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FLIGHTINTERNATIONAL

TRAINING HOW TO FIND AND EQUIP THE PILOTS OF TOMORROW REPORT P32

SUKHOI WARNINGSuperjet manufacturer orders suppliers to boost output and cut the costs of components 12

GOING ORBITAL Why Xcor Aerospace boss thinks that space tourism can become a trillion-dollar business 22

SPECIAL MISSIONS

ADAPTABLEAVANTIPiaggio pushes P180 into new roles

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£3.20

26 JUNE-2 JULY 2012

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FIN_260612_302 302 21/6/12 09:33:19

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FLIGHTINTERNATIONAL

VOLUME 181 NUMBER 5347 26 JUNE-2 JULY 2012

Superjet In

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ational/

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Russian airframer aims to raise production rate and offer better after-sales support P12. Airframer forecasts deliveries of 24,000 business jets by 2013 P18

COVER IMAGEItaly’s air traffic provider ENAV deploys the Piaggio P180 Avanti II for airborne inspections of ground-based navigation aids. Our cover story explores the airframer’s embrace of the special-missions market. See Cover Story P24

PIC OF THE WEEK YOUR PHOTOGRAPH HEREAirSpace user apgphoto posted this shot of an Air Berlin Airbus A320 departing Barcelona. Airbus figures reveal that at 31 May, 41 A320-family aircraft were operated by the German low-cost carrier. Open a gallery in flightglobal.com’s AirSpace community for a chance to feature here

flightglobal.com/imageoftheweekapgp

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EN

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NEXT WEEK FARNBOROUGH SPECIAL We build up to the biggest event in the aerospace calendar with programme updates plus analysis of the talking points sure to preoccupy show-goers

Rex

Featu

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26 June-2 July 2012 | Flight International | 3

NEWS THIS WEEK 6 ANA hard landing buckles 767 skin

7 Tight squeeze in prospect for CSeries

8 UK government splashes cash on apprentice pilots. WheelTug hails integrated motor tests

9 Beriev closes in on landmark UK sale. Iridium targets global ATC capability by 2017

AIR TRANSPORT 10 Speedbrakes missed before 737 slip.

Munich referendum rejects proposed third runway

11 Tianjin in line for A380neo assembly. Transaero seals orders for A380s and Superjets

12 Sukhoi pressures Superjet suppliers. ATR’s smaller -600 secures European certification

13 Testing starts on evolved geared fan

DEFENCE 14 USMC to stand up its first operational

F-35B squadron. Trio place formal bids for Seoul’s F-X III contest

15 Taranis advances to stealth testing as first flight slips.

Bell delivers first OH-58 wartime replacement

17 Ex-TNT BAe 146s enter conversion for Royal Air Force. Norway orders F-35As after securing support for Kongsberg missile

BUSINESS AVIATION 18 Sustained growth to return in 2013, says

Bombardier. AIr Works builds Empire with buy

19 Canny NetJets plays the field

GENERAL AVIATION 20 Piaggio to stretch P180’s range for special

missions

TECHNOLOGY 21 Engineering is headed for a mash-up

BUSINESS 22 Big bucks and bold going

REGULARS5 Comment 41 Straight & Level43 Classified 47 Jobs 51 Working Week 49 JOB OF THE WEEK Deputy Head of

Training, Tiger Airways, Singapore

COVER STORY24 SPECIAL MISSIONS Piaggio’s

strategic restyling P180 VIP turboprop aimed at special-missions market

28 Pilotless potential Unmanned K-MAX heralds a future of UAV flexibility

30 Dynamic delivery Dynamic Aviation rebalances its modifications business

FEATURES32 TRAINING Growing pains Airlines may

struggle to recruit and train enough pilots

36 Reality check Providers gear up to meet booming demand for authentic simulation

I AM GLOBAL Access the free Interactive Business Aircraft Guide

FIN_260612_003-004 3 21/6/12 19:28:25

flightglobal.com

CONTENTS

Flightglobal reaches up to 1.3 million visitors from 220 countries viewing 7.1 million pages each month

THE WEEK ON THE WEBflightglobal.comOn FlightBlogger, Stephen Trimble posted a video interview

with the head of Bombardier’s commercial aircraft division,

Mike Arcamone. On Ariel View, Israeli blogger Arie Egozi pondered his nation’s

spending on electronic

intelligence (ELINT): “Israel has an array of spy satellites,

squadrons of ELINT aircraft,

and other sensors in a variety

of ranges. All these failed.

Can a country rely on sensors, even if they are the most sophisticated ones?

Talking to the experts, an answer is beginning to formulate...

a big no.” On The DEW Line, Dave Majumdar pondered the

“mystery drone” revealed by a satellite image of Lockheed

Martin’s facility at Plant 42 in Palmdale California (above):

“It looks a lot like a RQ-170, but bigger. In fact, the shape –

from what we can make out – looks a lot like the P.420. But

who knows? It’s not like they’re going to tell us what it is...”

For a full list of reader services, editorial and advertising contacts see PXX

EDITORIAL +44 20 8652 3842 [email protected] DISPLAY ADVERTISING +44 20 8652 3315 [email protected] CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING +44 20 8652 4897 [email protected] RECRUITMENT ADVERTISING +44 20 8652 4900 [email protected] WEBMASTER [email protected] +44 1444 445 454 [email protected] REPRINTS +44 20 8652 [email protected] FLIGHT DAILY NEWS +44 20 8652 [email protected] ACAS +44 1788 540 898 [email protected]

HIGH FLIERSThe top five stories for the week just gone:1 Speedbrakes not armed before Southwest 737 excursion

2 Distracted crew let Q400 descend towards terrain

3 Analysis: Farnborough a crucial time in re-engined narrowbody fight

4 Comair future uncertain as Delta shuffles regional lift

5 Norway orders F-35As after securing JSM integration support

BEHIND THE HEADLINES Editor Murdo Morrison flew in

style from London Biggin Hill to

Rome Ciampino airport courtesy

of Piaggio P180 Avanti charter

operator K-Air for an experience

on board a very differently-config-

ured P180. The 1h sortie took

him over the Umbrian city of

Perugia (P24). Asia managing edi-

tor Siva Govindasamy reported

back from a visit to Airbus’s

Chinese final assembly line in

Tianjin (P11). And defence editor

Craig Hoyle was our unmanned

man as he travelled to BAE Systems’ Warton site in northern

England, where he was briefed on

the Taranis programme (P15).

