All Ops & safety articles – Page 1349
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News
Kiwi International forced to suspend operations
KIWI International suspended flight operations on 15 October after failing to gain a cash infusion from investors. The US airline had filed for bankruptcy protection two weeks before, and cut services, blaming high debts and the fall-out on other low-cost start-ups from the ValuJet crash. Kiwi has struggled ...
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Lancer flare
Rockwell B-1B bombers are being cleared to fire newer-model countermeasure flares with no restrictions, but are still constrained to Mach 0.85, with no rolling or yawing, if using older flares. The flare firing envelope has been restricted since 1995, when aircraft began suffering tailstrike damage after dispensing countermeasures. The damage ...
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Frontier dips
Frontier Airlines is the latest of the US start-ups to warn of a likely dip in its fortunes in the September quarter. The Denver-based carrier says that it expects to post a loss over the three months, blaming sluggish traffic, rising fuel costs and rising lease rates. The loss would ...
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'Outrageous' ATC charges anger European regionals
Julian Moxon/HANOVER THE EUROPEAN Regional Airlines Association (ERA) is complaining bitterly about the "outrageous" air-traffic-control (ATC) charges being imposed on its members. At its annual general meeting in Hanover, Germany, earlier in October, ERA director-general Mike Ambrose said that landing and navigation charges account for ...
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US airlines voice concern despite records
Kevin O'Toole/LONDON LATEST RESULTS coming in from the major US airlines point towards another round of record profits in the third quarter, but beneath the headline figures there is growing concern in the industry over how much longer the boom will last. Continental led off the ...
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Manufacturers' forecasts chart bright future for cargo aircraft
BOEING AND McDonnell Douglas (MDC) are forecasting strong growth in the air-cargo market, with the world's freighter fleet expected to double over the next 20 years. MDC's predictions are slightly more optimistic than Boeing's, with an annual growth rate in air cargo of 7.9%, compared with Boeing's assessment ...
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Maersk begins overhaul of Estonian Air
Max Kingsley-Jones/BILLUND MAERSK AIR has set about ploughing its airline expertise into Estonian Air, following ratification of its agreement to take a 49% stake in the privatised Baltic carrier. In May, the Danish airline, in partnership with investment consortium Baltic Creco, was chosen by the ...
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NTSB urges 737 rudder changes
Ramon Lopez/WASHINGTON DC THE US NATIONAL Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is urging the US Federal Aviation Administration to require that Boeing make various changes to the design of 737 rudder-control and system components. Three of 14 NTSB recommendations would require Boeing 737 design changes, and ...
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No-gain pain
AIRCRAFT ACCIDENTS ARE effective, if often tragic, teachers, and the aviation community always learns greatly from them. Incidents - the accidents which didn't quite happen -- can be just as effective teachers, but the aviation community learns far less from them. The reason is fear of disclosure- a fear which ...
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Germany to lead free-flight trials in Europe
GERMANY'S civil-aviation authority, the DFS, is working with Lufthansa to carry out trials of free-flight technologies in Europe. "We're looking at how to implement free flight in Germany as soon as possible," says Dr Klaus Dieter Ehrhardt, responsible for CNS/ATM planning in the DFS. "We will look at ...
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USAir investigates new 'no-frills' division
DISCUSSIONS BETWEEN USAir and its pilots could lead the way towards the creation of a low-cost service designed to counter operations such as those of the newly created Delta Express, Southwest and ValuJet. Successful negotiations between management and members of the Air Line Pilots Association over the start-up ...
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At cross purposes
Sir - In the article "Highly rated" (Flight International, 11-17 September, P46) the acronym CCQ is written as cross-crew qualification. I have heard, however, the term crew cross-qualification. I believe that the latter is correct, since it depicts what it is, the cross qualification of crews between two or more ...
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NASA looks at ways to save PCA during crises
NASA is studying a potential application of its recently completed Propulsion Controlled Aircraft (PCA) system, which would allow a twin-engined aircraft to survive a catastrophic engine and flight-control failure. The PCA was developed following the 1989 crash of a McDonnell Douglas DC-10 with disabled flight controls. The crew ...
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Airlines are 'confused' over European free-flight issues
Julian Moxon/AMSTERDAM A MAJOR INITIATIVE to prove the cost benefits of flying in a "free-flight" air-traffic-management (ATM) environment must be mounted if the system is ever to become reality, say leading industry officials speaking at the Flight International Airline Navigation '96 conference in Amsterdam on 9 -11 October. ...
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Airbus Industrie creates freight airline for Belugas
AIRBUS INDUSTRIE has set up a subsidiary to operate its A300-600ST (Super Transporter) "Beluga" outsized transports on commercial cargo charters. It is estimated that the new division, Airbus Transport International (ATI), could earn the consortium up to $15 million-worth of revenue each year using spare capacity on the Beluga fleet. ...
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Helicopter medevac will be aided by GPS
STAT MEDEVAC, a Manassas, Virginia-based helicopter emergency medical service (EMS) operating in western Pennsylvania, has signed a deal with Satellite Technology Implementation to set up a network of 13 global-positioning-system (GPS) approaches at remote hospitals. Installation of the US Federal Aviation Administration approved GPS approaches will allow helicopter ...
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747 conversions
Boeing has received a contract from All Nippon Airways of Japan for the conversion of one 747-200 to full-freighter configuration - the second of the airline's 747s to be modified. The aircraft will be delivered to Wichita in April 1997 for the conversion work, and is scheduled to be handed ...
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LF507 reliability levels 'not acceptable' says Crossair
Julian Moxon/HANOVER LOWER-THAN-expected despatch reliability of the AlliedSignal Engines LF507 turbofan powering Aero International Regional (AI(R)) RJ100 Avroliners has forced the engine manufacturer to spend $30 million on developing solutions. Crossair president Moritz Suter criticised the engine's 99.3% dispatch reliability during the recent European Regional Airlines ...
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IPTN plans N270 talks in December
SENIOR OFFICIALS from Industri Pesawat Terbang Nusantara (IPTN) and its US subsidiary, American Regional Aircraft Industry (AMRAI), plan to meet in mid-December to re-evaluate development of the proposed stretched N270 turboprop. The Indonesian meeting is expected to conduct a complete review of the yet-to-be launched, programme in ...