All news – Page 6250
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16 Air Assault Brigade Joint Helicopter Command
The AAC's Apaches will be operated by three regiments - 3 and 4 at Wattisham, Suffolk and 9 at Dishforth, Yorkshire - each with two squadrons of eight aircraft. Each regiment will also have a squadron of light utility helicopters, likely to be Lynx, incorporating an upgrade proposed by GKN ...
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Bilateral talks
A recent meeting in the USA between US Department of Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater and UK Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott has signalled fresh hopes for a renegotiation of the US/UK bilateral agreement. The last in a series of discussions between the two nations over an open-skies policy, held in ...
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Heliport opens
An unlicensed heliport was opened in Cardiff, UK, on 15 March. The £3.5 million ($5.5 million) facility has a 300m (1,000ft) runway, is claimed to be "the first purpose-built heliport in Europe capable of all-weather flights". Source: Flight International
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Antonov puts conventional An-74 into final assembly
Paul Duffy/MOSCOW Antonov expects the first An-74 twinjet featuring a re-configured, conventional engine installation to be flown before the end of this year. The first example of the new model, dubbed the An-74-300, is in final assembly at the Kharkov Aircraft Production Factory in Ukraine. The aircraft retains the fuselage ...
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Airports
Beijing Capital International Airport is to complete resurfacing work on its west runway in July, and also plans to build a cross-field taxiway and renovate Terminal 1. The airport can handled up to 35 million passengers, annually. Australian aviation and airports consultancy Airplan (Airport Planning) is contributing to an ...
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Italian carrier wraps up 747-400 order
Alitalia has finalised its long-awaited order for Boeing 747-400s with a deal for up to eight aircraft, to be delivered from early next year. The order is part of a L2,000 billion ($1.1 billion) fleet upgrade agreed by the board in mid-1999, covering new 747-400s to replace its ageing ...
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Cathay Pacific order plans take shape
More details about Cathay Pacific Airways' impeding widebody orders have emerged. The airline has a immediate need for more Asia-Pacific capacity, as well as longer term ultra-long haul requirement (Flight International, 14-20 March). According to Cathay corporate development director Antony Tyler, an order will be concluded by mid-May covering ...
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Aviation industry unites on frequency protection issue
Emma Kelly/LONDON The aviation industry has developed a unanimous position on the protection of its radio frequencies, says John White, director of the Infrastructure Support Group at the International Air Transport Association (IATA). The decision precedes May's International Telecommunication Union World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC). IATA and the International Civil ...
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Ilyushin draws up PS-90 re-engining programme for Il-76 freighter
A re-engining programme for the Ilyushin Il-76 freighter is being put together by the Ilyushin design bureau and TAPO Chkalov plant, based at Tashkent, Uzbekistan. The two organisations are negotiating a business plan with Russian and CIS freighter operators covering the re-engining of 40-60 Il-76s. The 50t (110,000lb)-payload freighter's ...
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Struggling LTU to replace Boeing fleet with Airbuses
Andrew Doyle/MUNICH LTU is to undergo a radical fleet restructuring which will see the loss-making German charter-carrier operating an all-Airbus fleet by the end of 2002. SAirGroup leasing company Flightlease has taken responsibility for fleet management at LTU and expects to finalise plans within the next two weeks ...
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Marketplace
Frontier Airlines has confirmed its deal for up to 36 Airbus narrowbodies, announced in October (Flight International, 27 October - 2 November). The Denver-based low-cost carrier has placed a firm order for five 114-seat, Pratt & Whitney PW6000-powered A318s and six 132-seat, CFM International CFM56-5-powered A319s. Options have been taken ...
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Nav Canada aims for North Atlantic ADS datalink trials
Paul Lewis/WASHINGTON DC Nav Canada hopes to begin full operational trials with automatic dependence surveillance (ADS) over the North Atlantic in early May, followed by controller-pilot datalink communications (CPDLC), with the upgrade of its Gander Automated Air Traffic Control System. "We are targeting being operational on 7 May. ...
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777-200ER takes polar route to Asia
American Airlines has flown a Boeing 777-200ER twinjet over the North Pole from North America to Asia for the first time, demonstrating wider applications for the new route and strengthening its bid for services to China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. The American flight from Chicago to Hong Kong was ...
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Bristol satellite will be first since 1971
Canada's Bristol Aerospace has won a contract from the national space agency to build the country's first science satellite since 1971. Called SCISAT 1, the craft will be launched in 2002 to study ozone depletion in the upper atmosphere, with particular emphasis on the atmosphere over Canada and the ...
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Slow service take-up hits Globalstar/Iridium
Loral Space and Communications is considering selling all or part of its 45% stake in the Globalstar worldwide mobile-communications satellite system following slower than expected sales of the telephone service. Meanwhile, Iridium prime investor Motorola has notified customers of its worldwide satellite mobile-telephone and paging services that it will ...
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NASA reacts to study criticisms
Tim Furniss/LONDON NASA has promised swift action following criticism in three separate reports of the space agency's Space Shuttle and "faster, better, cheaper" spacecraft programmes. The Space Shuttle Assessment Team has criticised NASA for cutting staff at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC), saying that it has eroded safety - ...
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Test aborted
The tenth of 14 test firings of a Boeing Rocketdyne XRS-2200 linear aerospike engine to be used on the Lockheed Martin X-33 advanced technology demonstrator was aborted 75s into a 220s test at the Stennis Space Center, Mississippi, on 9 March. The shut-down was caused by a change in the ...
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Proton success is boost for Russians
Russia scored a morale-boosting second consecutive launch on 12 March from the Baikonur Cosmodrome of the four-stage Proton booster, with its DM upper stage, after suffering two failures last year. The launch carried an Express A communications satellite, which was injected into a parking orbit of 226 x 195km ...
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Sea Launch fails with first ICO
Tim Furniss/LONDON The third firing of the international Sea Launch booster failed on 13 March, with the loss of the first ICO Global Communications satellite. The lift-off, from the Odyssey platform in the mid-Pacific, 2,240km (1,390 miles) south-east of Hawaii, was the second commercial launch by the Boeing-led ...
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Magnetosphere deal for UK company
The UK's Surrey Satellite Technology (SSTL) has won a $120,000, 100-day, Magnetosphere Multiscale Mission (MMS) study contract to investigate the range of suitable concepts for a five-spacecraft mission to study the Earth's magnetosphere. Planned for launch in 2005, the five-spacecraft MMS fleet will involve formation flying and two lunar ...