Vote at flightglobal.com/poll

Find all these items at flightglobal.com/wotw

QUESTION OF THE WEEK

15%

Routine maintenance fix

Destroys superjumbo sales prospects

Another headache for Airbus and operators

49% 36%

Total votes: 3,605

This week, we ask: What has been the most important passenger jet of the past 60 years? Comet 707 737 747 777

787 Concorde A320 A300 A380

Last week, we asked: What are your thoughts on A380 wing problems? You said:

IN THIS ISSUECompanies listedAer Lingus ......................................................6Aeroflot ........................................................12Airbus ................................................6, 11, 13Airbus Military ..............................................14Air Charter International ...............................18Air Tahiti .......................................................12Air Works ......................................................18Alitalia .........................................................22All Nippon Airways .........................................6ATR ..........................................................9, 12Aviapartner ..................................................23AVIC .............................................................11BAE Systems .........................................15, 17Bell Helicopter ......................................15, 20Beriev ............................................................9Blue Islands ...................................................9Boeing .............................................10, 14, 23Bombardier .................................7, 13, 18, 19CAE .......................................................18, 23Cassidian ....................................................14Cessna ........................................................19CFM International ..........................................8Dassault ..........................................15, 18, 19Diamond Aircraft ..........................................20El Al ...............................................................8Elbit Systems .................................................6Embraer .................................................18, 19Empire Aviation Group .................................18Eurocopter .......................................14, 18, 20Eurofighter ...................................................14Flybe .............................................................8Gama Aviation .............................................20Germania ......................................................8Guanchen Aviation .......................................20Gulfstream .............................................18, 19Hawker Beechcraft .................................17, 19Héli-Union ...................................................18Inmarsat ......................................................23International Emergency Services ..................9Iridium Communications ................................9Irkut .............................................................13Israel Aerospace Industries ............................6Jet Aviation Dubai ........................................18JetBlue Airways ..............................................6Liebherr Aerospace ......................................23Lockheed Martin ..............................14, 17, 23Lufthansa ....................................................10Minden Air ...................................................20Mitsubishi ....................................................13NetJets ..................................................18, 19Neptune Aviation Services ...........................20NH Industries ...............................................14NordStar ......................................................12Northrop Grumman ................................15, 17Northstar Aerospace ....................................23Piaggio Aero .................................................20Pratt & Whitney ......................................13, 20Precision Air .................................................12Qatar Airways ...............................................11Raytheon .....................................................15Rolls-Royce ....................................................8Ryanair ..........................................................6Saab ...........................................................20Scaled Composites ......................................22Selex Galileo ................................................20Sigma Space ...............................................23Southwest Airlines........................................10Sukhoi ...................................................12, 14TNT Airways ..................................................17Umeco .........................................................23Virgin Galactic .............................................22WheelTug .......................................................8Worldwide Flight Services .............................23Xcor Aerospace ............................................22Xian Aircraft .................................................11

4 | Flight International | 26 June-2 July 2012

Download the Military Simulator Census online nowwww.flightglobal.com/milisim

High-fidelity helicopter simulators and training systems.

FIN_260612_003-004.indd 4 21/6/12 19:09:32

COMMENT

flightglobal.com

David Learmount blogs on issues in pilot recruitment and training at flightglobal.com/learmount

See Report P32R

ex

Featu

res

More hands on deck required

The reckoning loomsFor more than a decade the airline industry has been able to put off planning for an adequate and reliable supply of expert personnel. It cannot delay any longer

In the last 15 years there have been many false alarms about impending pilot and engineer shortages, but

evidence now suggests the day of reckoning is at hand. And this time there will be no remission.

To understand current predictions, it is worth re-viewing how the airlines have been “saved by the bell” four times from their own failure to invest in training.

The first remission arrived in 2001 with the 9/11 ter-rorist attacks. Air travel slumped and large numbers of pilots were furloughed. In 2003 the threat of a glo-bal SARS pandemic depressed air travel, and an oil price crisis caused an economic slowdown. Then, in 2005, raising the pilot retirement age pushed the sup-ply problem back a further five years.

Despite all this, by 2007 the world economy was booming and airlines expanding. But the US regional carriers were losing their pilots to the majors in unsus-tainable numbers, so they looted flight training organi-sations for their instructors, causing a crisis in the train-

ing industry. Then the final bell came in 2008 with the banking crisis, and the airlines once again were saved from their lack of provision for the future.

But now the world’s economy appears to have bot-tomed out, the airline industry has shed much of its fat, air travel demand is rising in most of the world, orders for new airliners have created record manufacturer backlogs and economies in the Asia-Pacific region and the BRIC countries are expanding rapidly. Barring an-

Scary figures are being rolledout once more: 450,000 newpilots needed in 20 years

See Business P22

With any luck, the era of airline-style space tourism will have begun by early 2014. Virgin Galactic

and rival Xcor both reckon such a timetable is realistic.Either would like to claim “first flight” bragging

rights, but fortunately neither gives any hint that they see themselves in a modern space race. The original space race claimed too many lives owing to haste – as if the inherent danger of rocket flight were not enough.

So it is interesting to hear both organisations argue that too much regulation would stifle space tourism. In-deed, it is hard to imagine how any civil aviation-style certification regime could be compatible with rapid, en-trepreneurial development of truly novel machines.

As the rules stand, space tourism can happen be-

cause, legally, customers are willing participants and are not, like airline passengers, entitled to the protec-tion of a government-regulated safety regime. But when an accident eventually happens, the lawyers will shred any waivers signed on the ground.

At that point, operators will hope a UK-style no-fault compensation system prevails, rather than US-style class-action lawsuits and jury-determined damages.

In the meantime, aspiring operators would do well to remember that one sound aspect of airline-style op-erations is to have a plan worked out in advance for managing the operational, legal, financial and publicity aspects of a disaster.

Avoiding a leap into the unknown

other pandemic scare, the stage seems set for steady expansion, and all the scary figures are being rolled out once more: 450,000 new pilots needed in the next 20 years; Asia-Pacific alone needs 180,000 pilots and 250,000 engineering staff by 2030.

This would be fine if airlines just had to wake up and throw money at the problem. But what money? They may be expanding, but margins remain low. And the production of expert staff has a built-in two-year lag. There is no way training can be done more quickly, and the product, while – one hopes – of good quality, arrives on the line with low experience and a need for nurture.

Given the hurdles, it is essential that airlines urgent-ly attend to a number of tasks: attracting more well-ed-ucated young people into the industry; changing out-of-date training regulatory standards; training pilots differently for the modern piloting task by adopting evidence-based training; and promoting instructing as a career choice.


