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Aviation History
2004
2004-09 - 2194.PDF
flight.international@rbi.co.uk Letters 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 Opinions on this page do not necessarily represent those of the editor. Letters must be no longer than 250 words. SPACE INNOVATION Poor Shuttle return Peter Johnson takes me to task (Flight International, 19-25 October) for comparing apples with oranges when I compare Burt Rutan with NASA. It is true that Rutan is fol lowing in the footsteps of earlier NASA operations such as Project Mercury and that the information gained has enabled him to design with a lot a fewer unknowns in the physi cal environment. Unfortunately, NASA has not succeeded with the Space Shuttle, for all the billions of dollars spent — it is grounded after a second tragedy and has been replaced by Russian technology that dates from the 1960s. It has also been reported that NASA and the US Department of Defense have already approached Rutan to carry various experiments on SpaceShipOne - if it is so useful and easy to build, why didn't NASA build one out of the petty cash left over from the Shuttle programme? A cynic, or a US taxpayer, might conclude that the US manned space programme since 1975 has been a giant income stream for large aerospace companies, but has given a poor return for the money invested. Rob Wallace Reading, Berkshire, UK Is there a point to Rutan? While one can only admire Burt Rutan and his team's achieve ments, there must be a major ques tion mark over the specification for these ventures. Possibly the best example is the Kremer prize for the first man-powered flight over a given course. Thirty years on there is little evidence that the winner made a major contribution to aero nautics. Similarly Rutan's sub-space flight shows no major advance towards a practical solution for a reuseable vehicle. The problem lies in the original specification against which the competition rules were set. Whoever is responsible for the next venture (and there will almost cer tainly will be one) should look at the outcome of the Kremer and Rutan competition and analyse the practical outcome of a new pro posal. It might be argued that NASA should also review their requirements and specifications in respect of Rutan's achievement. It seems sad that such massive efforts should end up as an item in the Guinness Book of Records. D F Newland Stanmore, Middlesex, UK Single-engine champion The comments made by Kevin Walsh and Andy Adams ("Stating the obvious" and "Stopping point", Flight International, 12-18 October) seem to be made with the "old guard" attitude towards sin- gle-engined aircraft. The Pilatus PC-12 has proved itself in daily operations around the world in some of the most nagged terrain and operating con ditions. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police operates it in deso late territory over northern Canada and chose it to replace the DHC Twin Otter, a wonderfully reliable workhorse. As to Mr Adams' question "How far does it go when the engine stops at 800ft ?" I answer: about as far as the overloaded, overworked and ageing Cessna 400s, Piper Navajos and Dukes still operating in air-taxi operations in many parts of Europe and elsewhere. James Wilkins Florsheim am Main, Germany Supersonic mistake Making quiet progress on super sonic business jets (Flight International, 12-18 October) is only addressing part of the problem. The insurmountable problems are its adverse impact on the stratos pheric ozone layer, poor fuel effi ciency and likely increased global warming impact. Another issue to consider is if the public would sup port a programme that uses public tax dollars for the research and development of an aircraft to fly rich business executives. Name and address withheld Disappointed pilot When I received my 7-13 September issue, I looked forward to reading about US flight testing in the "US Air Force Issue" and, in particular, military flight testing in the USAE I had spent much of my air force career in the flight-testing business at both Edwards AFB in California and Holloman AFB in New Mexico. I was surprised to find almost noth ing about USAF flight testing, despite the fact that there is much going on at Edwards, Wright- Patterson AFB in Ohio, and Eglin AFB in Florida, despite the cover emphasis. John Prodan Rapid City, South Dakota, USA Focus on flying The prospect of air traffic manage ment (ATM) functions being trans ferred to the cockpit concerns me (Flight International, 12-18 October). The job of pilots is to fly the aircraft and keep a good look out, not manage the progress of other flights. If there is an in-flight emergency, the first priority of the crew is to deal with that, so what happens to the ATM then? The skills involved in being a commer cial or private pilot are different from those required to be an air traffic controller. Let us keep the tower and avoid an increase in cockpit workload. Steven Stott Thornton Heath, Surrey, UK 1-7 November Airshow China Zhuhai, China zharshow@pub.zhuhai.gd.cn www.airshow.com.cn/ 1-13 November Aviation Safety & Security Certificate Programme Washington DC, USA www.gwu.edu/~aviation Tel +1 703 726 8334 rtobin@va.gwu.edu 8-9 November 3rd Annual Military Data Links Conference Arlington, Virginia, USA Tel+1310 563 1223 hoodk@ttcus.com www.ttcus.com 10th Annual Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Conference Las Vegas, Nevada, USA Tel+1310 563 1223 hoodk@ttcus.com www.ttcus.com 15-16 November Training Seminar Aircraft Asset Management New York, USA +44(0)1342 324353 everest@everestevents.co.uk www. everest@everestevents. co.uk 15-18 November Aircraft Fire and Cabin Safety Research Conference Lisbon, Portugual Tel+44 (0)1293 573982 www.caa.co.uk training@srg.caa.co.uk 16-18 November AIAA Missile Sciences Conference Monterey, California, USA Tel+1703 264 7500 custserv@aiaa.org www.aiaa.org 18-19 November Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Seminar London, UK Tel:+1310 563 1223 Fax:+13105631220 hoodk@ttcus.com www.ttcus.com 22-23 November Technical Marketing & Proposal Preparation Seminar London, UK Tel:+1310 563 1223 hoodk@ttcus.com www.ttcus.com For a full list of events see www.flightinternational.com www.fliqhtinternational.com FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 26 OCTOBER - 1 NOVEMBER 2004 77
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