Miniaturized electronics using increasingly smaller voltages are key to packing more capability into advanced aircraft, sensors and communications networks--but they're on a collision course with nature. In addition to solar flares and radiation belts in space, these advanced devices are threatened by new electronic pulse weapons, bursts of microwaves from powerful new radars and proliferation of small nuclear weapons.
Bill Brodegard has become senior engineer for certification for Chelton Flight Systems, Boise, Idaho. He was director of technical services for the Avidyne Corp.
Refining a decade's experience in making airplanes on a moving assembly line, Boeing is using a unique set of shop-floor tools to speed the wing and body joins and the installation of systems, gear and engines as it pursues a pace-setting standard for 787 production.
The government of Gibraltar plans to start construction of a state-of-the-art, 20,000-sq.-meter (215,200-sq.-ft.) air terminal on "The Rock" in October that it aims to complete at the end of 2008. The current terminal, according to Gibraltar's chief minister, Peter Caruana, is "totally inadequate" for Gibraltar's needs and "as a building, is well past its shelf life." Gibraltar Airport, which is located near the border of Spain, has a single 6,000-ft. Runway 9/27 and is served daily by Iberia and GB Airways (operating for British Airways).
Carlos Suarez has been named head of EADS' Military Transport Div./chairman of EADS CASA, effective July 1. He will succeed Francisco Fernando Sainz. Suarez has been head of the division's military derivative programs for Airbus platforms.
Time is running out to enter Aviation Week & Space Technology's Annual Product Breakthrough Award competition. Four awards will be presented for best new or enhanced product/service; one each to Large, Medium, Small and Start-Up entities (AW&ST Apr. 2, p. 17). The deadline is June 29. Winners will be announced at the AVIATION WEEK Aerospace & Defense Programs Conference in Phoenix on Oct. 30. Contact [email protected]
I have been with the KC-135 maintenance staff for 12 years in Oklahoma and have seen a lot of changes. In the last few years, I have seen management move toward the lean improvement process. The size of management has doubled along with the number of analysts who are trying to iron out the wrinkles as if this were a new airplane. There are now fewer mechanics as repairs to the old KC-135 tankers have been grow- ing more complex and time-consuming.
USAF Maj. Gen. Wendell L. Griffin has been named Air Force chief of safety/commander of the Air Force Safety Center, Kirtland AFB, N.M. He has been director of Global Reach Programs in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition at the Pentagon. Griffin will be succeeded by Maj. Gen. David S. Gray, who has been commander of the USAF Expeditionary Center of Air Mobility Command, Ft. Dix, N.J. Gray, in turn, will be followed by Brig. Gen. Kip L.
A ficionados of labor relations by press release have a special place in their hearts for the National Air Traffic Controllers Assn., which salts and peppers its FAA contract talks with example after example of how poorly controllers are paid and how badly they are treated. Now comes a Natca campaign inspired by the law that enabled the FAA to impose its own employment terms last September after declaring an impasse in contract negotiations.
Booming order backlogs presage a banner year for the Paris air show. But several high-profile topics--Airbus's restructuring plan, the dollar-euro exchange rate and Boeing's newest aircraft--reach well beyond the biennial aerospace showcase. Le Bourget usually is the main event in the "odd-year" aerospace calendar, but this year it will take somewhat second billing to milestones such as the rollout and first flight of the Boeing 787--slated for a few weeks after the June 18-24 air show--and Airbus's planned first delivery of its A380 later in the year.
Ameco Beijing has widened its heavy maintenance services to Airbus products with a check on an Air China A340 begun this month. The joint venture of Air China and Lufthansa Technik had previously limited its overhaul capability to Boeing 737s, 747s, 767s and 777s. While the company's growth is mainly supported by expansion of the Air China fleet, it also aims to develop its business serving other carriers, partly by widening the range of services offered.
A patch of Martian soil analyzed by NASA's Spirit Mars Exploration Rover is so rich in silica that it provides strong new evidence that the rover's Gusev Crater landing site was wet and possibly habitable by Martian microbial life in the ancient past. The rover's German-built alpha particle X-ray spectrometer measured a composition of about 90% pure silica for this soil, which likely would have required the long-term presence of water to produce. The rover's Alliance Spacesystems' robotic arm (below) placed the instrument on the spot.