FIN_260612_005 5 21/6/12 18:31:20

THIS WEEK

flightglobal.com6 | Flight International | 26 June-2 July 2012

For a round-up of our latest online news, feature and multi-media content visit flightglobal.com/wotw

For more news and data on global aviation safety, go to flightglobal.com/safety

A Boeing 767-300 operated by Japan’s All Nippon Airways

was damaged after a hard landing at Tokyo’s Narita International airport on 20 June.

The aircraft – registration JA610A, a 2002-built airframe (MSN32979) with General Electric CF6 engines – was on a Beijing-Narita service when the incident happened at 13:28 local time.

Video footage of the incident, recorded on the airport’s security cameras, shows the aircraft flar-ing late, before touching down hard on its right-hand main land-ing gear. The aircraft then bounc-es onto its nose gear prior to mak-ing a second, hard contact with the runway before the pilot brings the aircraft under control.

Japanese TV footage indicates a large buckle in the outer skin of the forward section of the 767.

“The flight had a rough landing when it landed at Narita’s run-way,” says ANA. “After all pas-sengers and crew were off, our mechanic checked the aircraft and found the outer panel of the aircraft’s foreside of the body had been damaged.”

It adds that there were strong winds when the incident hap-pened, but it remains unclear

INVESTIGATION MAVIS TOH SINGAPORE

ANA hard landingbuckles 767 skinSafety authority launches probe as Boeing twinjet sustains damage at Tokyo-Narita aiport following “rough” touchdown

AirTe

am

Image

s

The Japanese carrier operates a fleet of 29 767-300s

HYDRAULIC FAILURE HITS JETBLUE A320SAFETY US investigators are gathering data on a post-departure

hydraulics failure that kept a JetBlue Airbus A320 (N522JB) in a hold-

ing pattern near Las Vegas for nearly four hours on 17 June. On

climb-out, the pilots alerted air traffic controllers of problems, includ-

ing issues with the hydraulics system. The pilots later declared an

emergency, telling controllers they had “lost two hydraulic systems”

and would need to stay in a holding pattern close to the airport for

more than 30min to burn off enough of the 16,800kg (37,000lb)

fuel load to land within normal weight limits. JetBlue says the pilots

declared the emergency “due to the loss of one hydraulic system”,

adding that N552JB landed safely nearly four hours after take-off.

ICAO SEALS SAFETY PACT WITH AIRPORT GROUPOPERATIONS Airport safety has potentially received a boost with the

signing of a pact between the ICAO and Airports Council International

to formalise co-operation between the two. Effectively this is an en-

dorsement of ACI’s APEX (excellence in airport safety) mutual-help

programme, but ICAO’s weight lends it greater prominence, putting

pressure on non-participating airports to sign up. Roberto Kobeh

González, president of the ICAO council, said the memorandum was

not simply a piece of paper, but an “action-oriented” measure.

RYANAIR BIDS A THIRD TIME FOR AER LINGUSAIRLINES Irish budget carrier Ryanair is making a third attempt to

acquire flag carrier Aer Lingus, just as its minority 29.8% share is

referred to the UK’s competition regulator. Ryanair, which could be

forced to sell its shareholding, is nevertheless offering €1.30

($1.63) per share for the entire Aer Lingus share capital, even

though the European Commission has twice blocked similar takeo-

ver bids by the low-fare operator. Chief executive Michael O’Leary

promises to delineate the two carriers, but adds: “By lowering Aer

Lingus’s unit costs and fares, growing its business at some of

Europe’s major airports and competing with high-fare incumbents,

Ryanair can significantly increase Aer Lingus’s profitability.”

ISRAELI SUPPLIERS HOME IN ON SWISS UAS DEALCONTEST Switzerland is expected to select a medium-altitude, long-

endurance unmanned air system for its armed forces before the end

of this year, with Elbit Systems’ Hermes 900 and the Israel

Aerospace Industries Heron 1 believed to be the final two contend-

ers. Detailed proposals should be submitted by August, with the can-

didates also to undergo further flight tests in different Swiss regions.

CO-OPERATION TO IMPROVE PEARL DELTA AIRSPACEAIR TRAFFIC CONTROL Aeronautical authorities of mainland China,

Hong Kong and Macau are working together to improve the Pearl

River Delta region’s air traffic management. The three will standard-

ise measurement units for air traffic data in order to minimise dis-

crepancies and improve co-ordination, Macau’s civil aviation

authority says. There are also plans to optimise runway usage at

Macau airport by adjusting aircraft approach procedures.

PLUNA SEEKS INVESTOR AFTER LEADGATE EXITFINANCING Uruguay’s government is looking for new investors for

main carrier Pluna, after controlling shareholder LeadGate withdrew

from the company amid tensions over funding. A ministerial source

says the airline needs recapitalising “in the range” of $30-35 mil-

lion. Pluna has a fleet of Bombardier CRJ900s.

BRIEFING

whether the weather caused the rough landing. Weather data indi-cates strong crosswinds of 14kt (26km/h), gusting to 27kt imme-diately before the incident as the aircraft attempted to land on Nar-ita’s runway 16R.

The Japan Transport Safety Board is now investigating the case and the aircraft is grounded at ANA’s hangar at Narita airport.

“It is not yet decided whether we will return the aircraft to serv-ice,” adds ANA.

None of the 183 passengers and 10 crew on board the aircraft was injured.

Following a series of incidents with early-generation 767s where normal landings caused damage to the fuselage, and at the US Na-tional Transportation Safety Board’s request, Boeing strength-ened the upper crown skins on the type. The production modifi-cations were introduced from MSN569 onwards.

A previous incident involving a tail-scrape on an ANA-operated Airbus A320 at Sendai in Febru-ary this year is also under investi-gation by the JTSB.

FIN_260612_006-007 6 21/6/12 19:14:44

THIS WEEK

26 June-2 July 2012 | Flight International | 7flightglobal.com

OUTLOOK STEPHEN TRIMBLE MONTREAL

Airframer cuts units in 20-year market forecast but sees turboprop growthBombardier has cut 300 units from

its 20-year market forecast of com-

mercial aircraft deliveries in the 20-

to 149-seat market sector as the

global financial outlook worsens.

But the Montreal airframer’s new

20-year forecast also expects a 400-

unit jump in deliveries for turboprops

with less than 100 seats, reflecting

a surge in US government forecasts

for the average cost of oil.

The commercial aircraft market

forecast predicts overall deliveries of

12,800 turboprops and jets worth a

combined $630 billion in the sector

below 150 seats from 2012 to 2031.

Compared with last year’s fore-

cast, Bombardier’s prediction for

deliveries between 60 and 99 seats

dropped the most. The airframer

now expects 5,600 aircraft deliver-

ies in that category, or 200 fewer

than last year’s forecast.

