tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53613702864892953522024-03-16T14:22:49.906+07:00Flight Over The Sky.....Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger947125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-37052440927237018562012-01-23T16:12:00.002+07:002012-01-23T16:12:49.146+07:00Panetta Lifts F-35B Probation<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/defense_images/Fighters/F35B_U.S.Navy.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has ushered the F-35B out of the penalty box, after the short-takeoff-and-vertical-landing (Stovl) version of the stealthy fighter was sidelined for poor performance for more than a year by prior Defense Secretary Robert Gates.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Standing in a hangar in front of BF-4, one of two F-35Bs to conduct testing on the USS Wasp amphibious ship last fall, Panetta spoke to a small audience of government and industry workers on the Joint Strike Fighter test team.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">“We now believe that because of your work the Stovl variant is demonstrating the kind of performance and maturity that is in line with the other two variants of JSF,” Panetta said here Jan. 20. “The Stovl variant has made — I believe and all of us believe — sufficient progress so that as of today I am lifting the Stovl probation.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Gates said last year that if the F-35B development project, which at the time was suffering from major testing problems, did not turn around in two years, he would recommend its termination. But he left office last summer, leaving the issue to be addressed by Panetta.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Gates’s announcement was followed quickly by a multibillion-dollar restructuring designed to reduce the concurrency between the development and production phases of the JSF program. The project also includes the F-35A, designed for conventional takeoff and landing, and the F-35C, designed for use on an aircraft carrier. The restructuring announced early last year also decoupled testing for the F-35B, which at the time was suffering, from the A and C models.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">George Little, Panetta’s spokesman, said the secretary’s decision to lift the probation was underpinned by improvements in five key areas: structural shortcomings in the Stovl bulkhead, flutter in the auxiliary inlet door, problems in the lift-fan clutch, unexpected wear and tear on the drive shaft, and heating on the roll-post actuator.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The utility of Stovl aircraft — namely the AV-8B Harrier — in recent operations in Libya and Afghanistan has “made an impression on him,” one defense official said, speaking about Panetta.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Though the B variant has emerged from probation thus far unscathed in development, defense officials are expecting a reduction in the production numbers of F-35s in the fiscal 2013 budget being sent to Congress on Feb. 6. This will extend the production plan and likely drive the per-unit price higher, at least temporarily, until orders go up. Lockheed Martin officials originally said their goal was to produce one fighter a day to reap the benefits of savings with high order numbers.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">When the B was put on probation last year, Gates trimmed production of the Stovl version.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The U.S. Marine Corps, which will operate the F-35B, is slated to be the first customer to declare operational use for the aircraft as early as 2016, depending on the pace of testing and training at Eglin AFB, Fla. After the U.K. opted to walk away from the B, Italy is now the only international customer officially planning to buy the aircraft. Nonetheless, Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Amos said he remains “bullish” on the future of the F-35B.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">With a much more productive year of testing in 2011 (following the abysmal performance of the Stovl variant in 2010), the test force is looking ahead to weapons separation trials this year, says Lt. Col. Matt Kelly, F-35 flight operations lead at the Patuxent River testing facility. The team has already conducted flights of the F-35B carrying weapons at subsonic and supersonic speeds. Initial flutter testing with the weapon bay doors open in flight have shown no significant problems, Kelly says. The major step, he says, is to drop weapons for the first time, a milestone expected in the second half of the year. Likely candidates will be the 500-lb. Joint Direct Attack Munition and the AIM-120 and AIM-9X missiles.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Thus far, the F-35B has been flown to Mach 1.4.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Kelly says he also expects to begin testing a redesigned tailhook for the F-35C in the second half of the year. The current design encountered problems last year when officials attempted rolling tests and the tailhook skipped over the wire owing to its weight and a problem with the dampening system. CF-3 will be the first test aircraft to have the new tailhook installed.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">After the initial ship trials with the F-35B last fall, the B model is not expected to go to sea until 2013, with the C model following in 2015, Kelly says.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Aircraft BF-4 is now operating the Block 1A software and BF-5 is using the 1B package. Kelly says the Block 2 software, which will be used by the Marine Corps to declare operational capability, is not expected at Patuxent River until late this year.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">In addition to having multi-level security, the 1B software will have new voice recognition technology that will allow the pilot to conduct some hands-free operations, such as switching the radio channels and squawking identification codes to air traffic control. Eventually, Kelly says, pilots hope to use the voice recognition technology for such operations as changing multi-function displays or shifting modes in the aircraft.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Meanwhile, officials at Edwards AFB, Calif., where the F-35A test force is located, conducted their first night flight with the conventional aircraft this week.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Flights at Eglin have not yet started, however. And, the aircraft there are now being used only for ground maintenance training.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-57062620723670368922012-01-23T16:11:00.007+07:002012-01-23T16:11:43.353+07:00NPP Commissioning Resumes After VIRS Anomaly<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/space_images/NASA/Miscellaneous/NPP-NASA.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Controllers have restarted on-orbit checkout of the Npoess Preparatory Project (NPP) satellite, which was suspended last year after the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) sensor begin losing sensitivity in four of its channels.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The spacecraft originally was scheduled to become fully operational in December, but its commissioning was put on hold while the VIIRS problem was analyzed.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Engineers found the Raytheon-built instrument’s mirror was contaminated with tungsten oxides, possibly as a result of nonstandard processing when the mirror was coated. The irreversible contamination appears limited to the VIIRS mirror, and managers expect mirror darkening to stop at a level that will permit it to operate within design requirements.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">It will take about six weeks to complete commissioning, which resumed on Jan. 18. The Advanced Technology Microwave Sounder, which was the first instrument activated in November, is already generating scientific data for snow and rain studies.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Ultimately VIIRS will collect radiometric imagery of the land, atmosphere and oceans in 22 visible and infrared wavelengths. In addition to the remaining VIIRS channels, NASA says three other instruments remain to be commissioned: the Cross-track Infrared Sounder, the Ozone Mapper Profiler Suite and the Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Problems with VIIRS contributed to massive projected overruns on the ill-fated Npoess (National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System) civil/military weather satellite program, for which NPP was designed as a pathfinder. Npoess eventually was canceled.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-14100581714658864862012-01-23T16:11:00.003+07:002012-01-23T16:11:08.322+07:00SIA Starts A380 Crack Inspection<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/Airlines/SingaporeAirlinesA380AIRBUS.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Singapore Airlines Friday started inspecting an Airbus A380 in response to a European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) airworthiness directive that operators examine their A380s for potential cracks in a wing component.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The airline’s spokesman says SIA anticipates that the new inspection regime will in no way disrupt day-to-day operations.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">He says SIA has 15 A380s in service, which is one or two more than it needs to maintain its current A380 flight schedule, so taking one out of service for inspections will not cause disruptions.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The airworthiness directive (AD) covers mainly high-cycle A380s. SIA is the lead operator for the aircraft type. As a precaution the airline decided to commence the inspections immediately, before the AD was issued, says the SIA spokesman, adding that the first inspection has begun. The AD was issued later Friday.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The AD comes after Airbus alerted EASA it found a new set of cracks affecting L-shaped brackets inside the wing of relatively high-cycle A380s. The cracks are more significant than the hairline cracks earlier discovered.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Inspecting the brackets involves draining the fuel-tanks inside the wing and opening an access panel so one can look inside the wing and do a visual inspection. SIA’s spokesman declines to say how much time it takes to do the inspection, but reiterates that the new inspection regime will have no impact on SIA’s A380 operation.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The spokesman also says the latest type of cracking identified by EASA in no way poses a threat to safety. Each wing has around 2,000 of the L-shaped brackets per wing, so the failure of one is not seen as a safety issue.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-46040709850088314092012-01-23T16:10:00.003+07:002012-01-23T16:10:47.767+07:00New Malaysia Widebody Charter Airline Planned<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/Airframes/Boeing/747-400-sunset-Boeing.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">A new privately owned airline, Eaglexpress Air Charter, is planning to start Boeing 747-400 operations in Malaysia as early as next month, assuming its air operator certificate (AOC) is approved.