July 2010 Archives

Trygve Gran makes the first crossing of the North Sea by air. He flew from Cruden Bay in Aberdeenshire in Scotland, to Klep near Stavanger, Norway in his Bleriot monoplane.

Flight, at the time, recorded the crossing as: "the longest oversea flight without sight of land which has so far been made," and added that: "for some time Lieut. Gran bas been waiting at Cruden Bay for a favourable opportunity to make the trip."

A Canadian Air Force F-18 pilot ejected to safety after his jet stalled during a low pass at Lethbridge County Airport in Alberta during training for a weekend international air show.

The aircraft plowed into the ground exploding into a ball of flames and his quick reactions of Capt Brian Bews, 36, as he activated his rocket-powered ejector seat, saved his life, escaping with mild injuries including scraped arms and a sore back, according to a newswire.

Newswire AP reported that the military and the Department of Transport immediately launched an investigation into the accident. There was no indication of the cause of the accident.

What do you think might have occured?

Images and video footage of the ejection and aircraft

 

 

Ten years ago today, a catastrophic fire took hold of Concorde's port wing during the take-off roll, which began at 15.44 at Paris Charles de Gaulle (CDG) airport.

Flight wrote that the aircraft was the oldest operational Concorde, built in 1975. It entered service with Air France on 23 October, 1980. It had accumulated 11,989 flight hours and 3,978 cycles. Its last "C" check was performed on 28 April 2000, while a more extensive "D" check was completed in September 1999. 

Recent developments:

Blog: Learmount - Nailing the Concorde criminals

21 May 2010: UK officials defend Concorde's safety standards as Paris trial continues

18 May 2010: Criminalisation of air accidents: the solutions may be forged in Europe

 

Flight recorded the accident in its 1-7 August 2000 issue -

• Comment: When to stop
• Tyre explosion probed in Air France Concorde crash (including an image and graphics)
• Aircraft profile: Concorde (including news, images, blog posts and videos)

In April last year, Max Kingsley-Jones and I went to Brooklands Museum, near Weybirdge in Surrey, UK, for the opening of the Concorde simulator.

The original full flight simulator used to train British Airways pilots was restored and made available for private hire.

The simulator forms part of the museum's "Concorde Experience" based around the fully restored first UK production Concorde G-BBDG. See what British Airways' last Concorde chief pilot Capt Mike Bannister has to say about what the aircraft was like to fly:

• PICTURES & VIDEO: Concorde simulator restored to 'flying status' at Brooklands museum

 

It's day five of the Farnborough Airshow (which we are covering in depth here at our special site) so that means it is also the last day for a new question for our Concorde quiz.

It's day four of the Farnborough Airshow (which we are covering in depth here at our special site) so that means it is also day four of our Concorde quiz and time for a new question!

It's day three of the Farnborough Airshow (which we are covering in depth here at our special site) so that means it is also day three of of Concorde quiz and time for a new question!

It's day two of the Farnborough Airshow (which we are covering in depth here at our special site) so that means it is also day two of of Concorde quiz and time for a new question!

If you're just joining us, each day this week we are giving away a copy of David Leney and David Macdonald's new book Concorde: Owners' Workshop Manual (above). The book is illustrated in full colour and provides a detailed technical account of the supersonic transport. For your chance to win simply submit your answer to the question below. One winner will be chosen from all of the correct submissions.

How many Concordes were built, including prototypes and pre-production aircraft?
A 20
B 16
C 7
D 14

Submit your answer by sending an email with the letter corresponding to the correct answer in the subject line. E-mail flightglobal.webmaster@flightglobal.com

Concorde made a number of appearances at the Farnborough Airshow, including at the 1970 show--a moment captured above by our AirSpace member Orville. This year at the Farnborough Airshow (which we're covering in full depth at our special site) we're pleased to be bringing back a little bit of Concorde.

We've teamed up with David Leney and David Macdonald, the authors of the new book Concorde: Owners' Workshop Manual (below), to hold a quiz every day this week. If you answer correctly you'll go into a draw to win a copy of the book. We're giving away a copy of the book every day so be sure to take the quiz and send us the answer to increase your chances of winning. There's more information here.

Here's the first question:

What was the maximum temperature on Concorde's nose when cruising at Mach 2?