In the 100- to 149-seat category,

Bombardier predicts there will be

100 fewer aircraft deliveries com-

pared with last year’s forecast. The

new forecast lists 6,900 aircraft de-

liveries in the sector that includes

Bombardier’s in-development 110- to

145-seat CSeries family Bombardier

also forecasts no change for the 20-

to 59-seat sector, with 300 aircraft

deliveries through 2031.

The overall 2.3% reduction in ex-

pected aircraft deliveries by

Bombardier is blamed on a reduced

forecast for global GDP.

Meanwhile, the US Energy

Information Administration has is-

sued a preliminary forecast that in-

cludes a $20 jump in the average

cost of fuel in the next few years,

with average prices rising from $107

per barrel in last year’s forecast to

$127 per barrel this year.

As a result, Bombardier expects

demand for turboprops to soar within

the overall aircraft delivery forecast.

Bombardier now expects delivering

about 2,832 turboprops during the

next 20 years, representing 48% of

the overall market for 60- to 99-seat

aircraft. In last year’s forecast, the

airframer predicted there would be

deliveries of about 2,500 turboprops

from 2011 to 2030.

Bombardier plans to meet a year-end deadline for CSeries

first flight by compressing a five-month final assembly process to four months, although it also has a back-up plan to deliver the first CS100 on schedule in late 2013 if final assembly is delayed.

Final assembly of the first flight-test airframe, FTV-1, is scheduled to begin in September, or within four months of Bombar-dier’s first flight deadline of 1 January, says Rob Dewar, vice-president and general manager of the CSeries.

The process of assembling the fuselage, wing and systems togeth-er should “typically” take about five months for the flight-test vehi-cles, but Bombardier is hoping to accelerate that timeline.

The programme has little mar-gin for error in its schedule. Entry into service is expected to follow 12 months after first flight, with the completion of a 12-month flight-test programme consuming 2,400 flight hours.

Bombardier has already signal-ed the industry to not be disap-

pointed if the CSeries’ first flight-test milestone is delayed.

Mike Arcamone, president of Bombardier Commercial Air-craft, told reporters and analysts on 19 June in Montreal to focus on the deadline for entry-into-service. He also noted that the company has 18 months to achieve that milestone.

Bombardier’s back-up plan to deliver the first production air-craft on time hinges on the per-formance of Aircraft Zero, a high-ly-integrated “iron bird” in the airframer’s completed aircraft in-tegrated systems test area.

Aircraft Zero integrates a fully-functional flight control system with roll, pitch and yaw axes for both left- and right-hand sides of the airframe, using hydraulic ac-tuators to simulate normal flight loads on the control surfaces. The test rig includes all of the CSeries’ major systems, including landing gear, avionics, hydraulics and electrical systems.

Bombardier has agreed in prin-ciple with certification authori-ties to receive certification credit

for more than 20,000h of planned simulations aboard Aircraft Zero, Dewar says, but the details are still being negotiated.

Any amount of credit awarded to the Aircraft Zero simulations

would reduce the number of flight hours required for certifica-tion, he adds, and indicates that the programme could use such credits to offset any delays to the first flight schedule.

UK government splashes cash on apprentice pilotsTHIS WEEK P8

Bom

bard

ier

Bombardier expects a jump in deliveries of turboprops

Bom

bard

ier

The first CS100 should be delivered in late 2013

DEVELOPMENT STEPHEN TRIMBLE MONTREAL

Tight squeeze in prospect for CSeriesBombardier to compress five-month final assembly process in bid to meet requirement for first flight by year-end

Stay up to date with the latest commercial aircraft news atflightglobal.com/flightblogger

FIN_260612_006-007 7 21/6/12 19:14:47

THIS WEEK


For a round-up of our latest online news, feature and multi-media content visit flightglobal.com/wotw

WheelTug has carried out the first tests of its electric taxi

system using motors integrated into an aircraft’s nose-gear wheels. Previous trials have been per-formed with external motor units.

Conducted over four days, commencing on 18 June at Prague airport, the trials were carried out on a Boeing 737-700 (D-AGEL) loaned by Berlin-based carrier Germania. Isaiah Cox, chief exec-

utive of WheelTug, says the tests validated its performance claims. “Whatever residual resistance in the industry there is to this sys-tem comes from people saying ‘it can’t be done’. The only way to disprove that is to do it.”

WheelTug also used the trials to collect data towards expected cer-tification in the second half of 2013, ahead of entry into service with Israeli airline El Al. Although Germania is not yet a WheelTug customer, Cox says the company is “in active discussions with the majority of 737 and [Airbus] A320 operators in the world”.

The UK aviation industry will benefit from a share of a

£25 million ($39 million) govern-ment fund designed to encourage the uptake of “higher apprentice-ships”, which will open up pro-fessional training to those nor-mally unable to afford it.

As well as training for pilots, the scheme extends to other pro-fessions such as law, specialist engineering and accountancy, areas in which the UK govern-ment predicts there will be a fu-ture shortage of qualified people.

The Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS) esti-mates that between now and 2030, European airlines will need to recruit 92,500 new pilots. It also says the UK will need to train 96,300 new engineers in the next four years just to replace those who are due to retire.

Higher apprenticeships, says BIS, enable people to pursue de-gree-level study while being paid. Training organisation City & Guilds has been working with BIS to develop a “Higher Appren-ticeship Pathway for commercial airline pilots” and, starting in

September, £217,800 has been earmarked to help participating employers. This includes airlines Jet2, British Airways, Monarch and Flybe, along with the Civil Aviation Authority and ground handling company Servisair.

Max Wright, head of training at Flybe, which has been run-ning its own unsupported sys-tem of subsidised pilot training as well as apprenticeships for engineers and cabin crew, says that the carrier will be talking to City & Guilds next month about

participating in the scheme. Sep-arately, BIS has unveiled a £40 million investment – matched by a further £40 million from in-dustrial partners including Rolls-Royce – in advanced manufac-turing research and capital equipment in a move “to keep the UK at the forefront of ad-vances in aerospace and ad-vanced manufacturing”. See Feature P32

CFM International expects the design of its Leap-1C engine,

which will power the Chinese-built Comac C919, to freeze with-in several weeks. The develop-ment will next enter the detailed design phase and the manufac-turer will also start fabricating components to start building the first full engine for tests.

CFM is also building its third “eCore” demonstrator, scheduled to undergo testing in early 2013, with tweaks incorporated from previous core-test findings.

“In the next 18 months or so we will complete another core test, the first full engine test and continue to conduct component and rig tests to further refine the design,” says the company.

The first full engine is sched-uled to start testing in the third quarter of 2013. It will then un-dergo trials on CFM’s flying test-bed in 2014, followed by the first flight on the C919 that same year.

