Britain's protracted efforts to shift the bulk of its defense labs, now known as Qinetiq, into the private sector made some headway last week with the government announcing it had selected the Carlyle Group as its preferred strategic partner.
Kenneth J. Paul (see photo) has become vice president-sales and marketing for Meggitt Avionics/S-TEC, Mineral Wells, Tex. He was director of marketing for S-TEC.
GE Aircraft Engines won a fixed-price, $15-million contract for 30 T58-GE-16A helicopter engine conversion kits. The kits, which will include upgraded cores, will improve the reliability, and help extend the service life, of T58 engines now powering U.S. Marine CH-46E helicopters (AW&ST Aug. 26, p. 41). Deliveries of the 30 kits are to begin in October and should end in April. The contract includes three options for a total of 304 kits. All contract deliveries should be completed by the first quarter of 2006.
Egypt may buy U.S. hardware worth more than $250 million in the coming months, including two Gulfstream IVs. The potential foreign military sales package announced by the Pentagon last week also includes two UH-60L Black Hawk helicopters and more than 450 AGM-114 Hellfire air-to-surface anti-armor missiles.
A selection of corrosion-free plastic filters eliminates contamination on pick-up lines for air, vacuum, liquid or oil uses. Effective in protecting pumps on any downstream device, the design prevents clogging. Available as fixed filter assemblies or as units that can be changed for cleaning or replacing, the units offer filter media in a variety of micron screen sizes from 5-500, and filters are color coded to identify micron size. Fittings can be provided with barb, threads, bulkhead, couplers or any combination--in plastic or metal housings.
District of Columbia Air National Guard F-16 pilots stranded by a nationwide grounding of commercial aircraft in the wake of terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 precipitated an unusual ``rescue mission'' flown by a sister squadron. Two flying units are under the DCANG's 113th Wing here--the 121st Fighter Sqdn., which flies Block 30 F-16s, and the 201st Airlift Sqdn. The latter operates three ``white-tail'' C-22s--a military version of the Boeing 727-100--and a C-38 Astra business jet.
Following its selection as a ``model unit'' for the Taiwanese air force, the country's only reconnaissance squadron did a ``meet the press'' last week in its first public appearance since being formed in 1997. The unit, based at Taichung's CCK AB, flies six RF-5E and two F-5F aircraft.
Scaled Composites' unusual new twinjet design had made four flights as of late last week from the Mojave, Calif., airport. The first flight on Aug. 1 revealed problems with vibration, and the aircraft returned quickly for landing. The vibration problem was fixed within 3 hr., said Scaled President Burt Rutan. A subsequent flight lasted for hours and during a later one, pattern work was conducted at the airport (AW&ST Aug. 5, p. 19). The cockpit has numerous small windows and a larger round door, which appears to be cracked open in this picture.
BAE Systems Controls is offering a commercial real-time operating system (RTOS) for flight-critical applications, joining Green Hills' Integrity RTOS and Wind River Systems with the VxWorks RTOS (AW&ST May 20, p. 17). Interest in the field is heating up. One reason is that government customers prefer to have flight software running on a commercial off-the-shelf operating system, not the proprietary and incompatible RTOSs that are now 55-65% of the market, said Leo Cotnoir, BAE Systems Controls marketing manager for the new ``CsLEOS'' product.
Shirley Kaufman has been promoted to vice president-employee relations and human resources legal compliance from senior director of legal affairs for America West Airlines.
In the days of the Cold War, we were able to manage the threat with strategies of deterrence and containment. But it's a lot tougher to deter enemies who have no country to defend. And containment is not possible when dictators obtain weapons of mass destruction and are prepared to share them with terrorists who intend to inflict catastrophic casualties on the U.S. The case of Saddam Hussein, a sworn enemy of our country, requires a candid appraisal of the facts. After his defeat in the Persian Gulf war in 1991, Saddam agreed under U.N.
Investigators of last month's Mi-26 crash in Chechnya are increasingly focusing on the possibility of an anti-aircraft missile launched by rebels. However, a technical failure has not yet been disregarded. The death toll has reached 118. This accident and other recent crashes involving army helicopters have prompted the Russian Defense Ministry to consider merging army aviation into the air force in an attempt to improve flight safety.