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">[The AOC] "hasn’t been approved yet, but they have been issued with a service permit for provisional approval,” says Mohd Yunus Charlie Charrington, director of air transport within Malaysia’s department of civil aviation. “They have to pass a technical audit before they are issued with an AOC and certificate of airworthiness.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Airline CEO Azlan Zainal Abidin says the carrier hopes to receive its AOC on Feb. 13, the same day it completes its proving flight. He says the airline on Monday signed a contract with Malaysia Airlines’ (MAS) parent, Penerbangan Malaysia Berhad (PMB), for the purchase of a former MAS Boeing 747-400, and it plans to buy two more 747-400s from PMB for delivery in March and April. MAS Engineering & Maintenance will help Eaglexpress with maintenance support, says Azlan.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">In addition, Eaglexpress plans to acquire one 747-400F that will be used to launch wet-leased freighter services in April from Kuala Lumpur to Los Angeles and Anchorage via Seoul Incheon International Airport. Azlan says the carrier has already secured one customer for its freighter.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The passenger business, meanwhile, will be operating charter flights on behalf of travel agents, beginning with services from Malaysia to Australia, South Korea and China, says Azlan. The airline also wants to cater to Muslim pilgrimage traffic from Asia to Saudi Arabia. Azlan says there always seems to be a shortage of air services for Haj and Umrah, and this explains why the airline decided on the long-range 747-400s.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Once it has established its widebody passenger aircraft business, Eaglexpress hopes to expand into narrowbody passenger charters by flying Boeing 737-800s to destinations within Asia, Azlan says. Longer-term, it hopes to be in a position to acquire 747-8s and Boeing 787s, he adds.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Having a new airline in Malaysia—particularly a passenger airline operating aircraft as large as a 747—is significant because the Malaysian market is now largely dominated by AirAsia and MAS. It is difficult to get an AOC in Malaysia for scheduled services because this is a cabinet-level decision. But Eaglexpress needs approval only from the department of civil aviation because it will operate only charters. Azlan declines to rule out the possibility that it may operate scheduled services, but says this is up to the government to decide.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Azlan, who is a former MAS pilot, says he owns 20% of the airline, while South Korean pilot Shin Man Soo owns 40%. The other shareholders, each with 20%, are Wan Ismail Abdul Rahman, former CEO of Maybank Finance, and Aseh Che Mat, former secretary general of Malaysia’s Ministry of Home Affairs. Aseh is now chairman of MWE Holdings, a Malaysian company that makes clothing and electronic goods. He also sits on the boards of some other companies, including Pos Malaysia, the national postal service.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-12249300166082698262012-01-23T16:10:00.001+07:002012-01-23T16:10:06.082+07:00France Pares Defense Spending<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/defense_images/Fighters/RafaleF3-Dassault.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">France’s 2012 defense budget has had to cut €267 million ($352.4 million) from its original request of €31.72 billion. Had the axe not fallen, this budget would have remained stable, since the original 1.8% rise on the 2011 figure was just above the 1.7% inflation rate. The increase now is 0.75%.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Funding includes income of €900 million from selling military radio frequencies; €160 million the defense ministry earned from selling real estate; €30 million from the sale of used equipment; and €100 million from the finance ministry for higher fuel prices.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The extra costs incurred by France’s participation in NATO’s Libya operation officially amount to between €300 million and €350 million, but has no effect on the budget, as extraordinary costs of overseas missions are met by an inter-ministerial reserve fund.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">On Nov. 7, Prime Minister Francois Fillon announced a tough austerity plan that includes eliminating another €100 million from the defense budget in addition to the €167 million reduction announced a few weeks earlier. This will bring the defense budget down to €31.4 billion. Jean-Claude Viollet, an opposition socialist party member who belongs to the National Assembly Defense and Armed Forces Commission, remarked after the cuts were announced that “we were close to the bone but now we’re beyond it.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Each of the four defense sectors will pay their due. As DTI went to press, defense ministry officials did not yet know where the new €100 million cut would hit. But the first cut of €167 million was approved by parliament on Nov. 9. The bulk—€88.3 million—affects the DGA procurement agency’s budget, which drops to €11.76 billion from €11.85 billion. The logistics and IT budget of €3.3 billion loses €44.5 million, while a further €25 million will be taken from armed forces and equipment maintenance funds, bringing the initial €22.34 billion down to €22.31 billion. Finally, €9.2 million will be shaved from the R&D, intelligence and secret services budget of €1.85 billion.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">There is nothing as spectacular on the 2012 order book as the Barracuda nuclear submarine, which was in the 2011 version. One interesting item is a medium-altitude long-endurance (MALE) unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to fill the gap between now and 2020-23, when the European MALE UAV is to enter service. France is developing this with the U.K. in the framework of the defense cooperation treaty both countries signed in 2010. Defense Minister Gerard Longuet announced last July that he had decided on Israel Aerospace Industries’ Heron TP platform, which Dassault would “Frenchify.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Quite a few items on the procurement list involve renovation: five Cougar helicopters; Atlantique 2 maritime patrol aircraft; and C-135 tankers. Others are a continuation of existing programs, such as launching a production tranche of the M51.2 ballistic missile and ongoing development of two Multinational Space-based Imaging System optical and infrared reconnaissance satellites, which will start replacing Helios 2 military observation satellites by 2016. The satellites, developed by Astrium Satellites and Thales Alenia Space, were ordered by the defense ministry in November 2010.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Other items include two Dassault Falcon 2000LX aircraft for government use and 34 NH90 helicopters.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Equipment to be delivered in 2012 includes a renovated Transall C-160 Gabriel aircraft to gather electromagnetic intelligence and satellite transmission stations; the Fremm-class Aquitaine multimission frigate; three Caracal helicopters; 11 Rafales; six Tiger helicopters; 100 VBCI armored vehicles; 38 VHM high-mobility vehicles; and 4,036 Felin future soldier systems. Armament includes 228 air-to-ground modular AASM missiles and 16 Exocet MM40 Block 3 missiles.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">In addition, two ground-to-air FASF SAMP/T missile systems, 61 Aster missiles, 10 MICA missiles and 15 renovated Mistral missiles will be delivered. These will be nowhere near a replacement for the 950 bombs and 240 air-to-ground missiles that French forces used in Operation Harmattan over Libya, the 431 HOT missiles fired by helicopters and the 3,000 100-mm and 78-mm shells fired by ships.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Projection, mobility and support equipment to be delivered in 2012 includes 200 PVP small protected vehicles; five Casa-235 transport aircraft; four modernized Cougar helicopters; 1,500 combat parachutes; eight NH90 helicopters; three Sprats (rapidly deployable floating bridges); and Dixmude, the third Mistral-class multimission vessel. Longuet says of the ship: “We were able to appreciate the extreme usefulness of this [type of vessel] during operation Harmattan, where the [ship] was deployed as a helicopter carrier.”</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-59816488804473579742012-01-23T16:09:00.006+07:002012-01-23T16:09:34.496+07:00ATR Plans 2012 Production Boost<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/Airframes/ATR/ATR_72-600.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Bolstered by record orders, turboprop-maker ATR plans to step up production quickly to keep pace with demand. ATR this year expects revenue to jump to $1.6-1.65 billion, and rise to $1.75 billion in 2013 and $2 billion “in the near future.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">In 2011, revenue topped $1.3 billion, and the company expects an earnings margin for 2011 of 8-8.5%, with cash flow of $150-160 million. The goal is to keep margins at similar levels, although a planned increase in output will put that under pressure.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">With 157 aircraft, ATR almost doubled its firm order intake last year from 2010 levels, which were twice as high as those recorded during the crisis years of 2008 and 2009. The sales activity last year far outpaced the level of activity the company was projecting. The aircraft maker also booked options for 79 more turboprops. With demand strong, list prices are increasing to $23.4 million for the ATR 72-600 and $19.5 million for the ATR 42-600.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Deliveries in 2011 increased slightly to 54 aircraft from 51 the previous year, but now are expected to grow markedly. At the end of 2011, ATR had a backlog of 224 aircraft valued at roughly $5 billion, including the 38 aircraft Kingfisher canceled during the year.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Bagnato held off on ramping up production in 2011 to avoid a conflict between an output increase and completion of the certification process for the -600 family, which was certified in May. Now, the focus will shift to output, with 72 aircraft expected to be delivered in 2012, at least 80 in 2013, and at least 85 in 2014.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Ramping up output is not easy, but the process has been under way since June and, Bagnato notes, the industrial challenges are far less than what Airbus, for instance, is doing in boosting narrowbody output.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Bagnato sees last year as an important one for turboprops, which secured 85% of the orders in the 50- to 90-seat segment over regional jets. ATR won 80% of the market of orders at 90 seats and below. Moreover, Bagnato notes that the backlog of turboprops is growing, compared with regional jets. “There is a migration away from the jet,” he argues. Turboprops hold 77% of the backlog in the segment, with ATR representing 70% of the total. Firm orders for ATR in 2011 were dominated by ATR 72-600s, with 128 firm orders, followed by 16 72-500s, 10 42-600s and three 42-500s. The last -500 will be delivered this year.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">ATR deliveries last year were dominated by 72-500s, with 38 units, followed by 10 72-600s and six 42-500s. First deliveries of ATR 42-600s are due in August; the aircraft is to receive European Aviation Safety Agency certification in mid-spring.