Bonnie Soodik has been named president of Boeing Shared Services, senior vice president of the Chicago-based company and a member of the executive council. She succeeds Laurette Koellner, who has become chief people and administration officer in the Office of the Chairman. Soodik was vice president-human resources for Boeing Space and Communications, Seal Beach, Calif.
Pamela A. Drew has been appointed vice president-engineering and information technology for Boeing Phantom Works, Seal Beach, Calif. She was director of math and computing technology/chief information officer.
Michael P. Field has become head of commercial engines marketing and sales for Pratt&Whitney, East Hartford, Conn. He succeeds Dan Webb, who is scheduled to retire May 31 as senior vice president-marketing and sales. Field was senior vice president-sales and customer support at International Aero Engines.
Stadiums, museums and such once were named for heroes of one sort or another (or at least for humans), not companies. The National Air and Space Museum had its Samuel P. Langley Theater named for the aviation pioneer and third secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, and the Albert Einstein Planetarium named for, well, you know. Say goodbye to those days. To the dismay of some curators, the museum is scraping Langley's name off the theater in favor of that of Lockheed Martin Corp., which recently donated funds for theater upgrades and the Dulles annex.
Louis Mancini has become vice president-maintenance operations services of Boeing Commercial Aviation Services. He was vice president-engineering and technical support at United Airlines.
In a sharply worded legal brief, Northrop Grumman Corp. is asking the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio to declare that state's tough anti-takeover laws unconstitutional and to block TRW Inc. from disrupting Northrop's attempt to acquire it. At the center of the legal firestorm is the Ohio Control Share Acquisition Act, which makes it extremely difficult to purchase an Ohio-based company when it does not wish to be acquired.
Since the development and entry into service of the A320 in 1988, Airbus has strived to keep a commonality in its fly-by-wire flight control systems, cockpit instrumentation and general airborne handling between its line of transports. Since the introduction of the single-aisle transport, Airbus production has encompassed the A330, the A340 and other variants of the A320.
The U.S. Air Force is looking for a way to detect a shoulder-fired missile launch and provide information to attack the shooter. Specifically, the service's UAV battlelab wants to demonstrate infrared sensors that could be put on a UAV to discern the launch point for the man-portable missile and track it in flight. Moreover, the system would be used to cue other sensors (on-board and off-board) to watch the launch position and provide target coordinates so the location can be attacked.
An FAA-sponsored study confirms a long-standing criticism of some of the agency's most basic internal workings: Inadequate communication between two FAA services--Aircraft Certification, which certifies the safety of aircraft types, and Flight Standards, which oversees their operations--sometimes blocks the most effective use of available safety information. As a secondary effect, designers and operators in industry don't get information they need, either.
The Airborne Laser's first attempt to shoot down a ballistic missile will likely occur a year later than planned because of problems assembling the Boeing 747-based weapon.
Security is the new rage among computers and software, and even Bill Gates has switched from forcing useless features on us that we don't want, to being a security evangelist. One trend is hardware-based security, said to be more difficult to crack than software-based techniques. New widgets include a fingerprint reader built into a laptop PCMCIA card, presented by Targus and IBM, that lets you access secure data by fingerprint instead of password. And IBM has partnered with a different company for another access scheme.
Some of Wall Street's leading sell-side analysts who track the aerospace/defense industry continue to believe virtually all military contractors will benefit from the Bush Administration's aggressive push to increase procurement spending, and there even could be moderate upside to projected growth estimates--some of which are quite healthy. But Standard&Poor's latest semiannual assessment recommending investor caution offers a contrarian view, if not a sobering reality check.
Linda Leukhardt has been promoted to vice president-business management/ chief financial officer of the Northrop Grumman Corp.'s Newport News (Va.) Sector. She was vice president-finance/controller for the company's Electronic Systems Sector in Baltimore.
Deutsche BA, British Airways' German subsidiary, will seek to restore profitability in the next 18 months after 10 years of continuous losses. To achieve such a long-overdue goal, it plans to devise a new strategy and become a low-cost carrier.
The Transportation Dept. threatened last week that it would withdraw U.S. cargo rights from one or more Japanese airlines, unless Tokyo reversed its plan to prevent FedEx from reacquiring 14 Tokyo Narita airport slots it leased to Delta Air Lines. Delta took down most of its Japan service after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and agreed to return the slots to FedEx, but Japan notified the U.S. that it would block the transfer and reallocate the slots to other airlines. Reassigning unused FedEx slots to U.S.
Montie Brewer has been appointed executive vice president-commercial for Air Canada, Allister Paterson president/chief operating officer of Air Canada Vacations and Kevin Howlett vice president-labor relations. Brewer was senior vice president-planning at United Airlines and Paterson executive general manager-commercial at Air New Zealand. Howlett was vice president-labor relations at Air Canada Regional.
Bonnie Allin has been appointed president/CEO of the Tucson (Ariz.) Airport Authority. She succeeds Walter A. Burg, who has retired. Allin has been vice president-aviation services.
Boeing's planned Sonic Cruiser aircraft now is about 60% carbon fiber composite structure by weight, but that could change as design trade studies continue. It is still early in the design phase of the program for the high-speed aircraft, and Boeing is keeping its options open--including the possibility of increased use of improved aluminum alloys.
Northrop Grumman suffers a black eye for the Global Hawk that crashed in the United Arab Emirates this year. It turns out a bolt had been installed backward during manufacturing, according to Air Force officials. The error led to a failure of a rod that moved one of the V-tail control surfaces. The unmanned recon aircraft, returning from a mission over Afghanistan, then spun to the ground. The blue suits express relief that it wasn't an Air Force-created problem, like an errant command signal that caused an earlier Global Hawk crash at Edwards AFB, Calif.
European defense officials were expected late last week to discuss the implications of Germany's decision to provide funding for Europe's A400M airlifter in two steps, despite insistence by Airbus Military Co., which will build the aircraft, and partner nations that the country tie down financing for the full 73-aircraft purchase.
Keith Henson has been appointed Knoxville, Tenn.-based director of security services for Lockwood Greene, Spartanburg, S.C. He was a lead security engineer.
The Irish government is reportedly ready to abandon its decision to buy five S-92 helicopters for a search and rescue requirement, and to reopen the bidding. The decision has been challenged by rival builder Eurocopter, which demanded to review the bidding procedures for possible irregularities.
The commercial aviation industry has bottomed out from its steep decline following the September attacks, but a sustained U.S. economic recovery is vital to the interests of most airlines in North America, according to International Lease Finance Corp. (ILFC). John L. Plueger, ILFC president and chief operating officer, said most of the company's North American customers report passenger levels within 5% of last year's numbers, and in some cases exceeding 2001 levels. Yields, however, remain a problem.
In another surprise move, the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has given domestic carrier Xiamen Airlines the rights to operate international routes, making it the ninth Chinese carrier to do so. Based in Fuzhou, Xiamen will launch its first international flight to Kuala Lumpur on Apr. 27. It also holds rights to Thailand, South Korea and Japan. Last November, CAAC said China Southwest could fly to Europe and the U.S. A month later, the agency said Hainan Airlines could operate to Thailand, Japan, Australia and Singapore.