ROCKWELL COLLINS HAS CERTIFIED a liquid crystal display Head-up Guidance System, the HGS-5860, to improve brightness and resolution. It will be offered first on the Dassault Falcon 7X. The HGS is designed to handle new capabilities such as enhanced vision (infrared imagery) and synthetic vision (digital terrain maps). In addition, the company's HGS-6000 has been selected as standard equipment for the Gulfstream G550 and G450 and will be an option on the G500, G350, G200 and G150.
Four companies that provide spacecraft to NASA under a catalogue approach will spend as much as $600,000 each over the next four months to deliver data on how their products can accommodate the planned Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM). The Rapid Spacecraft Development Office at Goddard Space Flight Center tapped Ball Aerospace, General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems; Orbital Sciences and Space Systems/Loral as potential suppliers for the LDCM satellite, which the agency hopes will plug a feared gap in the 35-year Landsat database.
Radiation is a reemerging problem for microelectronics, but BAE Systems has techniques and technologies lifted from its space programs for staying ahead of either natural or man-made threats to aircraft, sensors or missiles flying in the atmosphere.
AirTran Airways will expand its Boeing fleet with another 15 737-700s, raising its total orders for the aircraft to 115. Deliveries are set for 2011-12. The carrier has 45 -700s in operation using 12 seats for business and 125 seats for economy class. The contract has not been formally signed, but will make AirTran one of Boeing's largest 737 NG operators. It also flies 87 717-200s.
ARINC EXPECTS TO FINISH DEVELOPMENT of a new, slimmer K u-band antenna by the end of June so that more types of business jets can subscribe to its SKYLink broadband communications service. The new design fits into the radomes of Dassault and Bombardier airframes, including the Global Express and Challenger. The system provides high-speed Internet and private network connections in flight.
The Bush administration has reaffirmed its contentious opposition to developing new, legally binding arms-control regimes to the Democrat-controlled Congress. But Donald Mahley, acting deputy assistant secretary of State for threat reductions, export controls and negotiations, did allow the possibility of informal discussions over outer space in recent testimony.
The U.S. Transportation Dept. chose AirTran Airways over four other applicants for rights to a single daily round trip at Washington Reagan National Airport (DCA), relinquished last winter by Spirit Airlines. AirTran will launch additional service to Atlanta by Aug. 1 with Boeing 737-700s. The department cited competition in its decision, finding AirTran's proposed service to its hub at Atlanta more beneficial than ATA Airlines' to Chicago Midway Airport.
HONEYWELL IS EVALUATING WHETHER IT WILL ADD 3D airport maps to its synthetic vision system so pilots can see the entire airport surface, including taxiways, regardless of the weather. The company is developing its synthetic vision system for business jets and helicopters, with certification expected late this year for Gulfstream's PlaneView-equipped aircraft.
U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Guy C. Swan, 3rd, has been named director of operations for United States Northern Command, Peterson AFB, Colo. He has been commanding general of the U.S. Army Military District of Washington/commander of Joint Force Headquarters-National Capital Region. Brig. Gen. Jeffrey C. Horne has been appointed deputy director of the Joint Functional Component Command for Space within the U.S. Strategic Command/deputy director of Mission Support Operations at the National Reconnaissance Office, Chantilly, Va.
Willard D. Downs, 3rd (see photos) has been promoted to principal engineer in the Computer Engineering Subdivision from director of the Computer Systems Engineering Dept. of The Aerospace Corp., El Segundo, Calif. Jean L. Michael has been promoted to associate principal director from systems director in the National Polar-orbiting Environmental Satellite Systems program, at the corporation's Silver Spring, Md., office.
IN "CORE EUROPEAN AIRSPACE," where Mode S (selective interrogation) surveillance is being instituted this year, Eurocontrol reports that 95% of flights are signaling that they're capable of Mode S elementary surveillance and 90% are communicating they're capable of enhanced surveillance. Maastricht Upper Area Control Center is already using Mode S elementary surveillance data from three radars in Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands to downlink each aircraft's identification. Enhanced surveillance allows additional aircraft performance parameters to be downlinked.