• A 146˚C
• B 127˚C
• C 100˚C
• D 217˚C

Submit your answer by sending an email with the letter corresponding to the correct answer in the subject line. E-mail flightglobal.webmaster@flightglobal.com

I've enlisted the help of the Farnborough International air show section of its site to help identify the big hitting aircraft that have wowed the crowds over the years. With such information at my fingertips, I scuttled away to dig around in the Flightglobal's archive to see what coverage, at the time, was available. This is what I found:

1948: Airshow moves to Farnborough site. Flight wrote: "the adoption of the new venue -- which imposes fewer traffic restrictions than Radlett and, more important, allows the long-proposed admittance of the public -- should swell the Exchequer by promoting export sales, benefit British prestige and stimulate public morale."

1949 The De Havilland Comet 1 (the world's first jet airliner) makes its debut - here's a feature "The Comet emerges", published around Farnborough time

1950 The Bristol Brabazon I flew - Flight kept readers up to date with the goings on at Farnborough despite a printing strike 

1951 Hawker P.1067 gave the fastest speed demonstration then seen in public - Flight published "Farnborough: the opening phases 

1952 First appearance of the Avro Vulcan B.1 - Farnborough report 

1956 The Yellowjacks - the forerunners of the Red Arrows displayed: The 17th SBAC dispay 

1966 The first year of European aircraft participation, and first year of the Red Arrows -  

1968 20-aircraft fly-past to form a 50 to celebrate the RAF's 50th anniversary - The 26th SBAC show 

1970 Concorde made its triumphant debut during the flying display - Flight wrote that the 1970 show will be memorable for the appearance of Concorde 

1974 First ever fully international display at Farnborough; arrival of USAF Lockheed SR-71A Blackbird which broke the New York to London speed record en route to Farnborough - Flight headline: First Report Farnborough 1974

1976 - Flight celebrates the SBAC show - Show decades

1978 Airshow renamed Farnborough International; specially built ski-jump enabled Harrier T.52 to launch itself to demonstrate STOL capability - Flight wrote about a Boeing and Rolls-Royce coup 

1980 Red Arrows perform with their new Hawk T.1s; Mirage 2000, Super Mirage 4000 and Tornado prototype of F.2 variant all displayed -

Flight took 10 men to report on the show. That must have seemed like a lot at the time. But now there are many more, especially as we have the web audience to consider and of course the interactive daily. See our 2010 show page and watch Farnborough news unfold as it happens 

1984 World's largest helicopter a Mil Mi-26 Halo flew - The air show conundrum 

1988 Russian fighters in the form of two Fulcrums MiG-29A 10 and MiG-29UB 53 came to the show - Flight's show report 

1990 Russian Airforce wowed the crowd with tail-slide and cobra manoeuvres; the world's largest aircraft, the Antonov An-225 Mriya displayed - Flight's Farnborough retrospective 

1996 Flypast by USAF B-2A Spirit - Flight was excited about the Global Express debut 

1998 50th year of the airshow at Farnborough; feature of aircraft and jet types from the 1950s and 1960s; two British Airways Concordes visited - Flight liked the Bombardier Q400 

2000 de Havilland formation flypast - Headlining - the Aermacchie M346  

2002 Formation flight of four Eurofighter typhoons; handing over to Virgin Atlantic of ultra-long version of Airbus A340

2004 First ever landing at Farnborough of 747s and display by South African and Cathay Pacific 747s - Flight counts down for take off as the A380 emerges 

2006 UK debut of Airbus A380 - Flight headline: The race to rewire the A380 

 

• More about the first 60 years of Farnborough
• Who needs air shows? 

Hard to tell whether Sukhoi Civil Aircraft genuinely didn't mean to put a Superjet backlog table into its official annual report, or simply didn't expect anyone to notice it.

 

Either way, Sukhoi had kittens about this story, hastily withdrew the document and, when it reappeared, the table in question had been scrubbed.

 

So if you missed it, here's the original:

 

 

 

And here's Sukhoi's explanation for the selective editing...

 

Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company officially states that in its 2009 Annual Report in the backlog table certain airlines are mentioned by mistake. The same table mistakenly mixed firm orders with slot allocations. The document was erroneously published and will be replaced as soon as possible. We are sorry for any inconvenience it might cause.

 

...which really doesn't explain very much. It doesn't explain, for example, how so many "mistakes" ended up in the table, much less how it wound up being published in the official annual report. It doesn't explain why Sukhoi didn't simply publish a corrected version. And it doesn't explain about a hundred other things. Roll on, Farnborough.

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

Related items refers to content that is similar to the content that is being displayed. This can either be dynamically generated (using keywords or algorithms) or can be handpicked. On our articles, you can see related articles on the right hand side of the article.

 

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

Graphics and animations are what are used to illustrate a story.

