FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1982
1982 - 2205.PDF
AIR TRANSPORT wmmMtm JKgsm vIlliBl **"—*~~~ v:>,*a»;.-«.4>v> A convicing artist's impression of how the Boeing 757 will look in Air Europe colours. Final livery design work is being carried out for Air Europe's two 757s, which will enter service next summer on its busiest European routes, s uch as Palma, Corfu, and Tenerife DHC cuts back production TORONTO De Havilland Canada is halv ing the production rates of both the Dash 7 and the Twin Otter because of a slowdown in orders. The cutbacks will take place immediately, and will result in DHC laying off 750 production, supervisory, and office employees over the next two months. Dash 7 production will be cut to one a month from the current rate of two. Twin Otter production will fall from 2-5 a month to one a month. Production of the civil/military Buffalo is also running at one a month. According to DHC, 400 staff will go on September 24, and the other 350 on Oc tober 29. When the layoffs are completed, the com pany's total workforce will number 3,450, compared with a peak of 5,400 in 1981. DHC president John Sand- ford has said that through out the summer many cus tomers further delayed plan ned purchases of Dash 7s and Twin Otters, with the re sult that the company has been building aircraft faster than the market demands. The collapse of Golden Gate Airlines, which operated five Dash 7s and had another five on the line, did DHC's sales prospects for the type no good at all. Sandford has stated that the company will try to avoid further layoffs by switching employees to the Dash 8 programme from the other programmes if these need to be curtailed further. The Dash 8 programme is now working up to full produc tion and, at its peak, should require a workforce of be tween 2,500 and 3,000. ATEL wins DC-8 re-engine deal FARNBOROUGH UK aircraft sales and main tenance company Aviation Traders (Engineering) has won a contract to supply Global International Airways of Kansas City with four Cammacorp DC-8-73s. ATEL is to acquire four DC-8-63s, renovate them, and re-engine them with CFM 56s using conversion kits supplied by Cammacorp. The aircraft are to be delivered to Global International in 1983. According to ATEL's Chris Marshall, Global Interna tional has even suggested that ATEL may be asked to negotiate the financing for the entire project. The com bination of broking, conver sion, sales, support, and maintenance represents an expansion of ATEL's tradi tional market activities, but the company decided earlier this year that it should seek to expand the services it offers, so it should be trying to win more full-package deals in future. ATEL says that it has won other contracts valued at over £500,000 at this Farn- borough, and expects to an nounce further deals. Wheels will have to change LONDON Findings and subsequent recommendations in a report about a McDonnell Douglas DC-10 tyreburst and aborted take-off at London Heathrow may force radical changes in future airliner landing gear design. The Accidents Investiga tion Branch of the UK Trade Department has published its report on the take-off in cident which occurred on September 16, 1980. It acknowledges that there is a limit to what can be done to improve landing gear safety on aircraft currently in ser vice beyond improved moni toring of tyre condition and the introduction of rules which will ensure that this monitoring is carried out. One of the major problems in designing widebody air craft was the provision of landing gear and tyres which would stand the hugely in creased stresses the big aero planes would put on them; technology was stretched to its limits. Some of the AIB's recom mendations follow: • When a tyre or wheel on a multiple-wheel axle has to be replaced for pressure-loss reasons, all the other wheels/ tyres on that axle should be replaced. • Experiments should estab lish the maximum tyre age, usage, and retread level which is safe. Then this should be detailed in regula tions. • Standards should be set for the condition of re- retreaded tyres. • Regulation should estab lish better protection for all systems (hydraulics etc) on the undercarriage and in the wheel-well, to ensure that an exploding tyre or a gear fire does not cause serious damage. A specific recom mendation with this in mind is that the landing gear doors on all future large public transport aircraft should be designed to close when the gear is extended. • Gear design should be such that a single tyre or wheel failure does not re sult in a serious incident. O Flightdecks should be equipped with a take-off per formance monitor. Since such an instrument does not exist now, development of such a monitor "with a cock pit display should be under taken as a matter of ur gency". All large airliners should also have "tyre status monitoring equipment" in the cockpit. Such equipment is available but not widely used. • For take-off performance calculations, the present allowance of one second re action time should be in creased. Braniff gets more time to reorganise FORT WORTH Braniff has been granted 35 more days to file a re-organ isation plan under Chapter 11 of the US Federal Bank ruptcy Code. The airline had applied for a 60-day ex tension. A Federal Bankruptcy Court judge said that there is cause for giving Braniff more time because of the complexity of the airline's operations and its asset and debt structure. But the judge ruled a 60-day exten sion inappropriate. People .. . Alan S. Boyd is the new chairman and president of Airbus Industrie in North America. Boyd was the first US Secretary of Transporta tion, and has also been chair man of the Civil Aeronautics Board. FLIGHT International, 18 September 1982 827
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