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The aircraft maker also plans to open its new training center in Johannesburg at the end of the month, helping to support the 39 operators and 105 aircraft in Africa and the Middle East. In Brazil, the company is working with airline partners but is considering its own training center.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-5378716290340455482012-01-23T16:09:00.002+07:002012-01-23T16:09:10.084+07:00Airbus Eyes A330 Production Increase Before A320<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/Airframes/Airbus/A330200FagainAirbus.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Airbus expects to decide soon on a plan to boost widebody output to a rate of 11 aircraft a month even as it delays ramping up narrowbody production.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Airbus had been considering a single-aisle production rate increase to 44 aircraft a month, but has decided to hold off for the moment because of bottlenecks among Tier 2 suppliers. The situation is different for the A330, making a production boost there possible, says John Leahy, Airbus chief operating officer for customers. The company expects to reach a production rate of 10 widebodies per month this year.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Airbus COO Fabrice Bregier hints that a decision on the single-aisle side could wait until a rate of 42 aircraft per month is reached, which is expected next year. “It would be premature to do it now,” he notes.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">One of the reasons Airbus is keen to boost production is because of its bulging backlog. The company booked 1,419 net orders last year and made 535 deliveries. And 2012 should see order intake move ahead of deliveries, with new orders forecast to reach 600-650, while deliveries of 570 aircraft are expected. The order intake should include about 30 A380s, matching the 2012 delivery target.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Output is only one of the deliberations for Airbus this year. The other is whether to launch an A330 winglet program. Leahy says studies have begun for both forward-fit and retrofit options. A decision is likely this year.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">If the devices could yield a 2% fuel burn benefit, Leahy says such a program would likely move forward.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Not on the near-term agenda is the A380-900 program, a stretched version of the aircraft now on the market. Despite occasional customer interest, such a project would not likely emerge until the second half of the decade, says Airbus CEO Tom Enders. The focus now is on ramping up production. Profit-delivering aircraft will go to customers starting in 2015.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-29670191426720935952012-01-23T16:08:00.002+07:002012-01-23T16:08:34.450+07:00Funds Shift For Electronic Warfare In Europe<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/defense_images/UAVs/EuroHawk-NorthropGrumman.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The age-old electronic warfare adage “friend in war, enemy in peace” is about to be tested again.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">With the drawdown of military forces in Afghanistan clearly on the horizon, the era of relatively healthy levels of spending on improvised explosive device jammers and helicopter self-protection equipment may be drawing to a close. The potential turning point comes as many technologies are just starting to come into their own, such as two-color missile-warning equipment and detectors programmed to act as hostile fire indicators (HFI) that can alert pilots when they are being fired at by rocket-propelled grenades or small arms.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">In Europe, where spending levels and, commensurately, the pace of technical development lags that of the U.S., some of these technologies are on the cusp of entering the market, which could mean that a sharp funding decline would cut those developments off at their knees. Research for HFI detection “will mature in the next few years,” says Steve Roberts, Selex Galileo vice president and chief technology officer for electronic warfare. “We are getting that sorted.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">So what is the outlook for electronic warfare in Europe? The bleak prospect is that—with defense spending increasingly under pressure and troops being removed from “hot” zones—EW will be a convenient area to cut.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">But industry representatives see a more positive landscape, where requirements may shift but the underlying need for EW capabilities remains.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Rather than money disappearing, buying behaviors may change. “With the reduction of military budgets, especially in Europe and the U.S., it is likely that nations will be more hesitant and selective as to which aircraft to protect,” says Bjarke Legind Larsen, director of strategic business development at Terma Airborne Systems. “It is therefore to be expected that customers will demand shorter delivery times, and tend to favor systems that are mounted externally in pods or pylons to allow for fewer systems that can be rotated within the fleet.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Another factor to be considered is the Libya experience, which has highlighted the need for radar protection, says Andreas Hulle, head of EW strategy at EADS’s Cassidian defense unit. Some of the existing equipment, such as on Tornados, is aging.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The Royal Air Force experienced some of these issues during the Libya operation. Wing Cdr. Dicky Patounas, commanding officer of the 3(F) Sqdn., says that because of its greater capabilities, the Eurofighter Typhoon’s Praetorian electronic warfare suite was also used to provide situational awareness for Tornado GR4 crew.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The renewed attention on radar-guided threats could manifest itself in multiple ways, including greater interest, again, in towed decoy devices. The advent of more sophisticated surface-to-air missile systems will also require advances in radar warning equipment to a higher-end, almost electronic support measures-type capability.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The increasing availability of digital radio frequency memory technology should help tackle the advanced threats to produce jamming waveforms that more accurately represent the radar return and thereby spoof an adversary’s surface-to-air missile system, Roberts notes. Representing the complex scattered returns would not have been possible in the past, he says. The waveform generation is coupled with advanced phased array jammers that can allow airborne platforms to deal with multiple threats at different locations and frequencies.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">The underlying technologies to handle the increasingly complex threats exist, but managing that information is a work in progress. The U.K. has been funding the common defensive aids system technology demonstrator program. The goal is not just to better integrate elements of a self-protection suite, but to optimize the use of the systems in a tactical scenario, Roberts says.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">For instance, the system is supposed to alert pilots during an engagement where to fly to gain the maximum effect from their countermeasures or, depending on the distance between the helicopter and an infrared threat, adjust the pattern at which flares are dispensed. “The combination of maneuvers and countermeasures is more effective than maneuvers alone or countermeasures alone,” Roberts notes.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">The concern regarding radar-guided threats could also lead to a shift in priorities in signals intelligence. During the focus on insurgency campaigns, low-band communications intelligence has had primacy over the traditional high-band electronic intelligence-gathering domain. Given the uncertainties in the global political landscape related to where the next conflict may erupt, it increasingly important to have both strong communications and electronic intelligence capabilities, Hulle says.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Another threat that may gain increasing attention is laser-guided surface-to-air missile systems. Warning systems already exist to detect those threats, but developing the appropriate countermeasures has lagged. Options are available, Roberts notes. One is to try and defeat the missile in its final phase of flight, which may be difficult, while another is to disrupt the optical tracking system. Directed infrared countermeasures (Dircm) systems, now used to defeat infrared-guided-missile sensors, may have applicability when it comes to disrupting optical trackers.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">The underlying theme regarding electronic warfare developments—whether to defeat radar, infrared or small arms threats—is a reduction in systems costs. Larsen believes demand will remain for infrared protection for post-Afghanistan operations, given the ubiquity of the man-portable air defense threat. And, he adds, “with several ongoing Dircm development and test programs under way, it could be anticipated that the price of such systems could go down and thus gain a more widespread use.”</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Hardware and software reuse will also become more important, Hulle says. In the RF domain, for instance, he sees a move to using a common core across a variety of applications, starting with equipment serving as an improvised explosive jammer and then being modified for electronic countermeasures or even electronic support measures.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">On the signals-intelligence side, too, he adds, the key will be to reduce size, weight and price so the technology can go on smaller mission aircraft or unmanned air systems.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">The new market outlook is already shaping product strategies. For instance, the increased interest in radar threats helps explain Terma’s decision to add a third Mil-Std. 1553 bus interface to its ALQ-213 as part of the new reliability, maintainability and performance upgrade that is slated for next year. The feature is aimed at allowing for an easier interface of radar warning systems, such as the ALR-56M.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Moreover, the company is adding a gigabit Ethernet interface aimed at keeping pace with the employment of advanced radars, such as active, electronically scanned arrays, and more modern displays.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">EADS is looking to bring to market this year a Block 2 upgrade to its ubiquitous Milds missile warning sensor to provide hostile-fire-indicator functions.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Selex, too, has been working in this area. The company’s Sage digital electronic-support measures system and the related Seer digital radar warning receiver are aimed at bringing those technologies to lower-cost platforms.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Developments in Italy prove that even cash-strapped countries are finding funds for electronic warfare. The defense ministry recently contracted Elettronica to develop the Virgilius self-protection suite for the country’s AW101 combat search-and-rescue helicopter. The multi-phased effort first will see an electronic-support measures system with radar-warning-receiver functionality added to the helicopter. Later, radar-jamming electronic countermeasures are to be added, as is the ELT/572 Dircm system.