A significant number of attempts to fly at hypersonic speed have failed—not due to the advanced airframe or propulsion technology being tested, but because of the rocket booster needed to reach that speed.
Among this year’s milestones: the airline began its first international flights, established a new reservations system and will wrap up its operational integration with AirTran Airways, which it acquired in 2011. And perhaps most symbolically important, from Oct. 14 Southwest will be able to fly anywhere it wants in the continental U.S. from its home base at Dallas Love Field.
Tarik Reyes (see photo) has been named vice president-business development for the integrated air and missile defense division of the Falls Church, Virginia-based Northrop Grumman Corp . ’s Information Systems Sector. He was director of the civil information solutions unit within the sector’s civil division.
The FAA is rushing to overhaul backup plans and technology used at 20 en route air traffic control facilities in the continental U.S. after weaknesses were exposed by one troubled employee’s sabotage of the Chicago air route traffic control center. The damage caused the complete loss of command-and-control functions for en route aircraft over a five-state area in the Midwest.
Sheila Cheston (see photo), corporate vice president/general counsel for the Northrop Grumman Corp., has received the InsideCounsel Magazine Sharing the Power Award for “making significant strides to expand the influence and empowerment of women in the legal profession and leadership in enhancing diversity.”
Multiple articles discussed the comet Siding Spring and its close approach to Mars ( AW&ST Sept. 8, pp. 38-39) including coverage of the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile evolution (Maven) and Mangalyaan orbiters, but only a very brief mention of MRO—Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter—and no mention of the Odyssey. Those two have been in orbit around Mars for a combined two decades.
Alan Lindenmoyer, manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew and Cargo Program at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, has received a Samuel J. Heyman Service to America Medal for his work to stimulate efforts within the private sector to develop and demonstrate commercial cargo and human spaceflight services. Lindenmoyer was cited for leading “the effort that has launched a new era of private-sector orbital transportation while reducing the costs to taxpayers of building and deploying rockets and spacecraft,” through partnering with American industry.
Matt Hand (see photo) has been appointed director of scheduling for Kansas City, Missouri-based Executive AirShare. He was director of crew resources for Minneapolis-based Endeavor Air.
Sierra Nevada Corp. is underscoring its position as a potential human spaceflight provider for a global market, despite its rejection by NASA as one of two commercial operators to fly astronauts to the International Space Station.
If the KF-X survives while production of older European and U.S. aircraft winds up, then next decade it may be the only alternative to the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning as a fighter engineered for compatibility with Western weapons and communications
Russia’s Proton M/Briz M heavy-lift launch vehicle returned to flight Sept. 28, sending a Russian military satellite to geosynchronous orbit from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The vehicle, which has been grounded since a May incident that led to the loss of Russian Satellite Communications Co. (RSCC) AM4R satellite, lifted off at 12:23 a.m. Moscow time, marking the fifth launch of a Proton rocket this year.
Startup helicopter manufacturer Marenco Swisshelicopter put its SKYe SH09 single-engine light helicopter through its paces on Oct. 2. The aircraft was maneuvered in hover in a series of five test flights that lasted about 20 min. at the company’s test facility at Mollis, near Zurich, with chief test pilot Dwayne Williams in charge. The delayed flight comes 10 months after the rollout of the initial prototype on Nov. 28, 2013.
Miami-based Eastern Air Lines, which is not yet flying, has confirmed its order for 20 Mitsubishi Aircraft 92-seat MRJ90 regional jets. Deliveries are due to begin in 2019, about two years after the MRJ enters service. Mitsubishi now has orders for 191 MRJs, which should increase to 223 when Japan Airlines confirms an order for 32 covered by a letter of intent. In addition, customers hold options and purchase rights on another 184 MRJ90s. Eastern will use the name and livery of the historic but unrelated U.S. airline that closed in 1991.
Production of Boeing 737s is expected to rise to an unprecedented 52 per month in 2018. The company, which already announced plans to increase the production rate to 47 per month in 2017, hinted last month that the even higher assembly rate was being considered in response to market demand. Once established, the new rate means more than 620 aircraft a year will be built, roughly equivalent to the cumulative production for the first 13 years of the 737. Boeing has a firm order backlog of more than 4,000 737s: over 1,700 for 737 NGs and 2,294 for the 737 MAX family.
NASA selected Boeing and SpaceX to take U.S. astronauts to and from the International Space Station (ISS) as a way to stop paying Russia $76 million a pop for seats (and training) in the Soyuz capsule after early 2018. But even in this era of cooling relations between the countries, it doesn’t mean astronauts will stop flying Soyuz. And cosmonauts probably will fly in the new U.S. vehicles, to restore the “dissimilar redundancy” in ISS crew transport that has been missing since the space shuttle retired.
The U.K. Royal Air Force has stood down one of its AgustaWestland EH101 Merlin squadrons and handed over the aircraft to the Royal Navy. The former RAF Merlin Mk3s will replace Westland Sea King Mk4s that were the backbone of the Commando Helicopter Force but are due to be retired in March 2016. The RAF’s 78 Sqdn. stood down on Sept. 30 at RAF Benson with the handover, while the RN reactivated 846 Naval Air Sqdn. (NAS).
As part of ongoing moves to streamline its defense and space business, Boeing is moving the majority of its service and support-related work from Washington State to Oklahoma City and St. Louis. The move will take around three years and affect about 2,000 employees principally working on service and support of the E-3 AWACS, 737 Airborne Early Warning & Control and F-22 combat aircraft. Boeing says up to 900 jobs could be added in Oklahoma and 500 in St. Louis, and that further work will be moved to Jacksonville, Florida, and Patuxent River, Maryland.
Lockheed Martin’s full-scale mock-up of its Unmanned Carrier Launched Surveillance and Strike (Uclass) contender was unveiled in late September when CNBC reporter Jane Wells tweeted a photo from the company’s Skunk Works unit.
