An integrated approach using flight controls, sensors and synthetic vision to defeat the brownout landing threat could be extended to provide en route obstacle avoidance for helicopters following recent trials. The Sandblaster system, developed by a Sikorsky-led team for the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, was flight-tested on a Black Hawk helicopter at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California in mid-January.
Faced, as is almost everyone, with a nearly global recession or worse, Malaysian Airlines Engineering and Maintenance is expanding its offerings and its customer base to include some services that are more common outside Asia.
Tony Cervone (see photos) has been named senior vice president-corporate communications/chief communications officer for United Airlines ; Michael Quiello vice president-corporate safety, security, quality and environment for the UAL Corp.; and Mark Mounsey vice president-base maintenance for United Services. Cervone was communications vice president-global strategy and operations for General Motors, while Mounsey was general manager of Pratt & Whitney’s engine overhaul center in Cheshire, Conn. Quiello was vice president-safety for Delta Air Lines.
The Herschel infrared telescope, built by Thales Alenia Space with a cryostat and 3.5-meter mirror supplied by Astrium, will allow astronomers to survey the cold regions of the universe, which cannot be seen using conventional telescopes such as Hubble. Herschel is scheduled to be launched this spring together with a cosmic background explorer, Planck, atop an Ariane 5 ECA rocket (see p. 38). European Space Agency photo.
The new “safety of life” GPS civil signal for emergency and rescue calls is expected to become operational on the USAF/Lockheed Martin GPS Block IIR-20(M) satellite that was launched Mar. 24. The satellite, which incorporates an ITT-provided navigation payload, is the first developed to provide an on-orbit demonstration of a third civil signal located on the L5 frequency (1176.45MHz).
Aldo Basile has been appointed London-based vice president-sales for Europe, Russia and Central Asia for Boeing Commercial Airplanes . He succeeds Marlin Dailey, who is now vice president-sales. Basile was vice president-sales for several European countries.
China is accelerating reform of its military aircraft sector by bringing forward the establishment of a company that will be its national defense champion. Government and industry leaders have dropped plans to initially restrict the new business—a maker of fighters, trainers, drones and missiles—to the status of a division of national aeronautics conglomerate Avic (AW&ST Mar. 30, p. 40).
Southeast Asia’s largest budget airline group, AirAsia, is stepping up its assault on the Singapore home territory of rivals Tiger Airways and Jetstar Asia with plans to operate 50 daily flights from the city-state by 2011. The group, comprised of three affiliates from Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia flying under the same brand, is also seeking to raise its regional profile by getting approval to paint the flag of the Assn. of South East Asian Nations on its aircraft. CEO Tony Fernandes has said AirAsia’s future lies in Southeast Asia, not farther abroad.
A team led by Sierra Nevada Corp. has won a $2-million follow-on Defense Dept. Operationally Responsive Space contract to study a modular tool kit of spacecraft buses and payloads for rapid deployment of low-cost space vehicles. The four-month effort, due for completion in August 2009, follows an initial Phase 2 study which also included General Dynamics and ITT.
British Airways will sell 11 of its Boeing 757s for cargo conversion as the airline eliminates the aircraft type from its fleet between 2010 and 2012 in favor of Airbus single-aisles. BA subsidiary OpenSkies will retain four 757s.
The U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) is poised to issue a request for information to industry seeking technology that could form the basis for a responsive space launch X-plane demonstrator.
Singapore state investment fund Temasek is selling out of Jetstar Asia and Valuair, budget airline partners it has owned in association with Qantas. It will now hold 49% of the airlines, while Singaporean Dennis Choo owns the rest, ensuring that they retain that nationality under international air traffic agreements.
Of all the uncertainties that bewilder astronomers, none is more puzzling than what transpired in the first millionth of a second after the Big Bang. Understanding what occurred then will help unravel some of the best-kept secrets in the universe—including the density and nature of matter, the existence of “dark energy,” and the origins of stars and galaxies. That will be the objective of a €1.3-billion ($1.7-billion) twin-telescope mission due to lift off from the European spaceport at Kourou, French Guiana, at the end of April.
