Kit-built helicopter manufacturer RotorWay International, producer of the two-seat A600 Talon piston-powered machine, is planning to develop a production, two-seat turboshaft-powered trainer to replace the Robinson R-22. Provisionally planned with the Rolls-Royce RR300, the FAA-certificated helicopter will also be offered as a low-cost option for private pilots, aerial photography, law enforcement and news production. The A600 will still be produced.
Boeing has named three men with long government experience to senior positions that should boost its Washington presence. David H. Morrison, former staff director of House Appropriations’ defense subcommittee, will become vice president of government operations. He recently worked at one of the city’s powerful lobbying and public relations firms, the Podesta Group. Sean I. McCormack, a former assistant secretary of state for public affairs, is now vice president of communications. And Army Brig. Gen. (ret.) Leo A.
The United Arab Emirates will acquire 48 Alenia Aermacchi M-346 aircraft to meet its air force’s advanced jet trainer and light strike fighter requirements. Final assembly of the aircraft in country remains a strong option.
Current certification standards for engine bird strike ingestion and aircraft flotation will come under intense scrutiny by the NTSB in its ongoing probe of US Airways Flight 1549. Pilot training and experience will also be on the safety board’s agenda at a hearing it plans for late spring, NTSB Vice Chairman Robert Sumwalt testified Feb. 24 before the House Aviation subcommittee hearing on the unprecedented water landing of the Airbus A320 Jan. 15.
New White House skepticism over the U.S. military’s VH‑71 presidential helicopter has thrust the multinationally sourced, Lockheed Martin-led program under new scrutiny, as analysts and officials debate everything from cancellation to sticking to the recently revised plan.
Telesat’s Telstar 11N communications platform is en route to its operational position over the Atlantic following launch Feb. 26 on a Zenit-3SLB rocket organized by Sea Launch Co., as part of the Land Launch service the California-based company offers in collaboration with Space International Services of Moscow. The Zenit lifted the 8,845-lb. spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 1:30 p.m. EST on a 6-hr. mission to geostationary transfer orbit. From its final position at 37.5 deg. W.
Thales management this year expects to see a slowdown in organic revenue growth from last year’s 8%, but still believes that despite the economic troubles it can achieve a 3-5% increase through December. The goal is to maintain an order book worth around two years of production, management said late last week in announcing full-year financial results. The company also hopes to improve its earnings margin in 2009. Thales closed 2008 with a 10% increase in orders and a 1% hike in revenue.
President Barack Obama pledged Feb. 25, in his address to Congress, to “reform our defense budget so that we’re not paying for Cold War-era weapons systems we don’t use.” In doing so he quickened the pulse rate, increased the blood pressure and aggravated the ulcer of many a defense-industry executive—none more than the executives at Lockheed Martin Corp. responsible for the F-22 Raptor.
Late last week, NASA slipped the Kepler launch from Cape Canaveral by one day to Mar. 6, giving it two possible launch windows. 10:49-10:52 p.m. and 11:13 to 11:16 p.m. EST “to accommodate the additional time for analysis,” the space agency said (see p. 53).
So far there are no clues in the Fiscal 2010 defense budget about the F-22 program, says a senior U.S. Air Force official. Planning is afoot but Obama faces a dilemma, the official says. “He’s under pressure to retain high-tech manufacturing jobs, but he also needs to cancel high-cost programs to get Pentagon spending under control.” The Air Force chief of staff wants 60 more F-22s [see editorial]. He can live with a total of 243 Raptors if the F-35 ramps up to high rate production [of 110 per year].
ATK will ship the four solid-fuel rocket segments that will make up the business end of NASA’s planned Ares I-X flight test vehicle to its Florida launch site early this month, as the first version of the next U.S. crew launch vehicle begins taking shape. Transporters moved the segments through the snow to their pre-ship hangar at ATK’s Promontory, Utah, facility.
Aerojet engineers are evaluating results from a hot-fire test series of the roll control thruster it is developing for NASA’s planned Ares I crew launch vehicle. NASA awarded Aerojet the contract two years ago for a development based on the company’s MR-80 600-lb.-thrust monopropellant rocket, which used its throttling capability of more than 70:1 to ease the two landers onto the surface of Mars.
With all the rhetoric on which rotorcraft to pick for the next combat search-and-rescue (CSAR) helicopter, you would think it will be easy. And it is: If the AW101 is good enough to pick up the U.S. president, it should be good enough to pick up a downed aviator!