“The programme is on schedule to enter service in 2016,” adds CFM. The manufacturer also claims that two earlier core tests, the latest of which featured a 10-stage compressor and two-stage high-pressure turbine, produced “outstanding” results. “These tests validated the performance and op-erability characteristics of the cores, which ran smoothly and met all pre-test predictions,” it says.

CFM has also completed rig tests on an ultra-high efficiency low-pressure turbine. Next year, it will mate this with a high-pressure tur-bine in a dual-spool rig test. Its demonstrator engine underwent a 5,000-cycle endurance test and the blades emerged with “none of the damage propagated”. CFM has 470 Leap-1C orders for the C919.

PROPULSION

CFM closes in on Leap-1C design freeze

TRAINING DAVID LEARMOUNT LONDON

UK government splashes cash on apprentice pilotsAviation sector to share in £25 million fund in bid to make profession more accessible

British A

irw

ays

European airlines need to recruit 92,500 new pilots up to 2030

Certification of the electric taxi system is planned for 2013

David Learmount comments on operational and safety issues at flightglobal.com/learmount

WheelT

ug

WheelTug hails integrated motor testsDEVELOPMENT DOMINIC PERRY LONDON

The first full engine is scheduled to start testing in the third quarter of 2013

FIN_260612_008-009 8 21/6/12 18:28:40

THIS WEEK


Tianjin in line for A320neo assemblyAIR TRANSPORT P11

ACCIDENT

Blue Islands left red-faced by prangAn ATR 42 operated by regional airline Blue Islands caused the tem-

porary closure of Jersey airport on 16 June when its left-hand main

landing gear collapsed while taxiing to the gate. None of the 43 pas-

sengers and crew on board the aircraft, operating as flight SI308 from

Guernsey, were injured in the incident. The aircraft, G-DRFC, is a

1986-built airframe and as MSN007 is one of the earliest of the type.

John F

itzp

atr

ick

US company International Emergency Services (IES) and

Russian airframer Beriev have fin-ished initial trials in Russia of the Be-200 amphibian aircraft for use in the firefighting tanker role, in a bid to get US certification and clearance for the aircraft. The tests, held in April and May, included ground trials of the aircraft’s fire-fighting systems as well as water drops on a range near Beriev’s base in Taganrog.

Beriev says: “The United States

Forest Service assessment says the Be-200, and its water-han-dling system, fully complies with the requirements of the [US] In-teragency Tanker Board [which regulates tankers and providers in the USA].” However, Beriev adds that a number of minor modifications will be required to the aircraft’s firefighting systems for it to comply.

“The aircraft did extremely well with water drops. It is now being tested with retardant,

which is more commonly used in America,” says IES chief execu-tive David Baskett.

IES signed a letter of intent in 2010 for 10 Progress D-436TP-powered Be-200s – in a deal that could be worth up to $400 mil-lion – which the company will operate or lease to tanker opera-tors. In addition, it acts as a sales agent for the type in the USA and is in talks with a number of or-ganisations over potential deals, says Richard Hulme, IES vice-

president. He says the aircraft is ideal for firefighting and has been “designed from scratch” for that purpose. Asking older, converted aircraft to perform in a similar way is like “asking a large air-plane to act as a fighter”, he adds.

The Be-200 can land on water and scoop up 12,000 litres (3,000 USgal) of liquid. It can also be reconfigured for search and res-cue or passenger transport.

The USA has an urgent need to renew its ageing tanker fleet.

Iridium Communications, via a planned joint venture with air

navigation provider Nav Canada, hopes to offer global air traffic surveillance starting in 2018 using its next-generation satel-lites equipped with automatic dependent surveillance-broad-cast (ADS-B) receivers.

Called Aireon, the service in-tends to provide aircraft GPS in-formation to air navigation serv-ice providers using 66 Iridium Next satellites carrying ADS-B re-ceivers, the same technology mandated for US aircraft by 2020

and earlier in Europe. Iridium ex-pects to launch the Next constel-lation in 2015-2017, taking the system to operational status in 2018. The satellites are being built by the Thales Alenia Space joint venture and are to be launched on SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicles.

Also involved in the joint ven-ture are the US Federal Aviation Administration, communication systems manufacturer Harris Cor-poration, and technology firm ITT Exelis, provider of the FAA’s ADS-B ground system in the USA.

NAVIGATION JOHN CROFT WASHINGTON DC

Iridium targets global ATC capability by 2017

TESTING HOWARD GETHIN MOSCOW

Beriev closes in on landmark US saleRussian airframer carries out trials of Be-200 amphibian aircraft to prove its suitability for firefighting role in the USA

STC Solutions for Easy Retrofi t

www.cmcelectronics.ca

On the Button Accuracy LPV / GPS Landing System

Applicable to MMR and non-MMR equipped aircraftILS/MMR “look-alike” architectureAccuracy far superior to RNP 0.1, with better-than-ILS stability

FIN_260612_008-009 9 21/6/12 18:28:45

AIR TRANSPORT


Check out our collection of online dynamic aircraft profiles for the latest news, infor-mation and images on civil and military programmes at flightglobal.com/profiles

Citizens of Munich have thwarted plans for a third

runway at the second-largest Ger-man hub after voting against an expansion proposal.

Munich’s operator wanted to build a 4,000m (13,100ft) runway, northeast of the current parallels, by 2015. But final approval de-pended on a unanimous decision by the airport’s three sharehold-ers – the federal republic, the city, and the state of Bavaria.

While the state and republic supported the project, Munich’s city government called for a 17 June referendum. The turnout was only 32.8% but 54.3% of vot-ers were against the runway.

Responding to the vote, Bavar-ia’s transport minister Martin Zeil says the regional government will continue to pursue the runway construction “without ifs and buts”. He adds that there is “no way around the third runway to be able to accommodate tomor-row’s need for mobility”. Mu-nich’s two-runway system has a theoretical annual capacity of 480,000 movements, but “current studies” estimate demand will rise to 536,000 by 2020, Zeil says.

Mayor Christian Ude, who fa-vours the runway, had called on the regional government to re-spect the electorate by not at-tempting to push through expan-

sion if a majority voted against it. He says the public’s vote has “ul-timate significance” and cannot be subjected to “party-political games or legal tricks”.

Munich’s operator says there is no more capacity available throughout “most of the day”, particularly during peak hours. It expects the third runway to be “put on ice for many years”.

Chief executive Michael Kerk-loh says that the decision shows just “how difficult it has become in our country to clarify the sig-nificance of important infrastruc-ture projects”.

