You are at netAirspace : Forum : Air and Space Forums : netAirspace Daily News

News

Commercial

GE to outfit 777X engines with new composite fan blades
General Electric has redesigned the engines that will power the Boeing 777X to have thinner and stronger blades than any GE engine in service, and to power the aircraft more efficiently with fewer of them. GE has designed advanced carbon-fiber composite fan blades for its GE9x engine. The 777X, scheduled to begin production in 2017, will sport two of them. The type as of July had secured 300 orders and commitments from six customers. Since powering the 777X in 2013, nearly 700 GE9X engines have been ordered, GE says. The engine component redesign comprises carbon fibre and improved epoxy resin fan blades, the company announces. The blades’ leading-edge material also will be made from a steel alloy rather than titanium to increase strength.
Link

How will volcanic ash be handled this time?
When atmospheric volcanic ash from an eruption in Iceland drifted over Europe in April 2010, Europe’s aviation system was caught like a rabbit in the headlamps. Extensive ash in European airspace was a first in modern aviation history. But when volcanic ash drifts into the continent’s airspace again, the European Aviation Safety Agency has no intention of being unprepared. The agency has issued a special information bulletin to all operators reminding them of the systems and procedures devised since the 2010 ash event, with the intention of avoiding the paralysis that afflicted almost all flying in European airspace for an entire week. Today, atmospheric ash clouds can be better tracked and identified, and the risks to aircraft associated with ash of varying concentrations are better understood by both authorities and airlines.
Link

Icelandic Volcano Struck By Biggest Earthquake Yet
A magnitude 5.7 earthquake hit Iceland's Bárðarbunga volcano overnight, the biggest since tremors began 10 days ago, but there is still no sign of an eruption, the country's Meteorological Office said. Intense seismic activity at Iceland's largest volcano system has raised worries that an eruption could cause another ash cloud like that from the Eyjafjallajökull volcano in 2010 that caused the closure of much of Europe's airspace for six days. "There was one event during the night... a magnitude 5.7, the largest in this series," Palni Erlendsson, a geologist at the Met Office said. "Activity is still deep and we see no signs of anything close to the surface."
Link

ICAO To Trial Risk-Warning Plan For Airlines
The ICAO will launch two pilot projects designed to help airlines and states better share information about risks in conflict zones. The plans were announced at the conclusion of a two-day meeting by the UN's International Civil Aviation Organization's special task force on flights in conflict zones, which has been given the complex task of addressing risks to airliners in conflict zones. The first pilot project will look at how the existing Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) system can be used to better share urgent and critical risk information, the Montreal-based agency said.
Link

Airlines

Air China's H1 Net Profit Slides 58 Percent
Air China's first-half net profit fell 58 percent, weighed down by a depreciating yuan that increased financial costs. Air China said net income fell to CNY474.4 million yuan (USD$77 million), compared with the CNY1.12 billion it booked for the same period a year ago. The Beijing-based carrier said foreign exchange net losses for the first six months of the year amounted to CNY721 million yuan (USD$117.19 million), compared with foreign exchange net earnings of CNY1.12 billion for the same period last year.
Link

American sees single operating certificate in Q2 2015
American Airlines chief operating officer Robert Isom anticipates receiving approval for a single operating certificate in the second quarter of 2015, as the carrier’s integration with US Airways continues to move forward. The target is the first time that an executive from the Fort Worth, Texas-based carrier has provided any guidance more specific than 2015 for the actual operational integration of the two carriers. “I can actually see pieces of the plan all the way up to the ninth revision cycle that are already at work,” says Isom on the sidelines of the Boyd Group International Aviation Summit in Las Vegas on 26 August. “It just gives me great confidence that we’re going to hit the targets that we want to.” The “ninth revision cycle” is the final step in the phased approach that American devised to achieve a single operating certificate from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), he explains. The carrier is “firmly” in the fourth cycle, with aspects of the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth cycles underway, says Isom.
Link

American to offer refrigerated storage at Philly airport
American Airlines is investing up to $5 million in a cold-freight warehouse at the Philadelphia International Airport. The warehouse can offer storage for pharmaceuticals and other cargo that needs to be refrigerated. "Pharmaceuticals are the high-value bread-and-butter part of your cargo business," said Rhett Workman, managing director of government and airport affairs. "The new facility will allow us to handle a variety of goods at varying temperatures."
Link