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><span style="background-color: white;">Because budgets in Europe will not be sufficient to sustain all these development paths, industry is focusing on the export market. Hulle says that though EADS sees a business case in places such as India or Saudi Arabia, it still needs to spend its own money to develop a product and bring to market a new technology that it then can also sell elsewhere.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><i style="background-color: white;">Photo: Northrop Grumman</i></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-90903398194481497632012-01-23T16:07:00.003+07:002012-01-23T16:07:48.259+07:00Cessna Doubles Down On Bizjet Market Lower End<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ba_images/Cessna/CessnaCitationM2.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The top executive at Cessna Aircraft’s parent company says the struggling business jet manufacturer needs to stay focused on its core market of small- and medium-sized aircraft and dismisses talk it could revive a project to develop a larger jet anytime soon.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Scott C. Donnelly, the chairman, president and CEO of Textron, expresses confidence that the hard-hit lower end of the business jet market will rebound and says Cessna’s priority should be to protect its leading position in that segment against newcomers, particularly Brazil-based Embraer. “The fact of the matter is the light to mid-sized market is the core of what Cessna is all about,” Donnelly said in an interview with Aviation Week. “The best thing for us to do is invest and strengthen that market, which has been our most important.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Demand for small jets was hit particularly hard when the onset of a global credit crisis in 2008 left scores of buyers unable to pay for aircraft they had ordered. Since then, the value of Cessna’s backlog has shrunk from $16 billion to just $2.2 billion. But Donnelly is confident the hard-hit market segment will rebound. “I believe there is no fundamental change in why people buy light to midsized jets,” he says. Demand for aircraft that can travel 3,000 mi. or fewer “is going to come back to being a robust, vibrant, necessary marketplace.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Donnelly also dismisses speculation that Wichita-based Cessna might revive a $775 million project to develop the Citation Columbus, a larger, super-midsized jet that would compete with the Gulfstream 280, Hawker 4000 and Bombardier Challenger 300.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Launched with great fanfare in 2008, it was scrapped a year later after the downturn hit. “Could Columbus come back someday? Possibly,” he says. “But in the near to midterm, I think it’s a lot more important for us to make the kind of investments we’re making … to strengthen and make sure that we retain that light to mid-sized marketplace.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Two of those investments—the Citation M2 and the Citation Latitude—were unveiled last fall to counter new competitors in the light jet market. The M2 will take on Embraer’s popular Phenom 100 light jet and Honda Aircraft’s HondaJet, while the Latitude will compete directly with Embraer’s Legacy 450. “Obviously, there’s more stuff in the works,” Donnelly said.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The Textron chief shook up Cessna’s management team last May, ousting longtime CEO Jack Pelton. While avoiding direct criticism of Pelton, he says that Cessna had been too complacent about the challenge from Embraer’s entry into the light jet market. “I saw what happened with Embraer in other market segments,” he says. “And I looked at Embraer and I said … We need not to sit back and say, ‘OK, we’re going to give up a certain amount of share to the new guy.’ We need to sit down and say, ‘How do you compete and win against this company?’”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">In addition to Cessna, Textron’s aerospace businesses include Bell Helicopter and Textron Systems. Donnelly’s interview came as Wall Street was buzzing about a report from Reuters that the company was conducting a strategic review that could lead to the spin-off of one or more of its divisions. While he declined comment on that speculation, he does not rule out the sale of a major unit. “If we thought there was something that didn’t belong in the portfolio … we would pursue that,” he says.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">At the same time, Donnelly reiterates that Cessna, which was Textron’s profit engine before the downturn hit, remains a core property. “Let me assure you that Cessna is a very, very important part of the future of the company,” he says.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-38555707050608872452012-01-23T16:07:00.001+07:002012-01-23T16:07:20.482+07:00PC-12 Passes 1,100 Mark, With Follow-On Coming<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ba_images/Miscellaneous/Pilatus-PC-12-AvityaViaWikipedia.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">There was nothing like it: A pressurized, single-pilot, single-engine turboprop with 1,500-nm range, capable of taking off and landing on short, grass strips, featuring a flat-floor, 6-9-passenger cabin as capacious as those in some medium jets, and with a fully enclosed, flushing lavatory. And in addition to its people door, it had a barn-sized one that could swallow cargo measuring 4 sq. ft.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Pilatus Aircraft Ltd. had always been known for building unique utility and training aircraft, but this one stretched the definition to the limits.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">If it could sell 200 of the curiosities, the Swiss aircraft maker would consider the PC-12 (see photo) a success. At least, that was the thinking at the aircraft’s debut in 1994. That thinking has since changed. The company has now delivered more than 1,100, making the PC-12 the most populous Pilatus ever, and five new ones roll off the wooden production floor in the Alpine burgh of Stans every month.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">PC-12 buyers are as eclectic as the aircraft is unique. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police uses its fleet of 15 to transport personnel and prisoners and carry out searches. The two-dozen medevac versions operated by the Royal Flying Doctor Service are key to providing emergency care and transport for patients throughout Australia. PC-12s serve as regional airliners in South Africa, cargo-haulers in South America, executive short-haulers in the U.S.—PlaneSense, a fractional ownership program headquartered in Portsmouth, N.H., boasts a fleet of 30—and are a favorite among special ops forces alighting in places dark and dangerous.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Pilatus focuses on aircraft that serve niche markets and promise long production runs—the short-takeoff-and-landing PC-6 Porter has been in production, albeit at a very low 2-5 annual rate now, for over 50 years—and the PC-12 fits those criteria perfectly. The airplane was in production for 14 years before it underwent a major upgrade in 2008, being fitted with Honeywell’s Primus Apex integrated cockpit and a more powerful Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6A-67P engine flat-rated at 1,200 shp, creating the PC-12NG (as in “Next Generation”). That model, which is standard, sells for $4.5 million.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Conventional wisdom holds that airframers must provide their customers with follow-on models, and, accordingly, Pilatus management is regularly asked, “What’s next?” For years, the (non)response left reporters’ notebooks blank.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Privately held, Pilatus eschews debt and instead funds new product development—alternating between military trainers and civilian programs—with profits from sales, but it exhibits the reserve of a Swiss banker in sharing any details. Still, Chairman and CEO Oscar J. Schwenk has acknowledged that design work is underway on a new civilian model, the PC-24, and one company executive recently hinted there might be “some news this year” regarding the new aircraft.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Details on the airplane are woefully absent—could it be a turbine twin? A larger single? Something altogether different? But certain characteristics seem certain: it will be built to last, it will be unique, and it will be around for a long, long time.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-38164914192464241142012-01-23T16:06:00.002+07:002012-01-23T16:06:43.686+07:00EU ETS Treats BizAv Unfairly, Says EBAA<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ba_images/Airports/AerialLCY-LondonCityAirport.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The European Union's Emissions Trading System (ETS), which was extended to aviation this month, is discriminatory toward business aviation and still needs substantial work to be viable, the European Business Aviation Association (EBAA) says. The group this week aired a number of concerns it has with the system, which has drawn nearly universal opposition from commercial and business aviation leaders outside of Europe.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">EBAA backs the concept of market-based measures as part of a multi-pronged approach to mitigating the increase of carbon emissions and greenhouse gases, but says the ETS treats business aviation unfairly, compared with other modes of air transport.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">On average, European business aircraft operators must acquire permits for up to 96% of their historical emissions, versus a 15% requirement for airlines, EBAA says.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The association has had some success persuading European regulators to ease part of the financial burden on small operators by simplifying the reporting and tracking requirements.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">But EBAA President Brian Humphries adds, “It is deeply unfortunate that member states have so far decided against coupling the small emitters’ reporting tool with single-point verification. In many cases, for smaller emitters the costs for monitoring and reporting, and particularly verification (MRV), far outweigh the costs linked to acquiring CO2 permits. As such, the MRV procedure threatens to weaken the competitiveness of European business aircraft operators vis-à-vis non-EU competitors and other modes of transport, such as the airlines.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The requirements have varied by country, and some countries have demanded detailed company information for participation, industry advocates note, citing France among them.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">EBAA, however, commended Eurocontrol for implementing its ETS Support Facility tool for small emitter operators, and strongly encouraged all small emitters within the business aviation community to use it, noting, “The tool is only as valuable as the data put into it; the more operators who use it, the more powerful and accurate the reports it produces.”