Flightglobal, in 2010, began to publish an interactive show daily magazine starting with the Singapore Air Show where pages are turned at the click of a button on your mouse. The user is greeted with a welcome from the region's editor Siva Govindasamy who explained what to expect from the current issue.

Day one included a cutaway of a Singapore Airlines A380 with buttons which, when clicked on would take you into the interiors for economy and business classes, the flightdeck and the engine.

For animation or interactive graphic, Flightglobal commissioned its art department to use Flash to create a graphic to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon Landing.

 

 

 

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

Flightglobal produces a huge amount of in-depth features that look into every aspect of the aviation and aerospace industry. These appear both on Flightglobal and also in our magazines - Flight International and Airline Business.

Most recently you may have enjoyed a feature about how piston aircraft manufacturers stage and sustain a recovery after being  particularly hard hit by the economic downturn.

 

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

Yahoo! Pipes is a web application that provides users with the opportunity to create their own data mashups and RSS feeds that aggregate the web pages, feeds and services of their choice, eg Flickr images, blog posts and latest stories are collated into one RSS feed.

The user can "pipe" these feeds to create something appropriate for their own purposes eg adding it to their Facebook profile page thereby sharing this information with their friends.

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

Embedded links are links added into a story.

The links we provide take the user off to a different, relevant part of Flightglobal, for example if it's an Airbus A380 story, the link will direct the user to Flightglobal's A380 content which would include recent A380 stories, blog posts, images uploaded to the A380 gallery on AirSpace, and external sites around the wider web.

We would also provide external links directing the user to the report from which the story derives.

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

Most view showcases the most viewed stories, images, blog posts, and other aspects of our content that is the most popular and interesting among our audience. This helps us know what content is most appealing to you, so that we can continue to showcase the things from the industry that you want to see.

We use a web metrics software called Omniture to continually measure what content is the most poular and where you are entering and leaving the site.

Here's the latest web metrics report from Flightglobal:

Flightglobal Web & e-newsletter Analytics Report

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

Ratings enable users to judge the quality of an article and how informative they have found it. Typically articles are ranked by views, ratings and popularity and you can see the highest rated recent articles here.

You can submit a rating on an news story at the bottom of the article:

 

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

We have installed a live webcam in our chalet which we've transformed into a media lounge.  You will be able to watch the Flightglobal journalists in action as we bring you all the latest from the show.

Inside the news room, there will be several plasma tv screens showcasing our multi-media capabilities,including Twitter updates for #FARN10, video footage of the day's aerial displays, images and much more.

If you're at the air show, why not drop by and have a look around the media lounge and see for yourself. We'd love to welcome you.

Accept our invitation on Linkedin: Flightglobal Media Lounge at Farnborough Air Show 2010 on LinkedIn Events.

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

You've clicked on the "tweet ups" leaf on the tree. So what are they?

Some background information: What is Twitter? Twitter.com is a microblogging site. Micro, because tweeters have just 140 characters to get their message across, but Wikipedia expains the Twitter concept quite well.

A follower, a person who also has a Twitter handle (or username) can choose to follow whomever they choose and they usually will follow another Twitter user with something in common with them. There are plenty of Twitter accounts within the aerospace and aviation industry. You can follow all the Flightglobal Tweeters here.

Stefan the Pilot organised a tweet up under the wing of an aircraft parked amid the static display at the Dubai Air Show.

A number of the industry's Twitterati will be here at the Farnborough Air Show and we are sure we will be meeting up at some point. Please follow @flightglobal or @stefanthepilot for details of when a likely Tweet up will be. Stefan the Pilot looks forward to meeting you. 

Flightglobal's Tree of Communication explains how a digital publisher reports news and shows how facts, opinion and analysis can be communicated through the modern web.

Comments are written in response to a blog posting from our crack team of Flightglobal bloggers and/or in response to any of the other users who have commented on the same blog post. 

Comments on posts are always welcomed as Flightglobal continuously engages with its audience.

Check the "latest comments" tab and join in the conversation.

Australian airline Qantas gathered supporters on Sydney's Bondi Beach to hold up an 800 metre-long scarf containing messages of support the country's soccer team, the Socceroos. Photo: James Morgan/Qantas.

As the World Cup draws to a close, much stands out in terms of the countries that did and did not make it to the finals.

But from an aviation perspective (and specifically from the press releases sent to my inbox) one thing is clear: the industry rode the World Cup's coattails to promote itself. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but some of the efforts were humorous. Here are my top three favourite examples.

