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Aviation History
1990
1990 - 2553.PDF
H EADLINES Take-off rules 'compromised7 BY DAVID LEARMOUNT Aviation authorities could be forced to compromise on new proposals for rejected take off criteria because of the threat of opposition in the USA. The new rules would increase safety, but sacrifice payload and range. Rule makers fear that if they do not compromise, then resistance from operators, par ticularly in the USA, will kill the plan. Accidents and studies show- that current "accelerate-stop" criteria do not prevent runway overrun following an emergency abort at take-off decision speed (Vt) on a limiting runway. Ac celerate/stop calculations give the maximum take-off weight of an aircraft (and therefore its maximum payload/range capa bility). Shortcomings in the current accelerate/stop criteria for most airliners assume a dry runway, brake performance assumes the aircraft has new brake pads and pilots are given only Is decision time at Vj — widely accepted as not long enough. Only UK air lines are required to take run way wetness and brake-pad wear into account and this puts them at a commercial disadvan tage under runway-limiting con ditions. The other anomaly is the 1982 "Amendment 42" in which the Joint Aviation Au thorities (JAA) of Europe and the US Federal Aviation Admin istration (FAA) required new aircraft types to operate to tighter accelerate/stop criteria. The main requirement is that pilots have 2s decision time at Vr Only the Airbus A3 20 and the British Aerospace 146 have to operate to the safer criteria. All other airliners are older and do not have to comply. The JAA/FAA hope to make Amendment 42 retrospective and to do this a compromise has already been made. The original "42" criteria assumed acceleration at the "all-engine" rate during the 2s decision time because many aborts are not engine-failure related. This has now been amended to assume no acceleration. UK Civil Aviation Authority operations safety chief Ronald Ashford says, however, that a concession has been won as "42" now requires wet runway conditions to be taken into ac count, which he says is vital. The barrier to_ declaring "42"retroactive is the bureau cratic procedure through which the FAA is required to take the current proposals, particularly at the "cost/benefit analysis" stage. Ashford explains: "There is no lack of will on the special ist side, but the FAA keep warning us that this is not a foregone conclusion". The cost/ benefit analysis team may con clude that abort overruns are rare and that the American Air lines DC-10 at Chicago in May 1988 could be regarded as a typical example. The aircraft aborted following a slat disa greement warning before V,, but overran. The nosewheel was broken but no-one was hurt. D Grumman in site talks for Airbus Grumman is negotiating to establish an Airbus mainte nance site in Houston, Texas, according to Grumman chair man Dr Renso Caporali. Airbus does not have a main tenance base in North America, although it does have a spares station in Washington DC. Grumman says that it is talking about taking over the now dis used Ellington Field AFB in Houston. An Airbus maintenance capa bility is being set up in Costa Rica, following an agreement between French company Sogerma-Socea, Costa Rica's do mestic airline LACAS and main tenance group Coopesa. Mexicana, one of the largest Airbus customers in the world to date, is also talking about expanding its Guadalajara main tenance base in order to provide third-party Airbus maintenance and repair. Airbus says that it is unaware of Grumman's interest in setting up a maintenance site. D Grumman confident in F-14's future BY HUGH LUCAS IN WASHINGTON D.C. Grumman is predicting that its F-14 Tomcat will con tinue in production well into the next decade — even though current US Navy orders are only sufficient to keep the line run ning until 1992. The huge projected costs of bringing in new weapons sys tems to replace the aircraft were cited as the main reason for confidence in continuing pro duction. Grumman Chairman Dr Renso Caporali told a Washing ton press conference that the company was on the point of selling more E-2C Hawkeyes overseas. He said, however, that the A-6 Intruder line is nearing its end, although Boeing contin ues with composite wing modi fications to extend the opera tional life of the US Navy bomber. Giving a update on Grum man's prospects, Caporali said that he expects Congress to act quickly to extend production of the F-14. He noted that $750 million is already allotted for remanufacture of older aircraft in the Navy's FY1991 budget, and that the money could be switched easily to new produc tion. The company has been lobby ing Congress intensely, with some success, for new F-14 orders. Caporali said "...there is nothing else out there" to re place the Tomcat, with the Naval Advanced tactical Fighter (NATF) in danger of never get ting off the ground. The com pany is studying a new variant of the F-14, the Super Tomcat 21, as a possible replacement Grumman predicts F-14 production lasting beyond the year 2000 for NATF (Flight International, 22-28 August). The Navy will receive 37 F- 14Ds in 1992, he said. That, however, is the scheduled end for the interceptor, the main source of income for the Beth- page, New York, company for the past two decades. The E-2C Hawkeye continues to win orders in the interna tional market. Japan is to re ceive five in 1992, with Taiwan and France both showing inter est. The US Government has given Grumman permission to sell the EA-6B, but Caporali said that he does not expect a large demand because it is a "top of the line item". He pre dicted restart of the line by 1994 at the earliest, however. Among other Grumman pro grammes, Caporali said that the JSTARS battlefield surveillance system passed a field test in Europe earlier this year with another scheduled for October. The House had deleted money for JSTARS in FY1991 but he said that it is expected to re store it. • FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 5 - II SEPTEMBER, 1990
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