Two new composite fan blade manufacturing plants for Safran are coming alive this month and are worth hundreds of millions of dollars in investments that indicate the Paris-based company’s latest mark of confidence in the CFM Leap-1 engine and the U.S. market.
Airbus has started working with the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) to have its A320 recertified for a maximum load of 186 passengers, Aviation Week has learned.
I n the public’s view, there are only two choices facing the airlines following the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370: Act now to ensure aircraft can always be tracked, everywhere; or cave in to the airlines’ moan that it is too costly and face the consequences the next time an aircraft vanishes.
T he Web has done more than any medium to pin the pejorative label “drones” on unmanned aircraft. But now, two giants of the Internet are taking a new look at the old idea of using unmanned platforms as “atmospheric satellites” to bring affordable, accessible connectivity to all parts of the world (see page 28).
T hree big trends are underway in the Chinese airline industry: local government backing of services to promote economic growth, a westward push by carriers seeking to corral new markets and an outward push by airlines trying to make up for decades of underperformance in international operations. Movement on each of those fronts has occurred in the past few weeks.
Talk of streaming flight data from aircraft, sparked by the Air France Flight 447 crash into the Atlantic in 2009, has been rekindled by Malaysia Airlines Flight 370's disappearance over the Indian Ocean.
M ention aircraft broadband connectivity and the first thought is Wi-Fi access for passengers. But engineers are already looking beyond updating Facebook and streaming YouTube inflight
Embedded inflight entertainment (IFE) systems have become synonymous with long-haul air travel, providing a welcome distraction to passengers seated in tight quarters for many hours
Closing half the runways at one of the busiest West Coast airports for four months could be a recipe for chaos, but San Francisco International Airport is hoping that a new traffic-flow system will prevent taxiway bottlenecks and keep flight delays to a minimum.
Following hard on the heels of questions on the availability of sufficiently trained crews for rapidly expanding Asian LCCs, an Indonesian Boeing 737-900ER recently landed hard enough to burst a tire, injure passengers and cause structural wrinkles in the airframe. Although the weather conditions were good the Lion Air aircraft bounced four times after initial touchdown at Surabaya, registering a maximum 3.8+G vertical deceleration on the last hit.
Boeing 747-8 operators are installing new engine electronic control (EEC) software as a precaution against possible in-flight deployment of the thrust reversers.
Okinawa-based carrier Japan Transocean Air (JTA) has selected Boeing 737-800s to replace its fleet of 737-400s. The carrier says it has reached a deal to order 12 of the -800s, and it has the option of converting them to 737 MAX orders at a later date. JTA operates 13 -400s on Japanese domestic routes. The carrier is part of the Japan Airlines Group, and is part-owned by JAL. JTA's 737-800s will be powered by CFM56-7 engines. Boeing says the aircraft will be fitted with the latest Performance Improvement Package, and will have the Sky interior.
Air Berlin and Etihad face serious opposition from some of their European rivals against the plan for closer integration and more control for the Gulf carrier. Senior industry sources tell Aviation Week that “airlines will definitely not accept” any new set-up that would be contrary to effective ownership and control mechanisms, and they’re confident Germany’s transport ministry will reject any solution to the growing Air Berlin crisis that is not on firm legal grounds.