First up is Thales, who announced that thanks to "Flowcat", the company's air traffic management system, "the Air Traffic Navigation Services (ATNS) organisation of South Africa will have the world's most comprehensive tools to anticipate flow and optimise aircraft trajectories". Thales also plugged its technological involvement with Durban's new airport, and also found room to mention its role in the Jo'burg subway's fare collection as well as satellite broadcast.

Next Oman Air announced it would be the sponsor of its home's first-ever "World Cup village". The airline explains the "World Cup village will offer the country's many football fans the chance to watch every match in fully air-conditioned comfort, live from South Africa on the largest screen ever seen in Oman. A high-tech sound and lighting system, together with a stadium-style seating layout, will add to the atmosphere and refreshments will be available throughout. DJs and freestyle football demonstrations will provide entertainment between matches in the 1,500-capacity tent, which is located in the beautiful grounds of the InterContinental Muscat Hotel."

Finally in this triumvirate collection, Qantas gathered on Sydney's Bondi Beach supporters of Australia's Socceroos to hold an 800 metre scarf containing 10 cm-long messages of support fans submitted via the web. And, of course, there was a massive photo shoot for the event, with the airline hiring a helicopter to fly over the beach for that Kodak moment.

In the interest of full disclosure, here at Flightglobal we also had fun with the World Cup by way of calculating a fictitious ladder of teams likely to win based on how their home country airlines have performed.

On 10 July Britain will be celebrating the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Britain. Flightglobal is in a unique position to showcase its own and original coverage of the Battle, week by week as it unfolded.

Among the 210,000 pdf archive pages Flight published numerous articles about the aircraft used by Britain, its allies as well its enemies.

Here are some features and aircraft profiles written by Flight journalists, of some of the aircraft that played a part in the British victory.

Aircraft

• Information on and photo of the Supermarine Seagull V and more images 
• Technical information on the Supermarine Seagull  
• Recent photograph of the Supermarine Spitfire I
• Technical description/general arrangement drawing of Bristol Blenheim IV
• "Exclusive details" of the Heinkel bomber He 111s
• "Those Heinkel bombers" 
• Cutaway drawing of a Heinkel He112 
• Technical description/general arrangement drawing de Havilland Tiger Moth
• Cutaway drawing of the Gloster Gladiator and a letter written in 1958 letter about re-building it
• Gloster Gladiator manufacturer's advertisement that appeared in Flight
• A recent image on AirSpace of a Gloster Gladiator
• A recent image of a Messerschmitt Me 109 on AirSpace
• Technical details of the Messerschmitt 109 
• Friend or Foe: Comparison of the Junkers JU87 with the Miles Magister
• Picture JU88 / Me 109
• Technical information of the Short Sunderland MR5
• Stories of the Sunderland in war 
• Technical description and general arrangement drawing of a Falco F.8L
• Profile of Fiat CR42

• Picture of the Italian aircraft, the Fiat CR42 Falco

• Aircraft of axis powers
• Machines of the Luftwaffe 
• Trainer aircraft of WW2
• Recognising aircraft
• Designing [aircraft] for speed 
  

Strategy 

• 18 July 1939: Preparing for the Battle of Britain 
• 4 April 1918: Creation of the Royal Air Force
• Training German Pilots

External links

• Battle of Britain Museum 1978
• BoB Memorial Trust 
• Battle of Britain Memorial Flight
• Battle of Britain Monument London

Britain's Armed Forces have begun to blog so that the public can get an idea of what it's like for soldiers on the front line. 

"Servicemen and women have been blogging for years of course privately on personal pages, but we have never provided the platform to bring all those blogs together before. People can follow just one person or a number of bloggers from one regiment, or indeed read them all," says Task Force Helmand spokesman, Lt Col James Carr-Smith.

These "correspondents", are the first of what the Armed Forces hope will become tens, if not hundreds of bloggers serving in conflict zones. 

The main objective is to get those behind the scenes to impart their experiences to the public.

One blogger, Cpl Lewis MacLeod, introduces himself in a post: "I'm an RAF Reservist based at RAF Leuchars in Scotland. I'm normally a nurse in the NHS so I'm out here doing my day job, currently as a ward nurse at the hospital at Camp Bastion...

"The hospital deals with ISAF personnel and Afghan civilians caught up in the conflict, but everyone is treated exactly the same regardless of where they come from. The Geneva Convention is taken very seriously out here. It can be challenging working with the injured children at first, but fortunately your skills kick-in enabling you to deliver the best possible care." 

RAF blogs from Afghanistan

 

By Joel Foreman from Sutton Grammar School currently doing work experience with Flightglobal