</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">EBAA also praised the European Court of Justice ruling that ETS does not infringe on international law, ensuring equitable treatment between EU and non-EU stakeholders. But EBAA is concerned that the ruling added fuel to the fire by stirring up a range of protests from non-EU countries, including China and the U.S. The association questions whether the mechanisms put in place by the European Commission to enforce compliance will be robust enough to withstand widespread international resistance.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The group says the coming 12 months will prove crucial for the commission in its quest for international buy-in.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">EBAA is also concerned that the timing of ETS implementation could prove financially difficult. “The year 2011, and one expects the year 2012 as well, had and will record negative air transport figures amidst depressed demand and rising operating costs,” says CEO Fabio Gamba. “The ETS adds further costs to an already depressed sector, and its introduction should have at least coincided with the disposal of national tax schemes that have nothing to do with environmental protection.”</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-23521246230601289562012-01-23T16:06:00.000+07:002012-01-23T16:06:19.816+07:00USAF Launches WGS-4<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/space_images/Miscellaneous/WGS-4%20002.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The fourth Wideband Global Satcom military communications spacecraft is safely in its geostationary transfer orbit following a 7:38 p.m. EST launch from Space Complex 37 at Cape Canaveral AFS, Fla., Thursday.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The 7,600 lb. spacecraft, based on a Boeing 702 platform, was lifted into orbit on a United Launch Alliance Delta IV rocket in a Medium-plus configuration. It was ULA’s first launch of the year and the Delta IV’s 18th.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">WGS-4 is the first of the Block II configurations that includes a switchable radio frequency bypass system that is three times faster than the currently operating WGS satellites at transmitting airborne intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance imagery data.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The spacecraft will take several weeks to reach its final geostationary parking orbit. As it is transferred, controllers at Boeing’s El Segundo, Calif., satellite headquarters will command deployment of its solar array and antenna.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">When those essential tasks are completed, the controllers will begin a systems check-out, a process likely to take three months before the spacecraft can be formally handed over to the US Air Force.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Boeing now holds contracts for five additional Block II WGS spacecraft following the agreement announced Jan. 18 of an order for WGS-9. It is to serve Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and New Zealand.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-25123522532467835462012-01-23T16:05:00.002+07:002012-01-23T16:05:24.639+07:00EASA Demands A380 Wing Crack Inspections<img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/Airframes/Airbus/A380genericlanding-Airbus.jpg" style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px; text-align: left;" width="250px" /><br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) is ordering inspections of relatively high-cycle A380s to assess the extent to which a new set of wing cracks are affecting the Airbus fleet.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The inspections and potential repairs could impact A380 operations, although so far the damage prompting the EASA airworthiness directive has been found only on two of nine aircraft inspected. The culprit is an L-shaped bracket that attaches the wing skin to the ribs.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">An Airbus wing expert insists it is not a flight safety issue and that both a short-term fix has been identified in cases where cracking is detected, as well as a longer-term fix to avoid the stress cracks occurring in the future. The cracks have been found on the center section of the wing between the two engines.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The EASA directive addresses a similar parts fatigue problem with wing rib feet brackets initially found on a Qantas A380 and later seen on other aircraft. Those hairline cracks were deemed manageable and could be fixed at C-checks. Those cracks were found because the Qantas aircraft (MSN14) suffered an uncontained engine failure, giving engineers an opportunity to closely examine the wing.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The new cracking is slightly different and viewed as more significant, though. It has been seen on two A380s that have been more closely inspected. Originally, damage was found when a customer aircraft underwent a C-check around ten days ago. One of the brackets, rather than showing hairline stress cracks, on its vertical part had a more significant crack, prompting Airbus to notify safety authorities and also launch a wider inspection of nine aircraft at which point evidence of cracking was found on a second aircraft.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Each wing has around 2,000 L-shaped brackets (30-40 per rib, with 60 ribs per wing), so the failure of one bracket is not seen as a safety issue.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">EASA decided to call for an immediate inspection regime rather than waiting for a regular inspection opportunity. Around a dozen aircraft are likely to be affected. The Airbus official notes that even without the extra attention to the issue caused by the findings on the Qantas aircraft, the cracks would have been found during routine maintenance activity well before becoming a safety issue.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">Where cracks are found, the bracket has to be unbolted and a new one spliced into the section. Whether that is a permanent fix, or an interim measure is still being assessed.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">The inspection is relatively simple, the wing expert says, requiring drainage of the relevant tanks for a visual inspection. However, the time to drain the tanks likely means an aircraft is out of service at least 24 hours, depending on local safety rules. If a bracket is found to have cracked, it needs immediate replacement, which could take a few days.</span></div><div style="color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px; text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;">As part of the root cause analysis, Airbus instrumented one of its own aircraft to assess whether it had erroneously estimated the loads the wing would see, leading to the cracks. But the aircraft maker determined that was not the case. Instead, it found that the likely culprit is the assembly process, which imparts too much stress on the bracket when the wing skin is attached to the rib. The part itself is not being redesigned, but the assembly process is being changed for the long-term solution.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-54176916244921238352011-10-07T17:26:00.006+07:002011-10-07T17:26:59.200+07:00Lower-tech UAVs Boost Intel For British<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/defense_images/UAVs/T-Hawk-CrownCopyright.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Although the technology focus remains on the transition from Hermes 450 to Watchkeeper unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), it is the subtler changes to platforms and operational concepts that deliver increased performance to the British Army. And while the tactical UAV continues to provide vital intelligence, it is the lower-tech, less glamorous platforms that are gaining in popularity with the troops whose missions they support.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The army’s UAV battery is based here, where a fleet of leased Hermes 450 aircraft is flown and maintained. But the battery, from 32 Regt. Royal Artillery, is also responsible for two other UAVs that deliver full-motion video (FMV) from forward locations. These are the hand-launched Lockheed Martin Desert Hawk III (DH3), and T‑Hawk, Honeywell’s vertical-takeoff-and-landing UAV, which is part of the Royal Engineers’ Talisman route-clearance system (DTI September 2010, p. 19).</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Complementary to these are PGSS (Persistent Ground Surveillance System) aerostats, seven of which are deployed above bases in the British area of operations. These are operated and maintained by contractors, with support from 5 Regt. Royal Artillery liaison officers. The PGSS payload contains electro-optical and infrared sensors, which feed data into the Cortez network, permitting drag-and-drop viewing of multiple intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance (Istar) sources for a location.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">“The good thing about [Cortez] is it enables our cross-cueing piece,” says Capt. Alex Gray, operations officer of the UAV battery. “It could be that a base Istar asset picks something up then cross-cues a Hermes 450 onto it. It’s a useful and powerful tool.” Cross-cueing of layered assets generates detailed intelligence, showing information such as route obstructions and the type and size of structures, doors and windows.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">DH3 also feeds FMV into Cortez. Eight of the battery’s 12 DH3 detachments are at bases across Helmand. Two more are on hand as a surge capability and to back-fill during deployment changeovers, while two others are mobile—one with the Brigade Reconnaissance Force, the other with the Warthog group.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">“The key with DH3 is it’s quick into action,” says Gray. “It can get into the air in 5-8 min., and we’ve flown almost 2,000 flights on Herrick 14,” the U.K.’s Afghanistan deployment, which began in April.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The aircraft is programmed to return to a given position using GPS. It flies a U‑shaped profile on its way in, enabling it to assess local wind conditions and minimize impact on landing. The modular airframe disperses impact forces by breaking apart.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The new assisted trim landing (ATL) system gives greater control to the user during recovery, including the ability to manually flare for a gentler touchdown. The system was fielded in July.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">“With [ATL], we can use the Xbox 360 control pad, which is usually used to control camera movement, and land the UAV,” says Sgt. Matthew Trigg, a DH3 operator. “We’re getting a lot of good reports [from the detachments] and the attrition rate has started to go down.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Improvements to the T-Hawk are restricted to operational concepts rather than hardware, but the results are impressive. The controversial platform had seemed something of an afterthought in Talisman, but transferring control from the Royal Engineers to 32 Regt. helped it find a niche.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">“We overtook the amount of flights the engineers had done in our first month here flying it,” says Chris Darker, a bombardier and member of 32 Regt.’s two-man T-Hawk crews now embedded within Talisman squadrons. “The guys flying it had other jobs within the squadron—they could have been a Talon operator or a searcher—and were doing T-Hawk as a secondary job. But the more we use it, the more they want to use it. They’re adamant now that they want to bring two systems with them every time they’re out.