ADP Paris airports authority and Air France are scheduled to jointly inaugurate Roissy-Charles de Gaulle's (CDG) additional passenger terminal, dubbed S4, in July. This initiative is expected to strengthen the country's quest for hub dominance in continental Europe. With a touch of arrogance but also armed with convincing arguments, ADP President Pierre Graff and Air France Chairman/CEO Alexandre de Juniac jointly assert that Paris in the longer term will become an indispensable asset for the global airline industry.
Budget cuts not only put pressure on the scope of defense research, but also emphasize the speed with which results can be fielded to improve today's weapon systems. The Office of Naval Research (ONR)—responsible for science and technology (S&T) across sea, air, land and space realms for the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps—is looking to field technologies faster to meet the objectives of the Defense Department's new strategic guidance.
Moog plans to announce this week that it has selected AeroTurbine to provide global logistics support, including inventory management and distribution, for its Boeing 787 and 747-8 and Airbus A350 components and systems covered through Moog's support programs. AeroTurbine, a subsidiary of International Lease Finance Corp., will provide warehousing for Moog's global parts pools around the world, including in Miami, Los Angeles, Singapore, Beijing, London; Dubai, United Arab Emirates; and Sydney and Melbourne, Australia.
Scientists using NASA's Kepler spacecraft (see photo) to look for planets around other stars have been “surprised by the universe,” and the value of those surprises has earned the mission a four-year funding extension. Kepler was one of nine astrophysics programs granted peer-reviewed extensions on the recommendation of a NASA Senior Review Committee (SRC). Most of them—including the Hubble Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory—also will continue operating through 2016.
Cobham has launched another takeover effort of satellite communications equipment maker Thrane & Thrane after an initial bid was rebuffed by the Danish company. Cobham launched a £270 million ($432 million) bid for outstanding shares in Thrane & Thrane after bringing its own holdings to 25.6%. The move comes after Cobham withdrew an earlier bid last month, after Thrane & Thrane rejected it. Since then, Cobham has acquired shares from Jupiter Asset Management and other entities that represent 22.7% of Thrane & Thrane shares.
The beginning of a major downturn is not the best time to launch a new company. But the executives who run ITT Exelis didn't have much choice. The 20,000-employee defense and information technology operation was spun off last October as part of a breakup of multi-industry ITT Corp. designed to appease restless shareholders. And Exelis, which draws nearly 70% of its sales from defense, clearly was not the piece of ITT that investors saw as a growth play.
Monarch Aircraft Engineering Technical Training Academy will start Boeing 787 training this year, investing $2.4 million in desktop training equipment at its London Luton Airport facility. The training building will be refurbished to add several classrooms for composites and fiber optics training.
Eric Stuck (see photo) has been appointed senior manager for new business development in the product support organization of Gulfstream Aerospace Corp., Savannah, Ga. He has held sales and program management positions at Hawker Beechcraft, Bombardier, Banyon Air Services and AMR Combs.
Michael L. Coats, director of the NASA Johnson Space Center and former space shuttle astronaut, is the recipient of the 2012 National Space Trophy—the Rotary National Award for Space Achievement Foundation. The award is given for furthering national space goals.
Russia is planning to field its newest air and missile defense system, the S-500, after 2015. Work on the system, which would be the follow-on to the S-400 now being fielded, will take place at a new facility that manufacturer Almaz-Antey is building in Nizhny Novgorod with around 9 billion rubles ($30.6 million) in government funding, according to the company. The facility itself is to be completed in 2015.