The airport operator says it will put the project on hold with a

view to resurrecting it if political circumstances change. Lufthansa, the hub’s largest airline, warns that Munich will not be perceived by travellers as a “high-quality airport” if it is continually operat-ing at its capacity limit.

The German carrier adds that it will ultimately have to transfer growth to other airports if expan-sion is blocked indefinitely.

In co-operation with the airport operator, it is constructing a satel-lite for Terminal 2, which is used exclusively by the airline and its partner carriers.

Munich referendum rejects proposed third runwayAIRPORTS MICHAEL GUBISCH LONDON

US investigators have deter-mined that the speedbrakes

on a Southwest Airlines Boeing 737-700 were not armed before the twinjet slid off the runway at Chicago Midway.

The crew did not deploy the thrust reversers until 16s after touchdown on Runway 13C, which was damp as a result of rain showers.

In an update to the inquiry, the National Transportation Safety Board says the braking action was reported as “fair” by a preceding Southwest 737 crew.

However, it adds that flight-re-corder information shows the pi-lots of the incident flight did not arm the speedbrakes during prep-arations for arrival.

The crew had created extra workload by initially uploading and briefing the wrong approach procedure, not realising the error until receiving clearance to leave the holding pattern and begin the approach to Midway.

Having reprogrammed the flight-management system for the correct approach, a recalculation indicated sufficient landing dis-

tance available. Runway 13C is 6,522ft (1,990m) long.

The crew correctly set the au-tobrake but the NTSB says the pilots experienced “additional operational distractions” during the final minutes of the ap-proach, including a momentary flap overspeed. This flap issue occurred at about the time the before-landing checklist would normally have been performed – a checklist which includes arm-ing of the speedbrakes.

But the NTSB says “no men-tion” of the checklist or the speedbrakes was found on the cockpit-voice recorder, and the flight-data recorder shows the speedbrakes were not armed.

After touchdown, the speed-brakes did not deploy and the thrust reversers were not acti-vated. One of the pilots ex-claimed: “I got no brakes, man.”

The captain applied full man-ual braking after realising the air-craft was not slowing, and re-

verse thrust was engaged with about 1,500ft of runway remain-ing – an action which automati-cally deployed the speedbrakes.

“As the airplane neared the end of the pavement, the captain attempted to turn on to the con-necting taxiway but was unable,” it states. The 737 hit a taxiway light and rolled 200ft into grass.

Without the speedbrakes’ inter-ruption of lift, the deceleration capability is “severely degraded”, the NTSB says, because the brak-ing effectiveness on the type is reduced by as much as 60%. Delay in the selection of reverse thrust also contributed to the amount of runway used.

Simulations determined that, had the speedbrakes deployed at touchdown, the 737 would have stopped with 900ft of runway to spare – and as much as 1,950ft if the thrust reversers had been acti-vated at the same time.

None of the 139 passengers and crew members was injured in the 26 April 2011 incident.

Keep up with the latest in air transport news by logging on at flightglobal.com/airtransport

INVESTIGATION DAVID KAMINSKI-MORROW LONDON

Speedbrakes missed before 737 slipPressured Southwest crew overlooked checklist before wet runway touchdown and deployed thrust reversers late in roll

NTS

B

Video captured the 737 barrelling towards the end of the runway

Keep up to date with the latest aviation safety news at flightglobal.com/safety

FIN_260612_010-011 10 21/6/12 18:03:14

AIR TRANSPORT


Sukhoi pressures Superjet suppliersAIR TRANSPORT P12

Moscow-based Transaero has firmed an agreement for

four Airbus A380s and ordered up to 16 Sukhoi Superjets.

It had tentatively agreed to take the A380s – which will be config-ured for about 700 passengers, in

three classes – in October last year. Transaero has not disclosed an engine selection for the air-craft, for which Russia’s VEB Leasing will provide financing.

The deal takes total A380 or-ders to 257. “I am sure that the

operation of the A380 will stimu-late the development of Russia’s aviation sector, in particular its ground infrastructure,” says Transaero chief Olga Pleshakova.

Transaero is also ordering six 90-seat Superjet 100s, and has

placed options for another 10, for delivery over 2015-17.

Pleshakova says the carrier “deems it to be its duty” to sup-port the Russian aircraft industry, and this depends on firm orders from customers.

MANUFACTURING

China could land additional parts workAirbus is studying whether it could

assemble more parts of the A320

in China and increase the number

of components that it sources from

the country.

Xian Aircraft, a subsidiary of state-

owned airframer AVIC, assembles

the A320’s wings in Tianjin, where

Airbus has a final assembly centre

for the type.

Other AVIC subsidiaries produce

components such as the rear pas-

senger and emergency exit doors,

as well as cargo and electronics

bay doors.

They also manufacture part of

the nose section, fixed leading and

trailing edges, wing inter-spar ribs,

and skin plates.

Some of these are shipped back

to Europe for assembly and it may

make “more sense” to do some of

that work in China, says Airbus

China president Laurence Barron.

“We are looking to see if it makes

sense to assemble some more

parts here and install them in Tianjin

instead of shipping them to Europe

and then bringing them back here,”

he adds.

Airbus could produce the A320neo family of aircraft in

China if it successfully negotiates an agreement to extend the life of its final assembly centre in Tian-jin beyond 2016.

The company signed a joint-venture agreement in 2006 with a consortium of the Tianjin Free Trade Zone and state-owned air-framer AVIC to manufacture A320s in Tianjin.

This agreement will end in the first quarter of 2016 after 284 air-craft are produced, but negotia-tions began around May to keep the line open beyond that time-frame, says Airbus China presi-dent Laurence Barron.

INITIAL CONTRACT“In the initial contract, we had agreed on a date by which we had to begin negotiations on the fu-ture of the production line. We have begun negotiations in ad-vance of that date. These discus-sions are a relatively long proc-ess,” he adds.

The first re-engined A320neos are due to be delivered from 2015, and Barron says it is only “natu-ral” the Tianjin final assembly fa-cility will produce the newer variant of the narrowbody as fu-ture demand will be for that type.

“If we extend the final assem-bly line, the [A320neo] will come into place automatically and nat-urally,” he adds.

The dispute between the Chi-nese government and the EU over its Emissions Trading System has had “no impact” on the negotia-tions, says Barron.

Transaero seals orders for A380s and SuperjetsFLEET

AIRFRAMES SIVA GOVINDASAMY TIANJIN

Tianjin in line for A320neo assemblyAs Airbus prepares to raise production rate at Chinese plant, talks begin with partners to extend manufacturing agreement

While Airbus has yet to receive orders for the A320neo from Chi-nese airlines, the company is con-fident this will change. Eric Chen, senior vice-president for com-mercial and external affairs at Airbus China, says the lack of or-

ders is because Chinese airlines typically make plans on a five-year basis. “We are now in the 2011-2015 five-year plan, and the deliveries of the A320neo are be-yond that. When the Chinese air-lines start looking into the next

five-year plan, the [aircraft] will come into play,” he says.