Southwest could keep adding flights from Love Field
Southwest Airlines plans to eventually add 33 flights to Dallas Love Field after the Wright Amendment expires in October. However, a spokesman for the carrier said Southwest could possibly add even more flights. "We traditionally pride ourselves on having a very high-tempo operation and getting a lot of turns per gate," said Andrew Watterson, vice president of network planning and performance at Southwest.
Link

Airports

Houston requests DOT renegotiate air treaty with Mexico
The City of Houston has filed a request with the Department of Transportation to renegotiate an air treaty with Mexico. The current treaty, created in 1960 and last amended in 2005, limits the number of U.S. carriers from Houston that can serve Mexico.
Link

PreCheck popular with Reno travelers
The Transportation Security Administration says 2,792 travelers have enrolled in its PreCheck program at its Reno, Nev., office. Travelers undergo a background check, have their fingerprints taken and pay an $85 fee to join the program, which gives them access to expedited security screening at airports nationwide.
Link

Tenn. airport boardings rise 15% so far in 2014
Chattanooga Airport has the second cheapest average air fares among the state's major airports, according to a website that tracks ticket prices, with higher passenger boardings helping drive down the cost. Lovell Field's fares in June averaged $372, or No. 43 among 101 airports nationally, said Cheapflights.com. Only Memphis International Airport had a less expensive average fare -- $342, or No. 27, in the state, according to the website.
Link

Military

​Australian P-8A acquisition takes a step forward
The US Navy has executed an advanced acquisition contract related to Australia’s plan to buy 12 Boeing P-8A maritime patrol aircraft. The contract follows Canberra’s approval in February of the A$4 billion ($3.6 billion) acquisition, which involves eight firm orders and four options. “Together with high altitude unmanned aerial vehicles, these aircraft will replace the Royal Australian Air Force [Lockheed Martin] AP-3C Orions that have served Australia so well for over four decades,” said defense minister David Johnston.
Link

Improved US anti-radar missile hits its mark during test
The US Air Force and missile manufacturer Raytheon Co. successfully tested an upgraded anti-radar missile designed to more accurately take out enemy air defense early-warning systems. An air force Lockheed Martin F-16 on 22 August fired an AGM-88 high-speed anti-radiation missile (HARM), which scored a direct hit on a specific radar emitter outside a zone of exclusion that included another decoy emitter, Raytheon announces. The AGM-88 is used to find and destroy surface-to-air missile radars, early warning radars, and radar-directed air defense artillery systems to allow safe battlefield overflight of conflict zones by US and allied aircraft. The missiles identify and home in on the electronic transmissions emitted by radar installations. More than 4,000 HARMs have been fired in combat by the eight nations that include them in their munitions inventories.
Link

Wellington’s first T-6Cs arrive in New Zealand
Beechcraft Defence Systems has flown two T-6C Texan II aircraft from Wichita, Kansas to New Zealand, ahead of their entry into service with the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF). The pair arrived at RNZAF Ohakea on 22 August. The aircraft's arrival follows Wellington’s order of 11 T-6C Texan IIs for NZ$154 million ($129 million) in January. The aircraft will be formerly handed over on 31 October after RNZAF personnel undergo maintenance and pilot training in the USA.
Link

Space

Galileo 'on track' despite launch trouble
Europe’s bid to establish its own satellite navigation system suffered a setback with the failure of a Soyuz launcher to put the fifth and sixth spacecraft in what is to be a 30-satellite constellation into their assigned orbits. However, both the European Space Agency and European Commission are confident the program remains on track to provide essentially full services with 24 satellites from 2017, and to have the complete, 30-satellite constellation – including six orbiting spares – flying by 2020. Initial indications showed the 22 August launch from Kourou, French Guiana as a success – but following separation of the satellites from the rocket’s Fregat upper stage, telemetry showed them to be in the wrong orbit.
Link

Corporate

Cessna's CitationAir to cease operations
CitationAir - Cessna’s business jet charter and management arm - plans to cease flight operations 31 October around two years after it stopped selling fractional shares in new aircraft and jet cards. “After diligently evaluating options for the future of CitationAir, we have made the decision to wind down our operations and exit the business,” says CitationAir parent company Textron Aviation. The reasons behind its decision to shut down have not been disclosed by Textron, but low demand in the US for light and midsize cabin business jets - which are the backbone of the CitationAir offering - are believed to have played a role in its demise.
Link

Aviation Quote

"I'm sure we would not have had men on the Moon if it had not been for Wells and Verne and the people who write about this and made people think about it. I'm rather proud of the fact that I know several astronauts who became astronauts through reading my books."

