All news – Page 6656
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Sky Station integration contract awarded
Lockheed Martin Global Telecommunications has signed a contract to provide system integration for Sky Station International's stratospheric telecommunications-relay airships. Sky Station's concept is to place unmanned airships in geostationary positions 70,000ft (21,350m) above major cities, to provide high-speed Internet services. The solar-powered airships, up to 160m long, would remain aloft ...
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Bombardier offers to stretch Canadair jet to 90 seats
Graham Warwick/WASHINGTON DC Bombardier is offering airlines a stretched 90-seat derivative of the Canadair Regional Jet (CRJ). A decision on whether to launch the new model, dubbed CRJ-900, is planned for year-end. Deliveries of the aircraft, which would be derived from the 70-seat CRJ-700, could begin in 2002, ...
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Europe seeks views on Galileo navigation system
Emma Kelly/AMSTERDAM The European Commission (EC) has set up transportation groups to start gathering views from potential users of the Galileo satellite navigation system. Although forums have been established for the maritime, road and rail industries, no such group has been set up for aeronautical users. "We don't want ...
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Workshop
Aeronavali has subcontracted Boeing Airplane Services to convert a McDonnell Douglas DC-10-30 from passenger to freighter configuration for Brussels-based Skyjet Airways. Boeing was contracted by Aeronavali as Skyjet required the aircraft sooner than the Italian company could undertake the work. The aircraft is due to arrive in early November at ...
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Thais omit Airbus from probe
Andrzej Jeziorski/SINGAPORE Airbus Industrie has been excluded from the "nearly complete" investigation into the December 1998 crash of a Thai Airways International Airbus A310, amid Thai press reports that a mechanical failure was the main cause of the accident. Airbus says that if there were a mechanical failure, the ...
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British Airways receives its first of up to 188 A320 models
British Airways is this month introducing its first Airbus A319 - one of 59 International Aero Engines V2500-powered A320 family aircraft on firm order. The 126-seater will be used initially operate from BA's Birmingham base on services to Glasgow, Hanover and Frankfurt, Düsseldorf and Paris Charles de Gaulle. BA's Airbus ...
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NTSB warns airlines on media briefings
The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is to issue carriers with new rules for post-accident briefings to the media, after a strongly worded exchange with American Airlines over the handling of the recent Little Rock crash. Following a meeting with the Air Transportation Association (ATA), the NTSB will ...
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Marketplace
Air Foyle has confirmed that its outsized cargo joint venture with Antonov is being expanded, with the design bureau's operating division, renamed Antonov Airlines, taking two additional An-124s (Flight International, 22-28 September). These ex-Rossiya operated aircraft bring the An-124 fleet to eight aircraft, and a ninth, ex-Titan, aircraft is to ...
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LanChile eyes converted 767Fs
Paul Lewis/MIAMI LanChile is interested in Boeing 767 freighter conversions as replacements for its McDonnell Douglas DC-8s. The Chilean national carrier operates 13 767-300ER passenger aircraft, but will begin to replace these twinjets with seven new Airbus A340-300s, the first of which is to be delivered next September. ...
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Airlines cut millennium flights
David Learmount/LONDON Airlines are cutting flights 24h either side of midnight 31 December in response to lower than normal passenger bookings. Overall passenger demand is following a "seasonal pattern", according to scheduled and charter carriers, people are travelling earlier for a longer New Year holiday and want to be at ...
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Regulators meet Airbus on A3XX
Airworthiness authorities have met Airbus Industrie to discuss certification issues for the A3XX, as the consortium prepares to bring the airliner to market. The meeting, the third in a series of multidisciplinary gatherings designed to thrash out a timetable for type certification for the proposed 550-seater, was the first ...
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Russia lags behind in Y2K readiness
Russia has not yet reported its year 2000 (Y2K) readiness status to the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), industry sources have revealed. ICAO says that 156 of its 185 contracting states have filed Y2K status reports, but will not confirm that Russia has not reported. Among 28 other states ...
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Higher thrust 777 Trent tested
Guy Norris/LOS ANGELESBoeing is starting certification flight testing of the higher thrust Rolls-Royce Trent 895 turbofan on the 777-200ER, and is preparing to start tests of the General Electric GE90-94B by the middle of next year. Tests of the R-R engine, rated at 93,400lb (415kN) thrust, have focused on the ...
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Cash snags mar DoD satellite plans
Graham Warwick/WASHINGTON DC The ambitions of the US Department of Defense (DoD) to renew its communications satellite constellations could be scuppered by funding challenges facing all its programmes. The first issue facing the DoD is whether it can afford to replace the Milstar II satellite which was launched ...
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United Space accepts shuttle delay costs
The Boeing-Lockheed Martin joint venture United Space Alliance, which operates the Space Shuttle fleet for NASA, is to pay "several million dollars" in penalties for delays to the flight schedule caused by wiring defects in the orbiters (Flight International, 29 September-5 October). The cost of the repairs to the Endeavour ...
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Brazilian site
Brazil is to invest $26.3 million expanding its Alcantara launch site to enable it to fly medium and large boosters for international commercial customers using the equatorial location. Brazil has yet to launch its second VLS small satellite launcher from Alcantara after the first failed. The Chinese-Brazilian CBERS 1 Earth ...
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Worldwide launch flurry puts nine satellites into orbit
Tim Furniss/LONDON Six launches over seven days have resulted in the orbiting of nine satellites: four Globalstars, the Echostar V, Telstar 7, Ikonos 2, LM-1 and the Resurs F1M. The burst of activity started with a Starsem Soyuz launch from Baikonur on 22 September, which placed four Loral-built ...
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Orbimage and Ikonos moves warm up remote sensing fight
Competition in the commercial remote sensing satellite market will increase sharply because of the launch of the Ikonos satellite and moves by rival Orbimage to boost its market access. Orbimage and Radarsat International of Canada have signed an agreement which appoints Orbimage principal distributor of Radarsat 1 images in ...
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Space station may be turned over to commercial operator
NASA will consider turning the International Space Station (ISS) over to a commercial operator within five to 10 years to fund other exploration priorities, according to the space agency's administrator, Daniel Goldin. The proposal takes Nasa beyond its previously suggested plan to allow commercial companies to take up to a ...
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Cirrus looks at speeding up SR20's parachute
Guy Norris/LOS ANGELES Cirrus Design is studying expanding the speed at which the SR20 light aircraft's emergency parachute can be deployed, following its certification with the current production system. The Ballistic Recovery System (BRS) parachute is designed to be deployed from the SR20 in the event of an engine ...