Barron adds that the Chinese customers are aware of the popu-larity of the A320neo and need to begin discussions soon if they would like to book some of the early delivery slots. “China does not live in a bubble,” he adds. “We continue to have discussions with our customers all over the world, including China, about all of our aircraft.”

PRODUCTION RATEAirbus plans to raise the A320 production rate at Tianjin from three to four a month around the end of the year, and freeze it at that level for the foreseeable fu-ture. The airframer, which will deliver the 100th aircraft to be as-sembled in China in September, will not raise the production rate above four a month says Barron. This was the rate agreed in the joint-venture deal.

Production of A320s began in 2008 and the first aircraft was de-livered in 2009. “The purpose of the Tianjin facility is to serve the Chinese market and we have achieved that,” says Barron.

“The rate of four a month is still below what is being deliv-ered in total to Chinese custom-ers, and we are very happy with the way things have gone.

“Quality is not an issue at all in Tianjin. We meet all of the [key performance indicators] and we are in very good shape.”


Airbus

By the end of the year the facility will be building four per month

FIN_260612_010-011 11 21/6/12 18:03:17

AIR TRANSPORT

flightglobal.com

Check out our collection of online dynamic aircraft profiles for the latest news, infor-mation and images on civil and military programmes at flightglobal.com/profiles


Halfway through a pivotal year for the programme, Russian

airframer Sukhoi has called on suppliers to boost output and slash component prices of the 95-seat Superjet. At a suppliers sum-mit in Moscow on 14 June, Sukhoi civil aircraft division president Vladimir Prisyazhnyuk empha-sised correcting what has become a lingering concern both within and outside the programme.

Although Superjet officials had promised to deliver 15 Superjets in 2011, only six aircraft were re-ceived by airlines. The pressure on maintaining rate is only grow-ing as current plans call for deliv-ering 23 aircraft in 2012, 40 air-craft in 2013, and 60 in 2014.

“We should increase the produc-tion rates and strengthen the after-sales support to make the [Super-jet] programme successful both in local and international markets,”

OPERATIONS DAVID KAMINSKI-MORROW LONDON

Aeroflot completes first year of operations with twinjet

This year, Sukhoi has introduced

monitoring systems to minimise

technical issues and halve the time

to troubleshoot problems with the

Superjet fleet. The airframer adds

that it has worked to “optimise” de-

livery of spares within 48h.

Russian flag carrier Aeroflot has

just completed its first year of opera-

tions with the type. It is taking its

ninth Superjet, serial number

95017, in June and will receive an-

other five this year. In the first year

its Superjet fleet achieved 3,710

flights and logged 6,865h, serving

27 airports. Sukhoi says two of the

aircraft logged 249h and 240h re-

spectively in May, while two others

achieved 157 and 151 flights during

August-September last year. Aeroflot

has been able to utilise the type for

16h in one day, it adds.

Aeroflot Superjet fleet chief

Yevgeny Voronin says an improve-

ment in the efficiency of post-sales

technical support for the type will

increase utilisation of the fleet. By

the end of May, the carrier had 45

trained Superjet crews, among them

48 pilots without any previous

“glass-cockpit” experience. “On the

whole we are satisfied with the re-

sults of the first year of commercial

operations of our aircraft with

Aeroflot,” says Sukhoi Civil Aircraft

chief Vladimir Prisyazhnyuk.

European regulators have certificated the ATR 42-600,

the smaller member of the air-framer’s new -600 series turbo-prop family.

ATR says it expects the 46- to 50-seat type to enter service this summer. Customers include Air Tahiti, Tanzania’s Precision Air

and Russia’s NordStar. The air-framer says that the aircraft “ben-efited from its similarity” to the ATR 72-600 during the European Aviation Safety Agency certifica-tion process.

The turboprop has “glass cock-pit” avionics with new flight-management systems, autopilot

and five liquid-crystal display screens. “We are the only manu-facturer of 50-seater aircraft in the world and we estimate that, over the next 20 years, there will be a substantial potential market in this category,” says ATR chief Filippo Bagnato.

ATR’s larger aircraft, the 72-

600, obtained certification in May last year and is in service with seven operators. The air-framer says the combined -600 series order portfolio has reached 250 aircraft.

ATR’s smaller -600 secures European certificationAIRFRAMES DAVID KAMINSKI-MORROW LONDON

Prisyazhnyuk told the suppliers. He linked the urgency of increasing output to restoring the programme’s image following the crash of a pro-totype airframe on a demonstration flight in Indonesia on 9 May that killed all 45 on board.

“The readiness of key partners and suppliers… to work jointly

on increasing production rates and improving component quali-ty reflects not only the support of the programme after the recent tragedy in Indonesia but the con-fidence in the future success of our product,” Prisyazhnyuk said.

Sukhoi’s slowed output last year was blamed on supplier per-

formance, particularly with en-gine venture PowerJet’s deliveries of SaM146 powerplants to assem-bly plant KnAAPO. Suppliers ex-pressed their “readiness to under-take all necessary measures to increase production rates and im-prove their product quality”, said Sukhoi following the summit. “To provide smooth [Superjet] opera-tions by the airlines, suppliers ex-pressed their readiness to improve their responsiveness to the cus-tomers’ requests,” it added.

Prisyazhnyuk also implored Su-khoi’s partners to lower prices to preserve the programme: “Key partners and suppliers also con-firmed their readiness to continue co-operation with [us] on re-pric-ing.” The airframer adds that the partners understand “the necessity to improve the economic condi-tions relevant to the supplied parts, with the firm intent to promote the [Superjet] programme”.


Superjet In

tern

ational

Thirty of the type are bound for Aeroflot and about half will have been delivered by the end of 2012

MANUFACTURING STEPHEN TRIMBLE WASHINGTON DC

Sukhoi pressures Superjet suppliersRussian airframer aims to raise production rate, improve component chain economics and offer better after-sales support

FIN_260612_012-013 12 21/6/12 18:35:42

AIR TRANSPORTUSMC to stand up its first operational F-35B squadronDEFENCE P14

PROPULSION STEPHEN TRIMBLE WASHINGTON DC

Testing starts on evolved geared fanEngine manufacturer Pratt & Whitney aims for higher bypass ratio with second-generation development of new powerplant

Pratt & Whitney has started a series of windtunnel tests on

a key component for a second-generation geared turbofan with up to 50% higher bypass ratio.