NASA may try to launch the space shuttle Discovery to the International Space Station on Mar. 12, pending progress on an evaluation of suspect gaseous hydrogen valves in each of the orbiter’s three main engines. If it looks like the work won’t be finished, the shuttle would need to wait on the pad while Russia delivers fresh crewmembers on a Soyuz vehicle. In that case, Discovery’s launch would slip to Apr. 6 to avoid having two vehicles docked to the station at once. Managers will meet again Mar.
Eclipse Aviation is expected to cease operations after its directors supported a move by major creditors to convert the struggling very-light-jet manufacturer’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection to Chapter 7 liquidation. The move was prompted by majority shareholder ETIRC Aviation’s inability to raise the financing to close its proposed $188-million buyout of the company’s assets. Eclipse has laid off its 800 employees.
Two key command-and-control systems being developed by the U.S. Marine Corps and Air Force still need polishing, according to the annual report by the Pentagon’s Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E). The Marines’ Common Aviation Command and Control System—meant to be the primary air operations planning and command-and-control tool for the Marine Aircraft Wing—“performed poorly” during its operational assessment in the past fiscal year, the report states. The Air Force’s Battle Control System-Fixed also has developmental problems, says the DOT&E.
Workers at EADS Astrium in Bremen, Germany, and elsewhere are hard at work preparing the second Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) for its launch to the International Space Station in mid-2010. Now the vehicle has a name—the Johannes Kepler. The German astronomer, born in 1571, is best known for working out laws of planetary motion. “The next ATV mission will be the confirmation of Europe’s commitment to and interest in the ISS for the years to come as the first step in a global space exploration effort,” says Simonetta Di Pippo, director of human spaceflight at ESA.
Spacecraft named for two more European scientists are in place for an Apr. 16 launch to the L2 Sun-Earth Lagrange Point, with the arrival Feb. 18 of ESA’s Planck observatory at the European launch center near Kourou, French Guiana. Named for Max Planck, the German physicist who helped found quantum theory, the 1,900-kg. (4,189-lb.) spacecraft will use a six-step cooling system and a 1.5-meter (4.9-ft.) primary mirror to measure variations in the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation left over after the Big Bang.
Military and intelligence officials are keeping an eye on Mexico and not just because the violence of its warring narcotics cartels is slopping over the border. Officials at the Marine Corps Combat Development Command have added Mexico to potential trouble spots that could pose national security problems between 2014-25. The drug violence, population growth and proximity to the U.S. could prompt massive migration north with accompanying instability, Col. Steve Zotti tells visiting reporters and editors from the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism.
Carbon-fiber main rotor blades are being developed and flight tested by Olympia, Wash.,-based Northwest Helicopters for the Bell UH-1H, 205 and 212. The blades, made up of a Nomex honeycomb core, carbon-fiber reinforced composite spar and a stainless steel leading edge abrasion strip, weigh 185 lb. each, 30 lb. less than the existing metal blades, and have a swept tip for lower drag. The units are designed to improve hot-and-high performance as well as to provide greater endurance, and are expected to be approved for military and commercial use on the UH-1H in July.
French engine maker Turbomeca made a record 1,313 turboshafts in 2008 and topped the billion Euro revenue mark for the first time, hitting €1.103 ($1.39 billion). Although girding itself for challenges in 2009, it remains committed to spending up to 9% of sales on research and development for long-term development. Plans remain firm to double staff to 180 by 2011-12 at the new manufacturing site in Monroe, N.C., where it makes Arriel engines for the U.S. Army and commercial customers.
The Obama White House has opted to retain another senior political appointee at the Pentagon, along with Defense Secretary Robert Gates who was held over from the Bush days. Air Force Secretary Michael Donley will stay on board overseeing the service, which is beset with acquisition problems and nuclear weapon management issues.
Funding for the second phase of a broad-ranging U.K. research program into operation of unmanned aerial vehicles in nonrestricted airspace is now expected to come online in April, several months later than originally planned.
Taipei’s Taoyuan International Airport is handling barely half the freight volumes of a few years ago, as the economic crisis accelerates Taiwan’s decline as a manufacturing exporter. In January, the airport handled only 72,213 metric tons of freight, compared with the average of 142,000 tons a month in 2005. The lunar new year holiday in January contributed to the fall, but monthly throughput has been well below 100,000 tons in recent months. Taiwanese manufacturing has steadily moved to China during this decade.
Rockwell Collins and L-3 Integrated Systems have handed over the first modernized Block 1 E-6B Mercury. The upgrade corrects deficiencies identified during operational testing of the E-6B, a modification of the Navy’s Boeing E-6A submarine-communications aircraft to take on the Air Force’s airborne command post mission. Block 1 addresses operator workload sharing and mission system obsolescence while providing an open systems architecture and multi-level network security.
