Systems & interiors – Page 817
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Delta ties knot at last
Karen Walker To the relief of its new chief executive officer, Delta Air Lines has joined the US matchmaking game. But the planned strategic alliance with United Airlines has union and governmental hurdles ahead. The two airlines confirmed their alliance plans on 30 April. The pair say they will ...
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Who's ready for a cosy threesome?
And then there were three. If things work out as planned - and that's a big 'if' - over 80 per cent of the US airline industry will be in the hands of three alliance groups. Globally, the situation is less clear-cut, but the industry is moving in the same ...
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How does your airline grow?
Tom Barkin and Todd Morgan With most airlines failing to deliver satisfactory shareholder returns over the full business cycle, it is essential to look beyond the core business for profitable growth. But seeking out and exploiting the best opportunities is not easy. Airlines need to combine their unique capabilities or ...
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Ryanair passes go in Europe
Tom Gill With soaring profits, share price and traffic, Europe's largest and longest established low-cost airline may yet achieve its ambition to be the Southwest of Europe. But as it strives to continue its profitable growth path Ryanair can expect to cross swords with the new British Airways ...
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Bizarre Thai love triangle
David Mann Singapore Airlines, Lufthansa and Qantas are among the latest suitors to be linked with buying a stake in Thai Airways International, as doubts linger over the airline's future membership of the Star Alliance. SIA, due to join Star in the near future, has confirmed its interest in ...
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Time to climb?
Karen Walker From the bottom of the pile, life offers a different perspective. While most US airlines have returned to profitability in the 1990s, the financial haemorrhage at Trans World Airlines has continued. So management was encouraged to note, after announcing 1998's first quarter results, that the words 'beleaguered' ...
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Uganda eyes foreign cash
Tom Gill Uganda Airlines is set to go private, with the sale of a controlling stake slated for mid-year. Six airlines have expressed interest in a yet to be determined majority stake in wholly government-owned Uganda Airlines, according to Michael Opagi, director of the Ugandan government's privatisation unit. The ...
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SR Technics reveals global ambitions
SR Technics, the maintenance subsidiary of Swissair parent SAir Group, is trying to secure joint venture partners in the USA and Asia-Pacific to enable it to offer comprehensive global support to its airline customers. Konrad Wittorf, vice-president of aircraft maintenance and overhaul, says that the company has retained Ernst ...
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US Airways may forge fresh alliance with British Airways
Ramon Lopez/WASHINGTON DC US Airways could forge a new marketing alliance with British Airways as a result of the projected tie-ups by both carriers with American Airlines. The deal would go ahead only under certain conditions, says Stephen Wolf, head of US Airways Group. The prospect of a ...
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Family planning
The early successes of regional jet upstart Fairchild Dornier are undoubtedly spurring a surge in excitement among the more established regional players. But perhaps before everyone rushes headlong into launching a raft of new aircraft in response to the market upswing, considerable thought needs to be given to the factors ...
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Airbus plans laminar flow tests in bid to bring down fuel costs
Max Kingsley-Jones/TOULOUSE Airbus Industrie will launch a laminar flow technology flight test later this year as part of its probe into the potential cost and emission reductions resulting from a lessening in aircraft skin drag. The consortium is modifying the tailfin of the prototype A320-100 for tests due to begin ...
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Sfim uses GPS to calibrate aircraft approach paths
Julian Moxon/PARIS French avionics specialist Sfim has developed a new low cost system to replace the optical equipment used for tracking aircraft flying runway approaches when calibrating runway landing equipment. Its Traki trajectography kit uses the satellite global positioning system (GPS) instead of a ground- based theodolite to ...
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German guard will take its first EC135
Germany's border guard is to receive the first of 13 Eurocopter EC155 twin-engine medium helicopters this year. Eurocopter co-president Siegfried Sobotta says the group is putting a "tremendous effort" into getting the first of the EC155s to the border guard this year. The EC155 is a further development of ...
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Developing nations ask ICAO to help with CNS/ATM funding
Emma Kelly/RIO DE JANEIRO Developing nations have urged the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) to establish an international aviation monetary fund to help them finance implementation of communications, navigation and surveillance/ air traffic management (CNS/ATM) system programmes. Bolivia, Pakistan and the 53 African ICAO member nations were among ...
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Global Hawk flies second mission
THE Global Hawk reconnaissance unmanned air vehicle has flown for a second time at Edwards AFB, California, performing what the company describes as a "text book" mission lasting 2h 24min. The aircraft reached 41,000ft (12,500m) during the sortie, which also included the successful hand-off of command and control via ...
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Fast and furious
Dave Higdon/KANSAS CITY Breaking out into the sunshine and levelling off the new Mooney Bravo high-performance piston single just above the cloud at 6,000ft (1,830m) brought home graphically the speed we were making. Billowing cloud tops blurred past the windows at more than 200kt (110km/h) as we raced south ...
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Vantage takes voice control
VisionAire has revealed new details of its teaming arrangement with Iowa State University to develop a voice control system for its Vantage single-engined composite business jet. The work is aimed at developing a voice recognition and synthesis system for cockpit control of secondary switching functions such as navigation and ...
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Embraer studies market for larger regional jet
Graham Warwick/SAO PAULO Embraer will decide within a year whether to develop a larger member of its regional jet family. Speaking at the roll-out of the 37-seat ERJ-135 on 12 May, president Mauricio Botelho said: "We think there is a market, but we are not sure if it is ...
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Free flight study finds pilots' workload is not increased
Ian Sheppard/LONDON A Dutch national aerospace laboratory (NLR) study has concluded that workload does not increase when a pilot is given responsibility for separation assurance in a "free flight" air traffic control environment. Ronald van Gent, NLRproject leader, says that the conclusion surprised the research team. "We anticipated a ...
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Controlling the future
David Learmount/LONDON There was a deafening silence from UK National Air Traffic Services (NATS) between 5 April and 13 May. At the beginning of the period, NATS had somewhat nervously announced that it had run the first full "operational" test of the much delayed new en route air traffic ...