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Two of the aircraft’s perceived disadvantages—noise and the airflow generated in hover—are now considered pluses. When flown near the ground, it can be used to blow dust away from possible improvised explosive devices to aid visual checks, and the noise has a potent deterrent effect.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The platform’s FMV is considered superior to that provided by DH3, and its utility for Talisman’s route-proving task is undoubted. Darker, who has used Hermes, DH3 and T-Hawk, says: “I’ve probably enjoyed flying [T-Hawk] the most. I flew this 14 times on one op where we cleared a route in [the Nahr-e-Saraj district, Helmand Province], and that route is still being used.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><i>Photo: Crown Copyright</i></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-65555991679558077752011-10-07T17:26:00.004+07:002011-10-07T17:26:35.276+07:00Frontier Says NEO Order Deadline Is No Issue<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/Airframes/Airbus/A319NEO_PW.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Frontier Airlines says it and parent company Republic Airways have “satisfied or amended” a contractual promise to execute a firm order for 80 AirbusNEO aircraft by Sept. 30, 2011, but will not elaborate.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The commitment to execute the firm order is (or was) in a commercial agreement Republic and Frontier signed with FAPAInvest, a limited liability corporation created to represent Frontier pilots employed by the airline as of June 24.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Under that deal—created to compensate pilots for the cost-cutting they agreed to in a separate but concurrent amendment to their collective bargaining agreement—Republic promised to do several things. Two of them had a Sept. 30 deadline: to raise more than $70 million in new financing and execute a “firm order” for 80 NEO aircraft. Republic signed a letter of intent for those aircraft in July.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Jeff Thomas, FAPAInvest’s manager and registered agent, told Aviation Week on Sept. 30 that the group “came to a resolution” with Frontier and Republic on the financing issue, although he declined to provide details and Republic referred questions about the financing issue to FAPAInvest.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Thomas added, however, that the deadline for a firm NEO order was not amended, and referred questions about the order to Republic.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Republic and Frontier refused to comment on the NEO order until Oct. 5, when a Frontier report on its September traffic included a two-sentence update that referred to it indirectly.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Ambiguous NEO Order</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">“Certain of Frontier’s restructuring agreements included conditions that were to be satisfied by Sept. 30, 2011. Those conditions have either been satisfied or amended, and Frontier is in compliance with all restructuring agreements,” the carrier reported. It did not immediately respond to a request for elaboration.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Presumably, if Republic finalized the NEO order, it or Airbus would have announced it. That has not happened, and Airbus is declining comment on the deal’s status.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">One question is whether any of it matters because there is no real consequence to missing the deadline unless someone makes an issue of it.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The biggest potential consequence of missing the deadline is that, under the separate collective bargaining agreement with the Frontier Airline Pilots Association, some of the cost-cutting concessions are supposed to be negated if any of the conditions in the commercial agreement are not met. But Frontier pilots do not really have an incentive to enforce that—as long as they believe the financing and aircraft order eventually will come through—because the cost cuts have been declared essential for Frontier’s survival.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The International Brotherhood of Teamsters does not seem inclined to make it an issue, either. The Teamsters became the union representative for pilots at Frontier and Republic’s three regional carrier subsidiaries just days after the former Frontier Airline Pilots Association ratified the cost-cutting collective bargaining agreement amendments and the newly created FAPAInvest signed the commercial agreement. The Teamsters union is challenging the legal validity of the entire FAPA and FAPAInvest agreements in court—not whether a condition in them has been violated.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">“At this point, Republic Airways Holdings’ position is FAPAInvest controls whether the concessions are voided,” adds William Wilder, the Teamsters’ attorney for the case.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Republic says the uncertainty created by the Teamsters lawsuit has made it more difficult to obtain the new financing. That delay also could be a factor in firming up the aircraft order.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-62349958553769030752011-10-07T17:26:00.002+07:002011-10-07T17:26:18.662+07:00NEW VIDEO: 2nd Lightning II Strikes the Wasp's Nest<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans; font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">The second F-35B, tail number BF-4, has landed onboard the Navy's USS Wasp amphibious ship. The landing occurred today, according to F-35 Joint Program Office spokesman Joe Dellavedova.</span></span><br />
<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><div style="text-align: center;"><object data="http://www.youtube.com/v/puj5lueXmJQ?version=3&hl=en_US&rel=0" height="350" id="ltVideoYouTube" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/puj5lueXmJQ?version=3&hl=en_US&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="450"></object></div></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
BF-4 joins its sister aircraft, BF-2, for a few weeks of shipboard trials designed to validate that the single-engine stealthy fighter can operate in and around the small deck of this amphibious ship class.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-6317062914188931542011-10-07T17:25:00.004+07:002011-10-07T17:25:29.838+07:00IAG Launches Iberia Express<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/Airlines/Iberia-IBERIA.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Iberia is setting up a new subsidiary for short- and medium-haul routes. The airline, Iberia Express, will be based in Madrid and is aimed at turning the loss-making short-haul business back into profitability.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The move was approved by the board of Iberia’s parent International Airlines Group (IAG) at a meeting on Thursday.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The airline will start operations in the summer of 2012 and will initially fly four Airbus A320s. The fleet will increase to 13 units by the end of next year. The aircraft will all come from Iberia’s current fleet. The carrier stated that its new subsidiary will hire employees at market rates, but that the decision will have no impact on terms and conditions of Iberia’s existing workforce.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The company hopes that Iberia Express will be able to operate at lower costs, particularly through the more efficient use of aircraft. Iberia Express is planned to fly domestic and European routes from Madrid and will also feed its parent’s long-haul network.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Iberia’s short-haul business has been loss making for years, like at most other European network carriers, and the airline has been indicating the move for some time. The decision is likely to cause union opposition, as aircraft are taken away from Iberia’s mainline fleet to be operated by pilots at lower wages.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The airline has also been moving to a more integrated relationship with its Barcelona-based low fare unit Vueling, which has also started code-sharing with Iberia and other Oneworld airlines. Iberia stated that the decision to launch the Express unit will have no effect on Vueling.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-4851257618294191172011-10-07T17:25:00.001+07:002011-10-07T17:25:04.062+07:00Boeing Studies X-37B Evolved Crew Derivative<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/space_images/Milspace/X37B_Landed-USAF.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">LOS ANGELES — Boeing is studying scaled-up variants of the reusable X-37B orbital test vehicle (OTV) for potential delivery of cargo and crew to the International Space Station (ISS) and other low-Earth-orbit destinations.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The development plan is believed to be aimed at providing a larger cargo adjunct to the company’s CST-100 crew vehicle as well as a possible longer-term, crew-carrying successor. The plan builds on the ongoing OTV demonstration with the U.S. Air Force, the first phase of which ended when the classified, unmanned OTV-1 demonstration flight concluded in December 2010 with an autonomous landing at Vandenberg AFB, Calif., following 244 days in orbit. A second mission, OTV-2, is under way.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">OTV-2 has been in space since March 5, and assuming it has not already been covertly recovered, is expected to remain in space until at least mid-October. A landing around Oct. 15 will equal the OTV-1’s mission length. Given the 270-day mission endurance limit of the X-37B, as earlier described by the Air Force, the early March launch means the landing at Vandenberg can be expected on or before Nov. 30.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The X-37B evolution study, which harks back to the pre-military NASA origins of the OTV, envisages a three-phase buildup. The first would see the current 29-ft.-long vehicle used for demonstration flights to the ISS. In its current configuration, the X-37B launched inside the 5-meter (16.5-ft.) fairing of the Atlas V could already take bulky items such as the station’s control moment gyros, battery discharge and pump module, Boeing says.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The second phase would see the development of a 165% scaled-up version, roughly 47 ft. long and large enough to transport larger line replaceable units (LRUs) to the station. The larger version would demonstrate operations to and from the ISS, paving the way for a human-carrying derivative in the third phase. This would see a human-rated version transport “five to seven astronauts,” says Art Grantz, Boeing’s X-37B project chief.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Speaking at the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Space 2011 conference in Long Beach, Calif., Grantz says “the next step is a larger cargo vehicle that can deliver and return large ISS LRUs while retiring the risks associated with autonomous transportation of astronauts to and from LEO.