Draft language of a new climate-change bill circulating in the House would require the Environmental Protection Agency to set greenhouse gas emissions standards for aircraft and aircraft engines by the end of 2012. The legislation, sponsored by House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), calls for a U.S. cap-and-trade system that critics say would indirectly tax airlines. Oil companies would have to buy credits for any fuel they produce, and those costs are likely to be passed on to airlines. The International Air Transport Assn.
Look for contractors working on NASA’s Orion crew exploration vehicle and its Ares I launcher to get more money this spring to account for schedule and design changes to the human-rated spacecraft developments. About $1.8 billion is expected to go for Lockheed Martin’s work on Orion alone.
Aviation inventor and engineer Seymour (Si) Robin, co-owner of Sensor Systems Inc., Chatsworth, Calif., has received a Living Legends of Aviation Award for his accomplishments as a designer of antennas for commercial, business and military airborne applications that are used on most aircraft types in the world. Living Legends of Aviation is comprised of 70 people—including entrepreneurs, innovators, record-breakers, astronauts, pilots who have become celebrities and celebrities who have become pilots.
The price of European Union emissions allowances (EUAs) under the EU Emissions Trading Scheme climbed during the first half of March but eased back on profit-taking, traders said. EUAs for December 2009 delivery on the over-the-counter market closed at €10.23 ($13.56) per metric ton of CO2 equivalent on Mar. 2, some way above the all-time low of €8.33 seen in mid-February.
I was pleased that the Lcross mission has adopted some of the principles of critical chain management (AW&ST Mar. 9, p. 48). Since leaving the Apollo program in the early 1970s, I have been involved with construction scheduling and cost controls, and have seen how effective this approach can be to managing schedule and cost. Despite transition adjustments for management of space projects, particularly for upper-level project managers, this could be the start of a paradigm shift for the space industry.
Andy Nativi (Long Beach, Calif.), Michael A. Taverna (Washington)
Although its second spacecraft is not yet in orbit, Italy is already laying the groundwork for a pair of follow-on milsatcom systems it plans to launch in partnership with France. After a brief delay due to a satellite-hardware glitch discovered during payload preparation in Long Beach, Calif., Sicral 1B is set to lift off around Apr. 19 on a Zenit-3 SL rocket. The launch platform Odyssey left Long Beach—Sea Launch’s home port—in early April, followed a few days later by the faster Commander control ship.
With a goal of cutting costs and cycle time by an order of magnitude, Lockheed Martin has opened a Space Vehicle Integration Laboratory on its Denver campus to improve the execution and reliability of software development for satellites.
More than 7,500 registrants attended the 25th National Space Symposium in Colorado Springs. The final count is expected to be a record, despite the economic downturn. During the event, which took place Mar. 30 through Apr. 2, senior decision makers in the civil and national security space arenas discussed “the next space age,” including challenges in the current financial climate as well as to securing and protecting assets in space.
Finland has OK’d a $280-million foreign military sales contract for the second phase of its air force’s Boeing F/A-18C/D Hornet mid-life update. The award covers software and system upgrades and the acquisition of Raytheon AGM-154C Joint Stand-Off Weapons. Finnish company Patria will install the retrofit kits. The update of its 64 F-18s is to be completed by 2016.
China’s newly established Avic Aircraft intends to become the world’s third force in making large airplanes, setting itself up for rivalry with compatriot commercial aircraft builder Comac. The new company is poised to deeply restructure much of the Chinese aircraft industry, reshaping it in the pattern of Airbus. Old regional entities such as Xi’an and Shaanxi Aircraft are to be swept away, replaced with a framework of units each specializing in its own part of the airframe, such as the wing or nose section.
Bombardier plans to make steeper reductions in business jet production, cutting deliveries by 25% in its fiscal year ending Jan. 31, 2010, and laying off an additional 3,000 employees. In February, the Canadian company announced it would cut Learjet and Challenger production by 10% and lay off 1,360 people, but order cancellations and deferrals have worsened. Production rates will be reduced on all business jets, but cuts will be deeper on the smaller Learjets.
Vitaly Savelyev has been appointed CEO of Aeroflot Russian Airlines . He succeeds Valery Okulov, who has been named Russian deputy minister of transport. Savelyev was deputy minister of economic development and trade.
