Despite threats of contractual retaliation from Moscow, French President Francois Hollande has indefinitely postponed delivery of the first of two Mistral-class helicopter assault ships to Russia, citing ongoing conflict between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian forces. Since suspending the 2011 contract in September, Hollande has been loath to cancel the €1.12 billion ($1.4 billion) Mistral deal. The first ship is dubbed Vladivostok and located at the Saint-Nazaire shipyard in France.
Japan has chosen the Northrop Grumman E-2D Hawkeye over the Boeing 737 AEW&C to fill a requirement for four surveillance aircraft, while also confirming it will proceed with orders for the Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk and Bell Boeing MV-22 Osprey. Three RQ-4s will be ordered in the fiscal year beginning April 2015, says NHK television. The timing of orders for the other types is unknown. The mid-term plan also set out the requirement for three surface-surveillance drones. RQ-4 beat the propeller-driven General Atomics Guardian ER, which is based on the U.S.
The U.K.’s F-35 test team has begun captive-carry trials of non-U.S.-made munitions for the aircraft. The Raytheon Paveway IV and the MBDA Asraam, both destined for use on F-35Bs were carried on external pylons for the first time last month. The weapons are scheduled for the Block 3F package.
Russian Helicopters is flight-testing the Mi-171A2 medium helicopter, the latest iteration of the Mi-8, equipped with new engines, rotors and glass-cockpit avionics. Developed by the Mil Moscow Helicopter Plant, the Mi-171A2 is powered by two digitally controlled, 2,400-shp, Klimov VK-2500PS-03 turboshafts, replacing the Mi-8/17’s 2,200-shp TV3-117s. The Russian KBO-17 avionics suite developed by Radio-Electronic Technologies includes multifunction displays, TV and infrared sensors and increased automation to reduce the crew to two.
Bombardier has completed the ultimate-load wing-up bending test on the CSeries static test airframe at Saint-Laurent, Quebec. The test took the structure to 150% of design load. Static-testing is planned to be completed this year, the company says, while the fatigue-test article at IABG in Germany has logged more than 7,000 cycles. Four CS100 test aircraft have now returned to flight, with the fifth and final one still to fly this year. The first of two stretched CS300 test aircraft has begun ground runs.
Hanwha Group will dominate South Korea’s aircraft engine, artillery and military electronics sub-sectors with the acquisition of a major stake in the defense businesses of conglomerate Samsung Group. Hanwha says it will buy a 32.4% share in Samsung Techwin, which in turn owns Samsung Thales jointly with Thales. Samsung Techwin makes the K-9 155mm self-propelled gun and, under license, General Electric F404 and T700 engines. Samsung Thales supplies the South Korean defense forces with radar and combat systems.
Aviation Week Senior Editor Guy Norris takes us on a test flight of the automatic air collision avoidance system, auto ACAS, with the U.S. Air Force 416th Flight-Test Sqdn.
Deep space is the ultimate focus of Exploration Flight Test-1, because the Orion capsule is the vehicle that will keep crew members alive during some of the most dynamic minutes of missions to the “proving ground,” around the Moon and, ultimately Mars.
Unmanned aircraft are most often viewed as augmenting manned aircraft, perhaps eventually replacing some of them, but a more likely future lies in their becoming intimately essential to each other. Two new U.S. research notices give hints of such an outcome.
The airline is the latest among the small group of airlines transforming European air transport. While Ryanair and EasyJet prepared the way for low-cost short-haul travel and dominate that segment, Norwegian is third and takes the business model far beyond where the two pioneers stopped.
By Adrian Schofield, Jens Flottau, Bradley Perrett
The concept of airlines forming leasing units is certainly not new, but the latest evolution sees more LCCs going down this path, particularly those with hundreds of narrowbody aircraft on order.
Japan is scheduled to launch Hayabusa-2 on a six-year mission to return samples from the asteroid 1999 JU3. Four landers are designed to explore the C-type asteroid’s surface before the main spacecraft itself touches down for two or three grab-and-go sample harvests.
Aviation Week's Bill Sweetman discusses the key takeaways from the recent China Airshow with Joe Anselmo. In addition to China's development of military aircraft, Sweetman details the tremendous push toward missile systems, radars and other command and control systems.
M ichael Rossell has been appointed deputy director general of Montreal-based Airports Council International. He was director of ACI relations with the International Civil Aviation Organization and has been the U.K.’s permanent representative to ICAO and its first vice president. Rossell succeeds Craig Bradbrook, who has become vice president-aviation services at the Greater Toronto Airports Authority.
Although the FAA has not yet completed rules for how UAVs should be operated in U.S. airspace, it can fine commercial operators for “careless or reckless” flying of unmanned aircraft—even those that cost less than $200. That is the upshot of what being perceived as a “win” for FAA regulators: an NTSB ruling this week on Raphael Pirker’s promotional video for the University of Virginia—shot from a remote-control aircraft.
Unspecified U.S.-government spacecraft have been detecting the fireballs generated when small asteroids have hit Earth’s atmosphere for the past 20 years at least, and apparently measuring the energy they generate as they burn up.
NASA’s Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (Maven) orbiter relayed this surface image from the Curiosity rover before placing itself in a safehold state Nov. 19 that the agency says was triggered by a “timing conflict between commands.” The spacecraft, which initiated full science operations Nov. 16, remained in high-data-rate communications with controllers, who were developing a plan to return it to normal operations.
