Australian regulators have given tentative approval to a partnership between Virgin Australia and Singapore Airlines. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission says the link between the two airlines “is unlikely to result in significant anti-competitive detriment in any of the relevant markets.” Virgin Australia and Singapore announced their intention to join forces in June. The proposed deal includes code-sharing and cooperation on prices and schedules, but does not cover revenue-sharing. The deal must also be approved by the Competition Commission of Singapore.
BAE Systems has defeated rivals to supply the F-35 with night-vision-goggle capabilities after developers discovered problems with stealth fighter's Vision Systems International helmet. The primary helmet being developed by Elbit and Rockwell Collins has been experiencing problems with jitter displaying data on the visor, and resolution is not high enough for its night-vision capability. The helmet is a primary flight display, so the problems were seen as having potential large effects on the entire JSF program.
BAE Systems hopes to conclude talks with Saudi Arabia by year-end over the country's purchase of Eurofighter Typhoons. In a trading update, BAE notes that the first batch of 24 Typhoons has now been delivered as part of Project Salam, finalized in 2007. At the time, plans called for final assembly to transition from Wharton, England, to Saudi Arabia, but that is no longer on the agenda. Details of how the rest of the program will unfold are uncertain.
The first validation blisk (bladed-disk) fan for General Electric's Passport turbofan, the engine in development for Bombardier's Global 7000 and 8000 business jets, is being prepared for initial testing. Completion of the 18-blade, 52-in.-dia. unit marks a key milestone in the engine program, which was launched in 2010 for the new Bombardier long-range jet pair. GE passed the Toll Gate 3, or critical design review, on the overall program on Oct. 5 and is on track to complete design freeze (Toll Gate 6) in the second quarter of 2012. First engine test is set for 2013.
General Electric is launching the first integrated vehicle health management (IVHM) system for a business jet on Gulfstream's G650. Similar to the integrated monitoring devices set for introduction on Boeing's 787 later this month, the GE IVHM will power Gulfstream's PlaneConnect Health and Trend Monitoring system. Designed to continuously manage and analyze data throughout a flight, the IVHM will create a set of health information for the engines, avionics, power, cabin and other aircraft systems.
Fred George, senior editor at Aviation Week's Business & Commercial Aviation, has won this year's National Business Aviation Association David W. Ewald Platinum Wing Award for lifetime achievement and excellence in journalism. A former U.S. Navy fighter pilot, George has logged more than 6,600 hr. piloting more 150 types of aircraft. He has been writing for BCA for more than 30 years. Ewald, who died in 2007, was publisher of BCA for many years and co-founded Flight Training magazine.
It works for software, but can a collection of people with only a website in common produce a better unmanned aircraft than one of the Pentagon's leading suppliers? The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) hopes to find out through its UAVforge global crowdsourcing competition. An open, web-based collaboration portal has been created that is allowing ad hoc teams to come together to design and fly small UAVs.
The Anglo-Spanish International Airlines Group (IAG) is poised to establish a low-cost, low-fare subsidiary—Iberia Express—which is slated to begin operating short-haul routes in mid-2012 with 13 Airbus A320s. IAG is focused on restoring profitability on Spain's domestic route system, a highly competitive market. It proposes to do so by lowering direct operating costs.
Airbus and Boeing are looking to ramp up production of new narrowbody aircraft at a time when world financial experts are warning that the global economy is headed for a massive downturn.
With fresh support in hand from congressional investigators, Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) is taking his effort to stop the Obama administration from striking up space partnerships with China to the Justice Department—again.
A trio of lawmakers wants to rein in federal reimbursements for the salaries of government contractors, a move that proponents and critics alike say would surely impact the nation's top defense companies. Under current rules used to define certain kinds of government awards, contractors can claim nearly $700,000 in the salaries of each of the top five employees, a figure that has nearly doubled since 1998, according to a letter to the deficit-reduction “super committee” from Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Paul Tonko (D-N.Y.).
