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Aviation History
2003
2003 - 2882.PDF
Letters flight.international@rbi.co.uk Flight International welcomes letters on any aspect of the aerospace industry. Please write to: The Editor, Flight International, Quadrant House, The Quadrant, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5AS, UK. Or email flight.inter- national@rbi.co.uk The opinions on this page do not necessarily represent those of the editor. We cannot publish letters without name and address. Letters must be no more than 250 words in length. BOEING 7E7 The magic will fade Being a million miler, I read with some interest your "Room to Relax" article (Flight International, 18-24 November). It appears that the Boeing interior designers have been spending all their time at their desks or in the first-class sections of aircraft. I expect the "magic" of the "arches" and "tall windows" will fade as you sit by a window and need to climb over two passengers to get to the aisle. I hope they do patent the three-two-three arrangement so that no-one else can use it. For an eight-abreast row, the best is two-four-two, where you are only one seat away from an aisle. Of course this appears to be the classic bait and switch and the two- three-two will quickly become the dreaded three-three-three with the most middle seats in the air. Since Boeing is getting a "good reaction" to this interior arrangement, it may wish to consider changing 7E7 to 7M7 (M for middle seat) since that is where 25-33% of the passengers will be sitting. Bob McAndrew, * President international Business Services Tucson, Arizona, USA 11-15 January 2004 AAAE Aviation Issues Conference Kauai, Hawaii Tel +1 703 824 0500 todd.hauptli@airportnet.org www.airportnet.org 21-21 January Network Centric 2004 Washington DC, USA Tel+1973 256 0211 info@iqpc.com www.iqpc-defence.com 26-28 January AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting and Exhibition Reno, Nevada, USA Tel+1703 264 7500 custserv@aiaa.org www.aiaa.org 28 January Flight International Countermeasures Conference Washington DC, USA Tel+44 20 8652 8718 sallie.edwards@rbi.co.uk www.flightinternational.com 28-29 January Air Power 2004 London, UK Tel+44 1628 604 311 sf@shephard.co.uk www.shephard.co.uk 3-5 February AFCEAWest San Diego, California, USA Tel+1 703 631 6158 events@afcea.org www.weest2004.org 4-6 February NDIA SO/LIC Symposium & Exhibition Washington DC, USA Tel+1703 522 1820 djenks@ndia.org www.ndia.org 6-8 February Great Lakes International Aviation Conference Lansing, Michigan, USA Tel+1 5174324000 www.greatlakesaviationconference. com 8-12 February AAS/AIAA Space Flight Mechanics Meeting Maui, Hawaii Tel+1617 2581144 www.space-flight.org JSF: between the lines Your JSF special (Flight Inter national, 25 November-1 Decem ber) was highly informative. Reading between the lines, I deduce the following: The JSF will be late, overcost and overweight. This is no surprise as almost every modern aircraft, and especially high-tech US aircraft, has been the same. Only Israel, Japan and the UK will stay with the programme and they will do so for political reasons. Other countries will buy the JSF "off the shelf" much later. The short take-off and landing (STOL) marine version will not see the light of day. The implications are that there are still opportunities for other manufacturers - Dassault, Euro- fighter, MiG, Saab and Sukhoi can expect further sales to fill the gap. The BAE/Boeing Harrier will remain the only STOL/VSTOL air craft readily available and money spent on low cost upgrades will be well spent. Rob Wallace Reading, Berkshire, UK A safety contradiction 1 read with interest your article on helicopter safety ("Lessons learned", Flight International, 4-10 November). On the one hand, Bristow Heli copters sees pilot instrument rating and fully instrument meteorologi cal conditions (IMC)-capable heli copters as fundamentals. In addi tion, in the UK, helicopters used for public transport have to be twin-engine, IMC-capable and either crewed with two pilots or equipped with an autopilot. The report highlights the danger at night of visual-meteorological- conditions pilots suddenly finding themselves in cloud, becoming dis orientated and losing control. And yet, for some of the most demand ing roles - air ambulance and police work, for example - an exemption to the rules permits these operations to take place at night in a helicopter that is not IMC capable, flown by a pilot without an instrument rating. The Australian Transport Safety Board has identified a safety defi ciency relating to visual operations at night following the loss of three rescue helicopters in Queensland in as many years (Flight International, 25 November-1 December). Put together, these reports ques tion the safety of visual operations at night in the UK by the emer gency services using helicopters that are not IMC capable, flown by pilots without instrument ratings. Robert Brown Leyburn, Yorkshire, UK Quality training David Ogilvy expresses his concern over the source of high-quality instructors under the proposed UK Military Flying Training System (Flight International, 4-10 Novem ber). He is concerned that the Central Flying School (CFS) will no longer be required in the new contractural environment. The CFS will continue to train instructors to the exacting military standards under the new system to sustain the requirement for quali fied flying instructors on the front line squadrons and operational con version units. Initial instructional training and experience will be gained on training aircraft (albeit many on the civil register) and the military/civilian balance, while yet to be finalised, will remain similar to the current proportions. Furthermore, it is likely that most of the civilian posts will still be filled by ex-military instructors. Wg Cdr S Chiddention OC Exam Wing, Central Flying School, RAF Cranwell, UK Square pegs Maurice McGreal's "Remember Paris" letter (Flight International, 18- 24 November) is illustrative of ham mering the square pegs of reality into the round holes of nostalgia. In common with that other flying souffle, the Space Shuttle, the Paris Concorde disaster was an accident waiting to happen. Blaming it on an unswept runway is like blaming the loss of the American Airlines Airbus A300-600R in New York in November 2001 on wake turbulence from the Japan Airlines Boeing 747 ahead of it. David Connolly Brussels, Belgium 40 9-15 DECEMBER 2003 FLIGH T INTERNATIONAL www.fliqhtinternational.com
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