While London will always be identified with certain touchstones of long tradition—The Tower, The Tube, The Few and undercooked bacon, among them—the British capital is vibrant with change, as its thicket of construction cranes attests. The Shard and London Eye have reshaped the city's skyline. Last year's Olympics drew global attention and applause. The royals are flying commercial. 'Will that be beef or chicken, Ma'am?'
British and French industry partners are hailing a research program that intends to drive new technology into European missile development and production.
The advantages of UAS for reducing cost and risk and their growing sophistication will continue to make it tempting to use the aircraft more often and in new situations.
The 50th Paris air show will offer French space agency CNES an opportunity to detail engineering tradeoffs being weighed as it designs a leaner, more cost-effective successor to Europe's Ariane 5 heavy-lift rocket. The new launcher is expected to fly in 2020, assuming European Space Agency (ESA) governments approve the estimated €4 billion ($5.2 billion) project at a meeting of ESA ministers slated for 2014.
Michael Fabey (Singapore), Bill Sweetman (Washington)
The U.S. Navy's amphibious assault ships will have to undergo flight-deck renovations before the world's most sophisticated fighter, the F-35B Joint Strike Fighter, can be welcomed aboard. Five years after the first flight of the F-35B, significant work will need to be done on 50,000-ton ships to accommodate the intense heat of the fighter's exhaust.
Stephane Cueille has been appointed managing director of Snecma affiliate Aircelle Ltd., Burnley, England. He was general manager of Snecma's Turbine Airfoils Center of Excellence.
Ken Peterman has become general manager of the government systems segment of ViaSat Inc., Carlsbad, Calif. He was president/CEO of the SpyGlass Group and president of ITT Communications and Force Protection Systems.
While news reports typically point to the public's perception of excess and greed as the primary threat to corporate business jets, there are other forces equally insistent on robbing executives of their winged chariots—engineers.
A confidential annex to a Defense Science Board report provides the first detailed Pentagon acknowledgment that China-based cyberespionage efforts have penetrated U.S. military programs in a widespread fashion, and an expose by The Washington Post on the cyberleaks last week may provide new impetus for Senate defense hawks to ban foreign products that benefit from cybersnooping.
FAA officials tell the National Air Traffic Controllers Association that the agency will not be spending this fiscal year on new initiatives for NextGen and the constitution of the controller-inclusive teams that are helping to push the air traffic modernization program forward, according to Dale Wright, the association's director of safety and technology.
The ability to deliver the first shot and then put distance between you and your adversary is a key survival tactic in beyond-visual-range air-to-air combat.
A micrometeoroid might be the culprit for an abrupt attitude problem that halted the flow of critical weather-prediction data for the U.S. East Coast from a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellite.
USAF Lt. Gen. John E. Hyten has been appointed commander of the Fourteenth Air Force (Air Forces Strategic) of Air Force Space Command/commander of the Joint Functional Component Command for Space of U.S. Strategic Command, Vandenberg AFB, Calif. He has been vice commander, Air Force Space Command, Peterson AFB, Colo. He is swapping positions with Lt. Gen. Susan J. Helms.
After two years of rapid growth, Airbus's air traffic management unit is carving itself an increasingly prominent role in the global ATM industry. The Airbus ProSky subsidiary is already one of the few companies to be deeply involved in both the U.S. NextGen initiative and its European equivalent, Sesar. Now, with a new management team in place, it is aiming to more closely align its disparate pieces and bring more-integrated products to market.
The first major airframe parts for Boeing's KC-46A tanker are due to enter the final assembly line in Everett, Wash., on June 26, the company says. The airframe will be completed and certificated to civil standards as a 767-2C “provisioned freighter” on the two-station Everett final assembly line, which has a capacity of 20 aircraft per year, and will make its first flight in that form in the third quarter of 2014.
Alenia Aermacchi, General Dynamics Canada and DRS Technologies Canada have firmed up their agreement on the C-27J as Canada prepares to release the long-delayed request for proposals for new search-and-rescue aircraft. Under the agreement, GD Canada would act as mission system integrator if the C-27J is selected for the Fixed-Wing Search And Rescue program. Alenia, as prime contractor, would supply green aircraft to be missionized and supported by GD in Atlantic Canada. DRS, Alenia's sister company within Finmeccanica, would provide long-term training.
Planetary Resources, which has been busy developing an initial prototype of its prospective space telescope, the Arkyd-100, is going public with a pitch for public donations. The group has unveiled a $1 million fund-raising campaign to launch the telescope, set up a user interface system, “cover fulfillment costs for all of the products and services in the pledge levels” and fund the “immersive” education program the company is promising.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) is holding its annual general assembly in Cape Town, South Africa, this week. And, it is certainly time that the high-profile event is being staged in Africa. Economic growth is beginning to change some parts of the continent, and air transport is beginning to benefit. Africa will always be a small part of the global air transport market regardless of how much change is coming, but given new trade links and a willingless to loosen regulation, there will be growth potential.
Allen A. Arata of Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems has won The Engineers' Council's Jack Northrop Spirit of Aviation Award. Based in the company's flight-analysis department in El Segundo, Calif., Arata received the award for his aerodynamic design work, which has enhanced “all aspects of aerodynamic design for present and future manned and unmanned military aircraft, especially flying-wing designs such as the B-2 stealth bomber.” The award commemorates the vision, perseverance and engineering prowess reminiscent of aviation pioneer Jack Northrop.
