Airlines are accusing some of the major airports in Australia and New Zealand of ratcheting up fees unfairly, and they are criticizing the governments of the two countries for not reining in these airports' pricing practices. Reflecting similar arguments around the world, local airlines say that fee hikes highlight the fact that regulators need to take a firmer line with airports. Now, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has stepped up its own calls for the two governments to intervene more directly in airport disputes.
USAF Brig. Gen. Mark C. Nowland has been selected for promotion to major general and appointment as chief of staff of Headquarters U.S. Southern Command in Miami. He has been the command's director of strategy, policy and plans. Brig. Gen. Christopher J. Bence has been named director, U.S. Air Forces in Europe-U.K./U.S. Air Forces in Europe at RAF Mildenhall. He has been deputy director for operations at the National Joint Operations and Intelligence Center, Operations Team Two, at the Pentagon. Bence will be succeeded by Col. Ronald D.
Vincent Caro (see photo) has been appointed as executive vice president-programs for the Landing Gear and Systems Integration Div. of Safran subsidiary Messier-Bugatti-Dowty, Velizy, France. He succeeds Helene Moreau-Leroy, who has been reassigned. Caro has been vice president-purchasing of another Safran subsidiary, Snecma.
Airbus can barely keep up with demand. A combination of high fuel prices and low interest rates has helped boost the jetliner market to record levels, with more growth ahead. But there is one exception to this happy situation: the A380. It is time to face some tough facts about the program.
In the wake of June's Paris air show, both Airbus and Boeing issued victory statements detailing orders, options, commitments and letters of intent reportedly signed during the five-day event. Both rivals claimed they achieved or surpassed their most optimistic sales predictions, disseminating robust releases to the media. And, once more, the press corps—in most cases without the required restraint—agreed to the rules of the game, although that was largely meaningless.
John Graber has been named CEO of Global Aviation Holdings Inc., Peachtree City, Ga. He was president of CHC Helicopter Services and had been president of ABX Air.
Ali Bahrami has become vice president-civil aviation and Mary Jane Mitchell assistant vice president-acquisition policy for the Arlington, Va.-based Aerospace Industries Association. Bahrami was manager of the Transport Airplane Directorate of the FAA Aircraft Certification Service. Mitchell has held numerous positions within the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force.
The Defense Department is mobilizing 40 new cyberteams for both offensive and defensive missions in cyberspace, Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter says. “The teams are . . . in addition to the [National Security Agency's],” he says, adding that the Pentagon is trying to create “another set of people” associated with the NSA and U.S. Cyber Command. A total of about 4,000 cyberexperts will eventually make up the 40 teams. Like Special Operations Command troops, he says, those with cybersecurity expertise are hard to find and take a long time to train.
Philippe Duhamel (see photo) has been named CEO of France-based ThalesRaytheonSystems. He succeeds Jack Harrington. Duhamel has been CEO of Thales Raytheon Systems SAS.
ATR estimates airlines will buy 1,340 turboprop airliners with 90 seats during the next 20 years, which sounds like a good market. But it could be a cramped one. If all five of the aircraft proposed for the segment go ahead, each will average a production run of fewer than 300.
“Warming Trend” (AW&ST July 8, p. 26) reports that the U.S. Navy is starting work on a Block III AIM-9X missile to gain increased range. Wouldn't it be easier (and cheaper) to start with the Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile and just replace its radar seeker with the AIM-9X IR seeker? Asheville N.C.
While Aviation Week's annual Top-Performing Airlines (TPA) study is the most extensive comparison of global airline strength, there is still one type of carrier that it does not include. The study only covers publicly traded companies, which means the TPA rankings exclude the large Middle Eastern carriers such as Emirates. So Aviation Week has run a separate analysis of Emirates to estimate where it might fit in the rankings if it did meet our criteria.
Earl L. Wiener, known to many as a founding father of aviation human factors, died on June 14 at his home in Menlo Park, Calif., after a long battle with Parkinson's disease. He was 80.
NASA is undertaking an aggressive investigation of a spacesuit leak that allowed an estimated 1-1.5 liters of water to seep into the helmet and spacesuit of European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano during a July 16 spacewalk outside the International Space Station. The planned 6-7-hr. excursion was cut short after roughly 90 min.
Swelling aircraft orderbooks are prompting questions about whether deliveries could inflate airline capacity too much in coming years. But Boeing maintains that a supply overload is unlikely to occur, and it has identified a set of metrics it says proves that market conditions justify the size of the current backlog.
Five years after General Electric launched its initiative to penetrate the small turboprop market with the acquisition of Czech engine maker Walter and the development of the H80, the company is midway through its first full year of production and poised to bolster its line-up with studies of additional variants.
Actually, the historical landing of an unmanned aircraft on a carrier deck is no big deal (AW&ST July 15, p. 25). U.S. Navy aircraft land routinely on carriers with no control input from the pilot on board. Automated landings have been around for quite a few years. And other military and commercial aircraft have had automated landing systems for decades in which the pilot on board merely monitors things “just in case.”
Carbon in its many forms is transforming manufacturing, from electronics to structures. Aerospace uses carbon in fiber form, but new nano-structured materials are emerging that promise improved properties and expanded applications.
Greg Raiff, CEO Private Jet Services (Seabrook, N.H. )
There is not a great deal of difference between the recent Asiana Airlines Flight 214 crash in San Francisco (AW&ST July 15, p. 22) and the 2009 Air France AF447 crash in the Atlantic other than the death toll. Both may have been caused by a lack of basic airmanship skills. In the case of the AF447 crash, when you pull the nose up and the airplane keeps going down, it is time to put the nose down and firewall it, no matter what the computer says.
Investigators looking into the July 12 Boeing 787 fire are now focusing on what caused an emergency locator transmitter (ELT) device to combust, and devising modifications to prevent any recurrence.
The U.S. will help Panama and the U.N. examine a load of missiles, MiG fighters and other weapons systems found aboard a ship in the Panama Canal sailing from Cuba to North Korea, U.S. State Department officials said last week. Deputy spokesperson Marie Harf would not specify whether the U.S. will take possession of the ship for the U.N. as a Council committee looks into possible sanction violations. A U.N.
Eight years ago, Southeast Asian-based airlines had just 29 turboprop airliners in the 70-seat class. Since then the fleet has more than tripled to 106, with ongoing orders making the region one of the most important for the turboprop sector. More remarkably, this growth has happened, and is continuing, amid powerful expansion by budget airlines, the classic enemy of the turboprop operator.