April 23-26—Geneva Forum 2012: 26th Annual Aircraft Conference on Finance and Commercial Aviation. Hotel Arts, Barcelona, Spain. Call +44 (207) 017-7200 or see www.informaglobalevents.com/event/aircraft-finance-conference April 25—Avicon 2012 Aviation Insurance Claim Conference. Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum, New York. See www.rtiavicon.com April 27—Rotary International Award for Space Achievement. Hyatt Regency Hotel, Houston. Call +1 (281) 488-2733 or see www.rnasa.org
China's main rocket engine maker appears to have begun deliveries of production-standard YF-100 engines, the key powerplants of the forthcoming Long March 5, 6 and 7 launchers. A propulsion system for the Long March 5 heavy launcher, comprising two main engines and two auxiliary thrusters, was “recently” delivered by the Academy of Aerospace Propulsion Technology (AAPT), also known as the Sixth Academy, says national space group China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp. (CASC).
When pictures emerged last year showing Afriqiyah Airways aircraft destroyed in fighting in Libya, it was emblematic of the enormous toll that the war exacted on the region's air transport sector. A year later, industry officials at the Marrakech air show tell Aviation Week that they are starting to see signs of the market settling and the groundwork being laid for new orders. Deals themselves may still be months off, but the relatively quick turnaround is nonetheless striking even as carriers are also struggling with high fuel prices.
Goodrich has signed a five-year, Prime Solutions nacelle services agreement with LOT Polish Airlines for support of its nacelles and thrust reversers on the GE CF34-10E engines that power its Embraer 195 aircraft. Goodrich is expected to provide nacelle MRO services for thrust reversers, inlet cowls and other components. The deal also includes access to large nacelle components for lease or exchange.
Canada's CAE and Israeli manufacturer Aeronautics have completed initial flights of a Dominator XP twin-engine unmanned aircraft from Alma Airport in Quebec under Project Miskam. The flights from the UAS Center of Excellence at Alma constitute the first phase of an R&D project aimed at demonstrating how unmanned aircraft can be used for civil applications such as inspecting pipelines and hydroelectric installations, monitoring forest fires and natural resources, and assessing disasters.
Embraer may wait until 2013 to select a new engine for its family of E-Jets as it talks with airlines about what upgrades are needed to keep the aircraft competitive.
Jeff Davis has joined the Public Safety and Security Div. of San Diego-based Kratos Defense & Security Solutions as VP and general manager of the Southwest U.S. region. He comes from Stanley Convergent Security Solutions.
Michael Mecham (San Francisco), Amy Svitak (Paris)
A hosted payload agreement between Space Systems/Loral and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center offers the U.S. the chance to catch up with Europe's leadership in the use of optical systems, which hold the promise of faster data transmission for space communications and lower power demands.
USAF Maj. Gen. Anthony J. Rock has been appointed vice director of the Joint Staff at the Pentagon. He has been special assistant to the deputy chief of staff for operations, plans and requirements at USAF Headquarters. Brig. Gen. Jon A. Norman has been named director of U.S. Air Forces in Europe-U.K. of U.S. Air Forces in Europe, RAF Mildenhall, England. He has been vice commander, of the Twelfth Air Force (Air Forces Southern) of Air Combat Command, Davis-Monthan AFB, Ariz. Honors And Elections
Joseph Mack has been named chief operating officer of Hong Kong-based Sino Jet Management Ltd. He is a former pilot proficiency examiner and designated check airman.
The “Tanker Teaming” item in the The World section (AW&ST April 2, p. 16) reports that the European Defense Agency (EDA) is eliciting support for the idea of pooling air refueling tanker resources. If so, EDA need look no further for an operational model than the jointly operated C-17s at Papa Air Base in Hungary under the aegis of NATO. In this day of defense spending rollbacks, I predict the teaming idea will cascade into other weapons platforms as well. Brookfield, Wis.
The ability of the Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey tiltrotor to fly farther, as well as faster, than helicopters has been a key factor in its fight for survival for more than a decade.
Brien Bluhm makes a good case for air crews' wages being commensurate with their responsibilities. I made a somewhat similar argument in the early 1980s, when Boeing was developing the 757. The aircraft—designed as a replacement for the 727—would be flown by a crew of two rather than three, and it was widely touted that elimination of the flight engineer (FE) would save airlines tons of money.