— Arthur C Clarke, The View from Serendip

On This Date

--- In 1783... Jacques Alexandre César Charles flies the first balloon filled with gas rather than fire-heated air using hydrogen produced by pouring 489 lbs. of sulfuric acid on 1,000 lbs. of iron. The balloon has a diameter of 12 ft.

---In 1910... Radio is first used to send messages between the ground and an airplane when James McCurdy both sends and receives messages from a Curtiss biplane at Sheepshead, New York, using an H.M. Horton wireless set.

--- In 1913... Lieutenant Petr Nesterov of the Russian Army in Kiev performs the first loop-the-loop. The complete circle and other intentional acrobatic stunts prove to be valuable experience for the wartime maneuvers needed during aerial battles.

---In 1939... The first fully jet-propelled aircraft to fly is Germany’s Heinkel 178. A centrifugal flow turbojet engine powers it.

---In 1958…Beale Air Force Base is fully operational under the Strategic Air Command with newly built 12,000 foot runways. (Q)

---In 1990… Blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan is killed in the crash of a Bell 206B Jet Ranger helicopter near East Troy, Wisconsin.

---In 1990…First flight of the Northrop YF-23.

---In 2006…Comair/Delta Connection Flight 5191, a Bombardier CRJ-200, runs off the end of a runway and crashes at Lexington-Blue Grass Airport (LEX) while attempting an early morning departure, killing all but one of the 50 people on board, the lone survivor being the First Officer, James Polehinke. The crash is soon blamed on the crew mistakenly turning onto runway 26 rather than the assigned runway 22, with the plane having been unable to get airborne within the confines of the short 3500ft runway. The crash breaks a then unprecedented safety streak among commercial airlines in the United States, the last major accident having been the American Airlines Flight 587 crash in New York nearly five years earlier.

---In 2006…Boeing 737-900ER/9GP, is shown, with the first operator being Lion Air.

Daily Video

Editor’s Choice

Humor

Seat Mate Conversation

A stranger was seated next to a little girl on the airplane when the stranger turned to her and said, 'Let's talk. I've heard that flights go quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger.'

The little girl, who had just opened her book, closed it slowly and said to the stranger, 'What would you like to talk about?' 'Oh, I don't know,' said the stranger. 'How about nuclear power?' and he smiles.

'OK, ' she said. 'That could be an interesting topic. But let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow, and a deer all eat the same stuff - grass -. Yet a deer excretes little pellets, while a cow turns out a flat patty, and a horse produces clumps of dried grass. Why do you suppose that is?'

The stranger, visibly surprised by the little girl's intelligence, thinks about it and says, 'Hmmm, I have no idea.' To which the little girl replies, 'Do you really feel qualified to discuss nuclear power when you don't know shit?

Trivia

General Trivia

1. To be type-certificated under Part 23 of the Federal Aviation Regulations, a lightplane must be demonstrated capable of landing with a crosswind component of no less than _____ Vso.
a. 0.20
b. 0.25
c. 0.30
d. No minimum cross- wind component is required to be demonstrated.

2. The following is a list of the four most common violations of the Federal Aviation Regulations committed by VFR pilots. Arrange them in order of their occurrence, the most common deviation first and the least common last.
a. airspace violations
b. airspeed violations
c. flying VFR into IFR conditions
d. low-level flight

3. Henry Ford took his first airplane ride in
a. a Fokker Trimotor.
b. a Ford Tri-Motor.
c. the Spirit of St. Louis.
d. Henry Ford never flew in an airplane.

4. True or false; the Cessna Aircraft Company never produced a piston-powered, single-engine, low-wing monoplane subsequent to the end of World War II.

5. True or false; the British navy had an aircraft carrier that used a sail to help keep the ship headed into the wind.

6. True or false; a person can climb a ladder inside the vertical stabilizer of a Lockheed C–5 Galaxy and step outside the aircraft at the top of the fin.