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Although many details of the OTV-1 flight remain unknown and with OTV-2 shrouded in even more mystery than the first flight, Grantz says the initial launch was aimed at “making it operate like an airborne test platform.” From a vehicle viewpoint, however, it also demonstrated autonomous de-orbit using “shuttle-style” trajectory and aero-braking manuevers as well as a “soft landing” on a runway. The test also validated the X-37B’s autonomous guidance, navigation and control system, electro-mechanical flight control system and thermal protection. During the X-37B’s eight months in space, Air Force controllers also demonstrated deployment of the solar wing, its subsequent stowage and return for reuse.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><i>Photo: USAF</i></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-13328166794745234352011-10-07T17:24:00.001+07:002011-10-07T17:24:15.773+07:00Major ERAM Target Slips To December<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/FAA/LockheedERAMsystem-LockheedMartin.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Although the FAA has missed a near-term milestone for deploying its new en-route air traffic control system, the agency says it will still make major progress by the end of December.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The en-route automation modernization (ERAM) program has been plagued by high-profile cost and timetable overruns (see related story). ERAM is to be the backbone system at 20 en route ATC centers, and an essential precursor to many NextGen technologies.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">So far ERAM is only operational at its two initial sites, Salt Lake City and Seattle. Under its revised timetable, the FAA was scheduled to achieve initial operating capability (IOC) at five more sites by the end of its fiscal year on Sept. 30. However, this goal was not met.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The FAA tells AviationWeek that it now expects to achieve IOC at six sites by the end of December. The deployment list has also changed somewhat. The earlier plan was for the next ERAM sites to be Minneapolis, Albuquerque, Chicago, Denver and Houston. But for the December goal, FAA has added Los Angeles and Oakland to the list, and removed Houston.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">A government website that tracks federal projects had already classified the FY2011 goal as high-risk, and the FAA admitted in August that achieving the Sept. 30 target would be more challenging thanks to the agency’s temporary shutdown in July caused by congressional inaction on reauthorization legislation.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The FAA has rebaselined ERAM to be deployed at all 20 sites by the end of 2014, which would represent a four-year delay from the original schedule. However, the U.S. Transportation Department’s Inspector General believes the end date will slip to 2016. The FAA estimates a $330 million cost overrun, but the IG says this figure could balloon to as much as $500 million.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">In congressional testimony on Oct. 5, the IG once again slammed FAA for mismanaging the ERAM program. Early in the program, FAA and contractor Lockheed Martin “significantly underestimated the complexity in fielding ERAM,” and “ignored early warning signs of trouble during initial site deployment,” the IG says.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">While the FAA has made improvements in this area, the IG says “problems with ERAM are directly traceable to weaknesses in program management and contract oversight.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Software-related problems force controllers to use “a large number of procedural workarounds” in ERAM, says the IG. This would be a major concern at more complex ATC centers such as Chicago and Los Angeles, where controllers do not have time “to use workarounds to compensate for ERAM’s deficiencies.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The FAA says ERAM has been operational at its first two sites since late last year in what it describes as an operational suitability demonstration phase. The system was declared “in-service” in March this year.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Lawmakers have also been critical of FAA’s efforts on ERAM. In language accompanying its proposed FAA budget for FY2012, the House Appropriations Committee says that given ERAM’s problems, it “does not view the current projected cost and schedule for the program as being realistic.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Fiscal 2012 will be “a pivotal year” for ERAM, the Committee says. “Absent real progress towards establishing true 24 hour, seven-day operations, in which controllers can safely rely on ERAM to separate aircraft with a system that provides the core functionalities expected of this multi-billion dollar effort, the Committee will be left with no choice but to recommend suspending the program or denying future funding to this effort.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><i>(Photo: Lockheed Martin)</i></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-60268367268046619682011-10-07T17:23:00.004+07:002011-10-07T17:23:45.870+07:00Delta's Free Wi-Fi Content Could Boost Revenue<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ca_images/Airlines/Delta777DELTA.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Delta Air Lines has launched new free inflight Wi-Fi options with a dual purpose: to make money from the activities people engage in once they are connected and to encourage more people to sign up for the pay-for-access content.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Delta, which offers Wi-Fi on all of its mainline aircraft and will finish installing it on most of its two-class regional jets by the end of this year, will not disclose what percentage of passengers pay for Wi-Fi access now. But it does disclose that some passengers are telling the airline they are reluctant to commit their money until they know how the inflight connection compares to the connection they get on the ground.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The new Delta Connect portal is designed to give them that experience—and provide some additional revenue to Delta in the process—by expanding the free Wi-Fi content the airline provides. Delta had a “soft launch” of the new content on selected aircraft types on Sept. 30, but did the full rollout on Oct. 4.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Delta already offered free Wi-Fi access for Delta website content, some Wall Street Journal content and shopping site Gilt.com. The expanded free content includes features, such as OpenTable, which will enable passengers to make restaurant reservations in the city they are flying to, and Zappos.com for shoe shopping. It also includes StubHub and Eventful for finding events and buying tickets.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Featured partners have paid for their positioning on the free access site, a Delta spokesman said. He would not provide details on revenue-sharing aspects of the arrangement, if any.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Ultimately, whether Delta obtains more revenue from what passengers pay for Wi-Fi access or from what they do once they are connected will depend on how each traveler makes use of it, the spokesman says.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Also this week, Delta launched entertainment on demand via Wi-Fi on all 16 of its Boeing 757-300 aircraft, which do not have seatback inflight entertainment systems. Choices will include an introductory price for television programming starting at 99 cents and movies available for $3.99, and the TV show and movies the person “rents” will remain accessible on the customer’s personal device for viewing after landing for at least 24 hours after the flight.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The Wi-Fi entertainment on demand will be available for laptops initially and expanded to tablet and mobile devices by early 2012. There are no plans yet to expand the option to other aircraft that already offer more options via their seatback IFE, but Delta does plan to keep an eye on how much customers make use of the 757-300 offer.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-27802632079293497692011-10-07T17:23:00.002+07:002011-10-07T17:23:22.521+07:00Lockheed Developing Winglets For C-130, C-5<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/defense_images/Transport/C-130-LockheedMartin.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Lockheed Martin is testing winglets and other drag-reducing modifications to cut the fuel consumption of C-130 Hercules and C-5 Galaxy airlifters.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">With large-scale wind tunnel testing completed, Lockheed is fabricating a shipset of winglets for flight testing on a C-130 in 2012. The modification could be available for both retrofit and forward-fit by early 2014.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Computational analysis and small-scale tunnel tests have been completed on the C-5 winglets. Large-scale tunnel tests are planned for 2012, leading to flight tests in 2014 “if the customer is interested,” says Jack O’Banion, director of advanced development programs at Lockheed’s Marietta, Ga., plant.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The 5-ft.-tall winglets are projected to reduce cruise fuel flow by 170 lb./hr. on the C-130J and “probably more” on older versions of the Hercules, he says. They are designed to be fitted to any C-130 with the beefed-up “enhanced service life” center wingbox. This has the extra structural margin to accommodate winglet-induced bending loads.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Winglets for the C-5M are 6 ft. tall and projected to reduce cruise fuel flow by 1,100 lb./hr. This is on top of the 8-20% improvement in fuel efficiency that comes with re-engining of the C-5 with General Electric CF6-80C2 high-bypass turbofans, O’Banion says, adding that the wing already has sufficient margin to accommodate the winglet loads.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Lockheed Martin in August flight tested an aft-body drag-reduction modification on the C-130. This comprises a series of 36 vortex generators mounted on the aft fuselage. These “microvanes” alter the aft-body flowfield to pull the underbody vortex closer in and reduce base drag, he says.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Results are still being analyzed, but indications are the microvanes will reduce total drag by up to 3.7%, O’Banion says, for a fuel-consumption reduction of 2-3%. No significant changes in aircraft handling have been observed, he says.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The vortex generators, mounted in rows on the aft fuselage on either side of the rear loading ramp, are planned to be available by the end of 2012 for forward-fit and retrofit to the C-130J and earlier Hercules.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Another fuel-saving modification being studied for older C-130s is an upgrade to the latest Series 3.5 version of Rolls-Royce’s T56 turboprop, coupled with Hamilton Sundstrand’s NP2000 eight-blade propeller.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">For the C-5, Lockheed also is working on a drag cleanup that is expected to improve fuel efficiency by 2-3%. This would include new seals on the flight controls to minimize aerodynamic leaks that cause drag; and new seals in the pressurization system to reduce bleed-air demand on the engines and thus improve their fuel efficiency.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">In addition, equipment installed on the C-5s over time — such as defensive systems — would be cleaned up to reduce parasitic drag. “We are in the process of laying out a detailed program for the Air Force, including the business case and potential benefits,” O’Banion says.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The C-130 and C-5 drag reductions are part of an initiative by the U.S. Air Force to cut its fuel consumption. Other elements include drag cleanups on the Boeing C-17 and KC-10 and engine upgrades on the KC-135.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><i>Photo: Lockheed Martin</i></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-64225832664117103292011-10-05T19:20:00.003+07:002011-10-05T19:20:16.287+07:00For Anyone Wondering About That Wasp Deck<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans; font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px;"></span><br />
