Arianespace has concluded new contracts to launch three telecommunications satellites with Ariane 4/5 boosters in 1999-2000. They cover the Indian Space Organization's Insat 3A, Loral Skynet's Telstar 7 and an unspecified PanAmSat spacecraft. Arianespace's 43-satellite backlog is valued at $3.5 billion.
Lufthansa's revenues during the first half of 1999 increased 3.8% to $5.9 billion but pretax profits decreased by 40.4% to $305 million. Chief Financial Officer Karl-Ludwig Kley blamed the highly competitive environment, lower yields, higher labor costs and ``bottlenecks'' in the European airspace that disrupted operations. Nevertheless, Kley predicts Lufthansa's profits in 1999 will be in excess of DM1 billion ($525 million).
Northwest Airlines recently flew the proposed new ``Polar 3'' airway to Asia as part of its regularly scheduled service from Detroit to Beijing. The new airway could cut as much as 1 hr. from the Boeing 747-400 flight during the fall and winter months or add 6,000 lb. of payload, according to the airline. The transpolar airway is being flown on a demonstration basis while U.S. and Russian aviation and airline officials evaluate the results and determine if it will be implemented on a permanent basis.
As a precaution against potential problems on Jan. 1, 2000, Japan's MOT plans to increase vertical separation to 4,000 ft. from 2,000 ft. and horizontal separation to 15 min. from 10 min. for all international flights departing from Japan between 11 p.m. on Dec. 31 and 6 p.m. on Jan. 1. The change will affect about 65 flights and delay their departure up to 1 hr. As for domestic service, the MOT plans to reduce traffic to 80% of normal operations at 9 a.m. The restriction will cause delays of 10-30 min. for about 30 flights.
Data sharing was one of many issues that had to be resolved before the Defense Dept. and major U.S. airlines could agree on safety audits of international carriers. Senior officials of the Air Transport Assn. (ATA) and the Pentagon signed an agreement on Aug. 5 calling for six ATA member airlines to perform safety audits of code-share partners within a year and to repeat the audits every two years (or more often if problems arise). The airlines, however, will not file reports to the Defense Dept. Instead, Defense Dept.
Following the July 23 hijacking of an All Nippon Airways Boeing 747-400 by a man who easily eluded security at Haneda airport in Tokyo, Japan's 11 scheduled carriers have advised Transport Minister Jiro Kawasaki on ways to tighten domestic security screening.
DaimlerChrysler Aerospace Airbus has chosen Teledyne Electronic Technologies to supply the Flight Data Interface and Management Units on Airbus A330/A340 aircraft, beginning with the planned introduction of the A340-500/600 in 2002.
While international efforts to develop ballistic missile defense capabilities vary widely depending on real and perceived notions of the threat, most nations appear content to rely on the U.S. for the required technology and/or systems.
The second Italian Space Agency/Alenia multipurpose logistics module (MPLM) for the International Space Station has been delivered to the Kennedy Space Center by an Airbus Beluga ``Super Transporter.'' (See photo.) The aircraft landed on the shuttle landing runway. The 4.5-ton module is designated ``Raffaello'' and was flown from Alenia's facility at Turin, Italy. The 21 X 15-ft. module is to be launched on its first mission to the ISS by the space shuttle during mid-summer 2000. It is the second MPLM to be delivered to Kennedy, and a third will be delivered next year.
James D. Plummer has succeeded John L. Hennessy as the dean of engineering at Stanford (Calif.) University. He was John M. Fluke professor of electrical enginering. Hennessy has become university provost.
Elvie Lawrence Smith, the former head of Pratt&Whitney Canada, died of cancer on Aug. 4 in Quebec. He joined P&WC in 1957 and was a member of the initial team assembled by now United Technologies to begin gas turbine design and development. He was made president and chief executive officer of Pratt&Whitney Canada in 1980, and chairman and CEO in 1984. Smith retired in 1987 but remained chairman until 1994. Smith was 73.
Marshall Space Flight Center and Summa Technology of Huntsville, Ala., have signed a contract for manufacturing, operations and maintenance of the Fastrac engine in support of X-34 rocket plane test flights and possible commercialization of the engine. The contract--with a total value of nearly $11.3 million, including options--covers engine hardware, engineering support and refurbishment for 22 planned powered flights of the X-34.
A federal grand jury in Los Angeles subpoenaed Lockheed Martin Sanders documents on July 15 as part of an investigation into payment of a consultant on a 1990 foreign sale of an air defense radar. The radar was sold to Taiwan, and the probe is looking at the propriety of the payments and whether then-Sanders Associates tried to cover them up, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. Lockheed Martin says it did not violate any laws or regulations.
Robert Thomas (R.T.) Jones, a pioneer of U.S. swept-back wing designs, died Aug. 11 at age 89 at his home in Los Altos Hills, Calif. His swept-wing work was done at the Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory (now NASA's Research Center) in 1944 at about the time the Germans were working on their concepts, and he developed many offshoots of the swept-wing concept. His numerous honors included the Smithsonian Institution's Langley Award.
FAA officials have agreed to cap the distances used to separate aircraft and review the practice of ``ground stops'' as part of a pact with airlines to provide short-term fixes for air traffic control problems that are contributing to record flight delays this summer.
The final curtain is falling on the plan by Singapore Airlines to buy a 50% stake in Australia's Ansett Airlines, but the carriers are expected to continue to work closely in various marketing agreements. The signals have come in two forms. Global publisher Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. has told financial analysts that Ansett's financial returns will be reflected in News Corp.'s fiscal 1999-2000 results. That means News Corp. will not sell its 50% share in Ansett to Singapore Airlines (SIA) as planned.
Iridium defaulted on two loans totaling more than $1.5 billion, bringing the 66-satellite venture one step closer to bankruptcy, but marathon negotiations continued with creditors late last week in an effort to reach a debt restructuring agreement.
The U.S. Navy's newest littoral warfare aircraft, the Sikorsky SH-60R, is expected to begin flight tests in October after completing several weeks of electronic systems functionality trials and checkouts on the ground.