Despite confidence from senior Air Force leadership that Boeing can deliver all 18 of the KC-46A tankers by August 2017, Brig. Gen. Christopher Bogdan tells House lawmakers that there are four persistent risk areas under the $4.83 billion development program (formerly called KC-X). They are: managing the in-line provisioning of refueler equipment on Boeing's 767 production line in Everett, Wash.; concurrency in trying to gain FAA-amended type and supplemental type certifications while under development; Boeing's “aggressive” flight-test plans; and software development.
The new chief of naval operations, the Navy's top admiral, says he wants to avoid riskier technology programs and dial down some of the planned investment in that equipment. Other chiefs of staff, like Air Force Gen. Norton Schwartz, have similarly warned industry and officers that the military cannot afford to spend as much and as freely on new gadgetry as it did. The dilemma these days, Adm.
For the past two years while Pratt & Whitney and General Electric/Snecma launched their next-generation mid-thrust engines, the big question throughout civil aerospace has been, what about Rolls-Royce?
Airfreight may once again be serving its role as a leading indicator for the air transport business. If that proves accurate, increasingly dreary days are ahead for airlines. There is little doubt that the weak outlook for freight has taken a sharp turn for the worse. Pressure on yields has been building, and now they are declining. Air France-KLM reports unit revenue in cargo is down year-on-year and TNT Express had to adjust its outlook for the year.
Current efforts to restore the banking sector in the face of financial troubles in the euro zone may force Airbus and Boeing once again to rely heavily on export credit agencies to sustain their deliveries. In the midst of the worldwide credit crunch three years ago, export credit agencies (ECA) provided the vital backbone that kept the airframers' deliveries flowing.
“It's not all bad.” When it comes to the European Union and its relationship with the aerospace/air transport industry, that may be as positive an endorsement as Brussels can hope for.
Operating unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) alongside armed scout helicopters as part of a “full-spectrum” combat aviation brigade could lead the U.S. Army to revisit its decision not to arm its AAI Corp. RQ-7 Shadow tactical UAS.
The defense industry and some members of the U.S. Congress have been united in their push against the potential for nearly $1 trillion in reductions to the U.S. military budget. But as budget deliberations in Washington intensify, divisions among denizens of on Capitol Hill are emerging. Lawmakers are making specific pleas to save certain weapons programs. House Republicans are urging the Pentagon to avoid changes to military benefits. And partisan divisions related to spending and taxes are widening.
China may be a leading reason behind the U.S.'s long-term force structure planning, but recent think-tank analysis is suggesting that traditional Pentagon weapons, particularly many U.S. Navy ships now sailing, likely would be less useful in a confrontation with the Asian giant. Instead, the Rand Corp. says, the U.S. should look to offensive long-range strike and intelligence weapons that would hold Beijing at risk.
Italy has notched another European first in the adoption of unmanned aircraft systems by simultaneously operating three different UAS in civilian airspace and over ground. The Sept. 30 demonstration culminated the first phase of an R&D program by Piedmont regional authorities, with the medium-term goal of fielding a UAS-based monitoring system that could prove crucial for responding to natural disasters, as well as tracking pollution, road traffic, crops and urban development, along with supporting security forces and border control.
The three U.S. agencies responsible for purchasing launches of government payloads into space are agreeing on long-awaited criteria that for the first time pave the way for new rocket companies to penetrate a national security launch sector now dominated by the United Launch Alliance, a Lockheed Martin and Boeing joint venture.
India's launch of a new satellite, Megha-Tropiques, to study climatic and atmospheric changes in tropical regions has boosted the country into an elite club of global space-partnering, but the Asian giant has far to go to prove its space capabilities more generally.
Although he's been on the job for just four months, Scott Ernest, CEO and president of Cessna Aircraft, is pushing the throttles at the beleaguered airframer and accelerating the introduction of two new Citation models to counter new competitors in the light jet market, which Cessna has dominated for decades.
At one time viewed by corporate aviation as fashionable accessories with minor performance benefits, winglets will take center stage as business aircraft operators increasingly look to new shapes and structural concepts for fuel savings and reduced carbon emissions.