ARINC has successfully tested a broadband communications receiver for aircraft that has the potential to receive data at rates of 8-10 Mbps.--about 10 times faster than other commercial applications. The new system uses Ku-band satellite technology at ultrahigh frequencies to achieve an order of magnitude higher performance compared with other systems. The tests were conducted using a steerable dish antenna mounted on the empennage of a Cessna Citation X business jet.
A dramatic increase in attacks on U.S. Defense Dept. computers and networks during the last few years has prompted development of ``Cyber Warrior'' training to give space command officers a crash course in computer network operations (CNO). The training is now being extended to other domestic military and civil organizations, acquainting a broad base of government officials with network-hacking concepts. To underscore the importance of CNO in today's combat arms profession, U.S.
A federal rule restricting manufacturers of ultrawideband technology (UWB) from building unlicensed devices that operate near critical aviation frequencies may be challenged this autumn. William N. Sears, director of communications, navigation and surveillance for the Air Transport Assn., said there is a ``big push'' to relax the prohibition--a move he thinks could cause problems with GPS-based systems and other hardware. Sears said officials of the Federal Communications Commission plan to review the rule in October.
Rock singer Lance Bass isn't going into space because he is rich and can afford it. He is going because a sixth-grade girl suggested it to a movie production company. If his backers can complete financing arrangements with the Russians, the entertainer is to be launched Oct. 28 along with a Russian commander and Belgian flight engineer on a Soyuz changeout mission to the International Space Station.
Neil Hocker (see photo) has been appointed senior certification engineer/FAA designed airworthiness representative for Jet Aviation Engineering Services of San Antonio. He was manager of quality and enginering for West Star Aviation.
A 10-12-in. fatigue crack has been found in the center wing box of the firefighting Lockheed C-130A that crashed June 17, along the line where the right wing separated from the body. Other smaller fatigue cracks were also found along the parting line on the lower wing skin. The chordwise length of the wing box at that point is 80 in., meaning the crack itself covered 12-15% of the skin. Laboratory analysis of the crack confirms that it is due to fatigue (see photographs).
Suzanne Stephensen has been promoted to director of inflight resources from manager of inflight services and Amy Quinn to director of inflight training from chief flight attendant and ground instructor for SkyWest Airlines.
Flight tests of Toyota's Advanced Aircraft single-engine proof-of-concept (POC) general aviation vehicle (see photo) have shown it has about twice as much drag as was predicted (AW&ST June 10, p. 16). Zero-lift drag coefficients from the wing, fuselage, wing/body intersection, the horizontal and vertical stabilizers and other areas of the airframe add up to more than 0.038. As a result, top speed of the POC in level flight is 128 KTAS, well below the projected 168 KTAS for the same conditions.
USMC Col. (ret.) Reno Bamford has become federal security director for the Lincoln (Neb.) Airport. He was commanding officer and professor of naval science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Navy ROTC.
A contract worth a potential $4.5 billion over the next 16 years has given TRW Inc. the lead in producing U.S. civil and military polar-orbiting weather satellites. Called the National Polar-Orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS), the spacecraft are to satisfy the daily operational needs now filled by NOAA's Polar-Orbiting Environmental Satellite (POES) Program and the Defense Dept.'s Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP). But they also are to serve NASA's long-term commitment to build a continuous stream of climate data.
NASA has picked Spectrum Astro to build its next gamma ray observatory, the Gamma Ray Large Area Telescope (Glast). Set for launch in 2006, probably on a Boeing Delta II rocket, Glast will be a follow-on to the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory. The spacecraft's main telescope is designed to be at least 30 times more sensitive than its predecessor, while its gamma ray burst monitor will have a broader field of view and spectral range.
Norris J. Krone, Jr., has modestly instigated his fair share of aerospace breakthroughs in the past two decades. He did it in the 1980s with the introduction of the radical X-29 forward swept-wing fighter; he did it last year when Gulfstream certified its G-V enhanced vision system, and he's working at it again right now in his quiet suburban Maryland laboratory.