<div><span style="font-size: x-small;">"That is just the deck," says Joe DellaVedova, spokesman for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. He provided this response to questions about the dark spot on the U.S. Navy's USS Wasp, the amphibious ship being used for ship integration tests with the F-35B. </span></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br />
<a href="http://sitelife.aviationweek.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/5/14/f51ccc3e-2b90-4b2d-9e79-3875e5d25394.Full.jpg" style="color: #224e9c; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" title="Click here to view this image at full size in another window..."><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="blog post photo" id="f51ccc3e-2b90-4b2d-9e79-3875e5d25394" src="http://sitelife.aviationweek.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/5/14/f51ccc3e-2b90-4b2d-9e79-3875e5d25394.Large.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px;" /></div></a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><em>photo credit: JSF JPO</em></span></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">There <a href="http://tinyurl.com/42ertbg" style="color: #224e9c; text-decoration: none;">has been much speculation</a> about those dark spots, which are shown in the first photos released by the Joint Strike Fighter Joint Program Office of BF-2 conducting its first landing on the Wasp deck. Some wonder whether the decks of amphibious ships can withstand the hot exhaust from the F-35B. And, some suggest that there could be protective matting placed on the deck of the ship.</span></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br />
</span></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">However, DellaVedova says that no special matting or coatings have been put down for the F-35B's shipboard trials. The only items added to the deck are sensors that are used to collect test data, he says.</span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-64734699893833615112011-10-05T19:19:00.004+07:002011-10-05T19:19:58.054+07:00Pentagon Searching for a Path Forward for Ground Vehicle Fleet<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans; font-size: 11px; line-height: 16px;"><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://sitelife.aviationweek.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/13/6/fd4ae061-c490-46cd-86b7-cf54773a4476.Full.jpg" style="color: #224e9c; text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank" title="Click here to view this image at full size in another window..."></a></span></span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://sitelife.aviationweek.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/13/6/fd4ae061-c490-46cd-86b7-cf54773a4476.Full.jpg" style="color: #224e9c; text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank" title="Click here to view this image at full size in another window..."><img alt="blog post photo" id="fd4ae061-c490-46cd-86b7-cf54773a4476" src="http://sitelife.aviationweek.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/13/6/fd4ae061-c490-46cd-86b7-cf54773a4476.Large.jpg" style="border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px;" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><br />
Breaking off a little chunk <a href="http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=defense&id=news/dti/2011/10/01/DT_10_01_2011_p48-368556.xml&headline=U.S.%20Army%20Vehicles%20Meet%20Fiscal%20Reality" style="color: #224e9c; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">from my story in DTI's October issue:</a></span><blockquote><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Given all the unknowns in the budget situation, Army leaders are moving forward with three combat vehicle programs—two wheeled and one tracked. How many will actually make it to the fleet remains to be seen, though the service maintains that all three—the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV), the (tracked) Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV), and the Humvee recap program—are doable.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Others aren’t so sure. Stephen Daggett of the Congressional Research Service recently told DTI that he thinks “the Army is going to give up the Ground Combat Vehicle and JLTV” in subsequent budgets, relying instead on recapped Humvees, Strykers, M-ATVs (MRAP All-Terrain Vehicles) and recapped M-ATVs.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">In August, the Army awarded almost $900 million to two teams led by BAE Systems and General Dynamics for its GCV program, a move that appeared to be a big vote of confidence in the program. But then came the details.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">In giving the green light to the program, Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter instructed the Army to conduct two analyses of alternatives (AOA), which will come on top of the AOA the Army completed to ensure that no existing programs perform the tasks envisioned for the GCV. Army Col. Andrew DiMarco, GCV project manager, asserts that his office “looked at a variety of platforms,” including the Bradley and the Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected (MRAP) vehicle, as well as several foreign programs such as the Puma infantry carrier, made by Germany’s Krauss-Maffei Wegmann and Rheinmetall Land Systems. None had the capabilities that the Army believes it can achieve with a newly built vehicle.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">The other sticking point in Carter’s memorandum was the issue of differing price estimates between the Army and the Pentagon’s Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (CAPE) office. While the Army is sticking to its average unit manufacturing cost range of $9-10.5 million, and its $11-13 million estimate for average unit production cost—which includes spare parts—CAPE estimates the average unit production cost to be $16-17 million, DiMarco reveals. He calls the discrepancy the result of “different methodologies” in estimating costs.</span></blockquote><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=defense&id=news/dti/2011/10/01/DT_10_01_2011_p48-368556.xml&headline=U.S.%20Army%20Vehicles%20Meet%20Fiscal%20Reality" style="color: #224e9c; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Click through to read the whole thing here...</a></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-4392852058878313522011-10-05T19:19:00.001+07:002011-10-05T19:19:07.239+07:00Lawmakers Tear Into F-16 Upgrade Decision<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/defense_images/Fighters/F-16_mntns_LockheedMartin.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">House lawmakers skewered administration officials Tuesday on the decision to sell Lockheed Martin F-16 upgrades to the Taiwanese government, rather than brand-new F-16 C/D aircraft. But the officials indicated the story’s not over. They might be open to selling F-16 C and D aircraft in the future.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">“The decision not to sell Taiwan the next generation of F-16 fighters is a decision with grave repercussions,” said Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee during a hearing. “Why must Taiwan depend on rickety old aircraft provided almost 20 years ago by the George Herbert Walker Bush administration to face state-of-the-art Chinese fighters?”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The upgrade deal was part of a $5.85 billion package announced last month. Administration officials including Kurt Campbell, the assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, and Peter Lavoy, principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for Asian and Pacific security affairs, stressed that U.S. weapons sales to Taiwan are at or near their peak under the Obama administration.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Rep. Howard Berman (Calif.), the committee’s top Democrat, indicated support for the administration, but says he is wondering when the White House will move forward with the sale of new-model F-16s.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">The administration hasn’t closed the door to future sales. “We have not ruled out future aircraft decisions,” Lavoy says. “We understand Taiwan’s interest in F-16 Cs and Ds, and this is under consideration.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Berman points out that the government and the contractor are at odds on how quickly Lockheed can deliver. The administration has “asserted” twice that Taiwan would receive greater capability more rapidly by purchasing the upgrades rather than the new aircraft. Lockeed, however, says the new F-16 C- and D-model aircraft would be ready two years earlier than the upgrades, according to Berman.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Lavoy, for his part, skirted a direct answer.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">“It’s our conviction . . . that upgrading their existing fleet of F-16 A and Bs is the immediate priority,” Lavoy says. “We will make sure we work with the defense contractor to accelerate those upgrades.”</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><i>Lockheed F-16 file photo</i></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5361370286489295352.post-68545787908634573172011-10-05T19:16:00.002+07:002011-10-05T19:16:26.293+07:00Cessna Unveils New CJ1+ Variant<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #c3c3c3; color: #333333; font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><img align="left" height="150px" src="http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/ba_images/Cessna/CitationM2-Cessna.jpg" style="padding-bottom: 2px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 3px;" width="250px" /></span><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Cessna Aircraft on Sept. 26 introduced a new version of the CJ1+, which it calls the M2. It will have a Garmin 3000-based “Intrinzic” flight deck and a fiber optic “Clairity” cabin infotainment system with a wireless router, allowing passengers to use their iPads and other devices.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">CEO Scott Ernest says he is pricing the first 47 aircraft at $4 million.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;">Deliveries of CJ1+ plummeted over the past three years, with 14 delivered in 2009, three in 2010 and only one in the first half of this year. The aircraft was hurt in large measure by the market arrival of Embraer’s Phenom 100, with a larger cabin and lower price tag. The initial surge of Phenoms has ebbed, however, and Cessna believes the time is right to regain share with the M2, which cruises faster, has more range and better hot and high performance.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 14px; margin-top: 2px;"><i>Photo credit: Cessna</i></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0