All aerospace news – Page 1902
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777 suffers new engine troubles
Guy Norris/LOS ANGELES Pratt & Whitney and General Electric are inspecting their respective PW4090 and GE90 engines for the Boeing 777, after a new series of problems with powerplants on British Airways and United Airlines aircraft. The GE90 suffered a crack in a rotating seal on ...
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Orbital surgery
NASA is sponsoring a new US national computation centre at Stanford University, California, which will focus on the use of three-dimensional virtual reality in coping with medical emergencies in space. NASA's Ames Research Center will provide $500,000 a year for five years. Source: Flight International
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China's Long March 3B launches the ApStar 2R
Tim Furniss/LONDON China Great Wall Industry (CGWIC) again launched a Long March 3B booster on 17 October, marking the second successful launch in less than two months and helping to restore confidence after the failure of the first LM3B in February 1996. The booster carried Hong ...
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Panel trouble hits Global Surveyor
Tim Furniss/LONDON NASA's Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) orbiter may be restricted in its $250 million mapping mission of the red planet by a problem on one of the spacecraft's twin solar panels, which were to be used to control the orbit. The MGS was demonstrating the ...
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Russian cash
Money allocated to the Russian space programme in 1998 is "so inadequate" that it could discontinue space activities. The cash is "not enough" to honour Russia's commitment to the International Space Station claims Vladimir Gusev, chairman of the Russian parliamentary industry and transport committee. The allocations are 60% less than ...
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Airbus supplement: A319 flighttest
Peter Henley/HAMBURG The 124-seat A319 is the smallest of the Airbus Industrie family of airliners, featuring the same basic flightdeck and similar handling characteristics to all the other Airbus fly-by-wire (FBW)aircraft. A "shrink" derivative of the 150-seat A320, the A319 is offered with the same engines ...
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Explorer costs
Boeing says that direct operating costs for new-production MD Explorer helicopters have been reduced to $394/h, from $430/h originally, through longer-life parts and a 22% cut in spares costs. Source: Flight International
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Hamburg Airlines to fold after partner talks fail
Andrzej Jeziorski/MUNICH Hamburg Airlines managing director Udo Klien confirms that the carrier will fold at the end of the year, after the failure of partnership talks with regional carrier Augsburg Airways. Augsburg is now planning instead to extend its Hamburg operations within its existing Team Lufthansa ...
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Pilots warned of software glitch
Flight manuals for the Airbus A320 family are being amended to alert pilots to a "software anomaly" which can cause the aircraft to adopt "an unintended flight path". The US Federal Aviation Administration airworthiness directive (AD), to take effect on 3 November, is sufficiently urgent for the FAA to have ...
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Saab ready to close regional-aircraft lines as orders dry up
Julian Moxon/PARIS Saab Aircraft will shut down production of its 340 and 2000 turboprops in 1998 and leave the regional-airliner market altogether, unless new orders can be secured by the end of 1997. In a statement, Saab warns that the decision could come as soon as ...
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Delta plans HUD choice soon
Delta Air Lines is expected to select a head-up-display (HUD) system for its Boeing Next Generation 737 fleet by early November, as the leading manufacturers scramble to respond to the airline's request for proposals (rfp). Delta is the first of the US majors after Southwest Airlines to opt ...
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Air Littoral cancels Bombardier CRJ options
Air Littoral has cancelled options for five Bombardier CanadairRegional Jets (CRJs) due to be delivered in 1998. The action follows a pilots' strike begun on 13 October and was still under way as Flight International went to press. The dispute, which has hit up to 60% of flights, ...
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North Korea plans to upgrade its air-traffic-control system
The North Korean Civil Aviation Administration is scheduled to complete an initial upgrade of air-traffic-control equipment by the end of the year, in readiness for the start of international flight trials through the Pyongyang Flight Information Region (FIR) in late February. North Korea is modernising communications equipment at ...
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Unions side with Boeing in Sabena order battle
Unions at Sabena have intervened in the fight between Boeing and Airbus to secure a contract to replace the carrier's Boeing 737-200 with a threat of industrial action if the airline decides in favour of the Airbus A319. The Belgian flag carrier is due to make a decision ...
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Free flight-who pays?
Billed as the "Path to Free Flight", the US Federal Aviation Administration's Flight 2000 programme could prove a rocky road for planners of this ambitious demonstration of the future US air-traffic-management system. While agreeing that a large-scale rehearsal of the Free Flight concept is a good idea, lawmakers, operators and ...
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Step forward
Kistler Aerospace's fully re-usable K-1 launch vehicle will be flight tested from Nevada, USA, or Woomera, South Australia, as early as July 1998. This is the first step towards offering a 4,500kg satellite-delivery service to low- and medium-Earth orbit (LEO/MEO), costing $17 million a time (Flight International, 23-29 October, 1996). ...
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Maintenance Directory
Fokker Aircraft Services specialises in airframe Ian Sheppard/londonDATA TABLES/Air Transport Intelligence Europe's maintenance industry has been faced with growing international competition and the need for consolidation, and has continued to take on board the new Joint Aviation Requirements, bringing it more into line with the USA. Many fixed-base operators ...
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Sikorsky adds HUMS
Sikorsky has delivered the first health- and usage-monitoring system (HUMS) for the S-76C+ helicopter following certification by the Norwegian and UK authorities. The HUMS, manufactured by GEC-Marconi, was delivered to Norway's Norsk Helikopter, which operates an S-76C+ on offshore-oil services. GEC's HUMS, developed for the S-76A+ and S-76C, ...
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Bel 427 for Hainan
Samsung Aerospace has signed a letter of intent to sell three new Samsung-Bell 427 eight-seat helicopters to Hainan Airlines of China. It is also negotiating similar agreements with China Ocean and China Southern's Zhuhai Helicopters for another ten. Source: Flight International
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Cassini takes off on mission to Saturn
The NASA/European Space Agency (ESA) Cassini-Huygens spacecraft was despatched successfully en route to the planet Saturn 42min after launch by a Titan 4B/Centaur from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on 15 October. The spacecraft, which had been surrounded in controversy because it uses a nuclear powerplant, will reach Saturn in July 2004 ...