the way geographic information is handled. Instead of printing and warehousing paper maps for future contingencies, they can now be produced ``just in time,'' said Terry L. Casto, Harris Corp.'s senior manager for the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) program. Tailor-made products are possible, combining satellite imagery, aircraft photography and digital maps.
President Jacques Chirac's initiative to dissolve the parliament and call early general elections is endangering the French aerospace industry's consolidation and privatization. France's general elections, which are scheduled for May 25 and June 1, are expected to further delay the outgoing government's plan to sell its 58% stake in Thomson-CSF by midyear. Theoretically, the deadline for offerings still is May 7, but that date is now expected to be postponed.
Richard W. Girard and the team of Frank T. Fox and Susan F. Hallowell have won FAA Technology Transfer Awards--Girard for pioneering the use of required navigation performance for commercial purposes, and Fox and Hallowell for developing the controlled deposition standard for trace explosives detection.
THE NAVY'S OFFICE OF TRAINING TECHNOLOGY has consolidated information about training systems research, development and deployment at its ``Spider'' Web site (http://ott.sc.ist.ucf.edu). The site, whose name stands for Seamless Product Information Data Exchange and Repository, is designated as the Navy's ``premier on-line resource'' for training technology data. However, it includes links to other Defense Dept., government and approved commercial sites and a search engine.
The U.S. Marine Corps has selected Bell Helicopter Textron to remanufacture 280 UH-1N and AH-1W aircraft and equip them with more powerful turboshaft engines and four-blade main and tail rotors.
D. Wayne Snodgrass has been named vice president of Northrop Grumman Antisubmarine Warfare and Ship Systems in Baltimore. He was vice president of the company's Naval Systems in Cleveland.
Time is rapidly running out for USAirways to put into place a lower cost structure, which continues to elude the carrier even as it is losing the battle against all of its competitors. The U.S.' fifth largest airline last week reported record profits for the first quarter (see p. 11). But the financial performance does not reveal the whole picture.
Donald F. Colleran (see photo) has been appointed vice president, sales, for the Asia Pacific Div. of Federal Express in Hong Kong. He was managing director of sales for the North Pacific region.
In its first mission undertaken outside the U.S., an Orbital Sciences Corp. Pegasus XL booster orbited a Spanish scientific satellite last week in an air launch off the Canary Islands. The Pegasus and its primary payload, the Minisat satellite, were dropped from Orbital Sciences' L-1011 aircraft at 39,000 ft. over the Atlantic Ocean on Apr. 21. The booster subsequently fired in midair and carried Minisat to its orbit of 570 X 577 km., inclined to the equator at 151 deg.
Future conflicts may rely on high-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicles to provide communications relay for large areas of the battlefield. Providing a good picture of where the friendly and enemy forces are, down to the lowest level, ``could give U.S. forces an order of magnitude improvement in lethality,'' said USAF Col. Roy Edwards, program manager for the Airborne Communications Node at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.
THE FAA HAS ISSUED its Inflight Aircraft Icing Plan that calls for improvements in icing forecasts, ice detection technologies, pilot training and certification standards. Guy S. Gardner, FAA associate administrator for regulation and certification, said the plan urges improved aircraft design through ongoing research into icing physics and the effects of freezing rain and drizzle on contemporary airfoils and anti-icing/deicing systems.
High resolution miniature displays have great potential in aerospace, but making them bright enough to be seen, easily portable and low-power efficient is a challenge. Longmont, Colo.-based Displaytech has begun shipping developer kits of low-cost displays using high-speed spatial light modulators that are mounted in a 1-oz. housing no bigger than an egg. These have high enough resolution and pixel counts to replicate the visual display of a standard PC monitor.
Jim McDonough (see photo) has been named Houston-based Southwest U.S. sales manager for Bombardier Aviation Services of Montreal. He was regional sales manager for the AR Group.
John W. (Jack) Russell, crew chief on the Bell X-1 rocket plane that first exceeded Mach 1, died Apr. 14. He was 78. Russell also worked on the U.S. Air Force's first jet aircraft, the Bell XP-59 during its flight test program at what is now Edwards AFB, Calif. He later served 27 years as chief of the rocket propellant group at NACA and NASA, involved in testing X-series aircraft from the X-2 to the X-24B. Russell regularly flew as launch control operator on the B-52 ``mother ship,'' dropping the X-15 for 150 of its 199 flights.