The first-generation geared tur-bofan, with a 12:1 ratio, has al-ready been selected for types in-cluding the Airbus A320neo, Bombardier CSeries, Mitsubishi Regional Jet and Irkut MS-21.

However, P&W is already de-veloping a second generation of the geared propulsor for an en-gine with a bypass ratio of be-tween 15:1 and 18:1, says Alan Epstein, P&W vice-president of technology and environment.

The new windtunnel tests at a NASA facility are examining the propulsor flow path, including the inlets and the geared fan.

P&W is studying a variety of de-signs that reduce the length of the inlet.

Inlets are now sized to provide noise attenuation, Epstein ex-

plains, but the geared turbofan architecture allows the fan to spin more slowly, which generates less noise.

“So I can afford, in a noise-

budget sense, to reduce the length of the nacelle,” he says.

The second-generation version will also feature a new hot section with a reduced requirement for cooling flow, which lowers the thermal efficiency of the combus-tion process.

P&W is considering incorpo-rating advanced metallics and ceramics into the high-pressure spool of the second-generation engine, Epstein says, noting that an all-ceramic turbine section is not feasible for the next genera-tion of turbofans.

Flight tests have started for the PW1217G geared turbofan for the Japanese-built MRJ.

Pra

tt &

Whitney

Flight trials are under way for the Mitsubishi Regional Jet’s engine


FIN_260612_012-013 13 21/6/12 18:06:06

DEFENCE

flightglobal.com

For free access to Flight’s Defence e-newsletter visit flightglobal.com/ defencenewsletter


The US Marine Corps will stand up its first operational

squadron with Lockheed Mar-tin’s short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) F-35B in No-vember as long as everything goes according to plan, a senior service official says.

“VMFA-121 will now be the first squadron to stand up, in Yuma, [Arizona],” the official says. “They will stand down as a [Boeing] F/A-18D squadron in July once they return from de-ployment to Japan.”

Receiving the first F-35B in Yuma during November is con-tingent on the USMC first starting up its training pipeline for the type at Eglin AFB, the official says. The service currently has two test pilots flying at the Flori-da base, but that number will soon increase.

“We should start getting addi-

tional pilots qualified in July,” the official says. “Training will still be delayed until we get at least 120h of maturation flying, but I am hopeful we can start training students by October. We will be close, but I think we can do it.”

The USMC expects to eventu-ally acquire 340 F-35Bs and 80 carrier variant F-35Cs to replace its Boeing AV-8B Harrier II strike aircraft and F/A-18 Hornets.

Boeing, the Eurofighter con-sortium and Lockheed Mar-

tin have delivered formal bids for South Korea’s 60-aircraft F-X III competition, with the nation’s Defense Acquisition Program Ad-ministration (DAPA) expecting to make a decision by October.

Presentation of the documents by 18 June should have been largely a formality, as the compa-nies had already mounted exten-sive campaigns with their respec-tive F-15 Silent Eagle, Typhoon and F-35A Joint Strike Fighter de-signs. However, Eurofighter and Lockheed have been asked to re-submit their proposal documents with additional translation before a 5 July deadline.

Eurofighter’s documents need extensive translation, as its bid was submitted mostly in English, with only an executive summary provided in Korean, says an in-dustry source familiar with the competition. EADS defence unit Cassidian is leading the Typhoon campaign in the country. The Lockheed proposal needs only some sections translated.

“This was all just a small mis-understanding,” the source says, adding: “DAPA wants to be com-pletely above board and transpar-ent with this competition.”

According to Seoul’s Yonhap news agency, the contenders will be judged using four primary cri-teria – cost, capability, interoper-ability with South Korean forces, and industrial benefits – and 150 secondary criteria. The nation is also likely to require the winner to provide significant help with its indigenous KFX fighter.

Sukhoi earlier this year de-clined an offer to pitch its devel-opmental PAK-FA/T-50 for the F-X III requirement. Saab attend-ed a January meeting where DAPA issued a request for pro-posals, but appears to have de-cided not to bid its Gripen E/F.

Airbus Military has demon-strated the future lift poten-

tial of its A400M during ground trials involving two European medium helicopter types.

Performed in June in Toulouse, and at Holzdorf air base in Ger-many using development aircraft

“Grizzly 4”, the loading and un-loading trials involved the Euro-copter EC725 and NH Industries NH90, respectively.

“The tests were the first dem-onstrations of the A400M’s cargo-carrying capability using a real aircraft, and represent the most

challenging loads in terms of their dimensions required for initial operational capability,” Airbus Military says.

This milestone is due to be de-clared with the delivery of its first production example to the French air force in December or early 2013, with aircraft MSN7 being targeted at a 23 August first flight from Seville, Spain.

The successful trials using the combat search and rescue EC725 and NH90 tactical transport will be followed later this year by work to clear a variety of other military equipment and ground vehicles for carriage by the A400M. On order for eight nations, the turbo-prop-engined aircraft will have a maximum cargo capacity of 37,000kg (81,500lb). See next week’s issue for our A400M programme update

REQUIREMENT

Trio place formal bids for Seoul’s F-X III contest

For all the latest defence news from Asia, visit flightglobal.com/asianskies

STRIKE AIRCRAFT DAVE MAJUMDAR WASHINGTON DC

USMC to stand up its first operational F-35B squadronVMFA-121 to move from F/A-18Ds to short take-off and vertical landing aircraft in November

US

Marine C

orp

s

The Marines plan to eventually acquire 340 STOVL fighters

Keep up to date with all the latest US defence news at flightglobal.com/dewline

A400M passes helicopter load trialsDEVELOPMENT CRAIG HOYLE LONDON

Airbus M

ilita

ry

Eurocopter’s EC725 was a comfortable fit for the new transport

FIN_260612_014-015 14 21/6/12 18:21:16

DEFENCE

flightglobal.com

First US Navy MQ-4C Triton unveiledDEFENCE P17


The UK has delayed the first flight of its Taranis unmanned

combat air system technology demonstrator until “the first part of 2013”, according to lead com-pany BAE Systems.

Revealed in July 2010 under a project worth £140 million ($220 million), the stealthy Taranis has recently completed a series of radar cross-section pole tests per-formed at BAE’s Warton site in Lancashire, says Tom Fillingham, director of future combat air sys-tems for its Military Air & Infor-mation business unit.

Speaking at Warton on 19 June, Fillingham said data from the test work was still being assessed by the UK Ministry of Defence and its Defence Science & Technology Laboratory, but that “the results are very promising”.

BAE and its industry partners on the Taranis project have con-ducted a large amount of test and development work in the past two years, he says, also in-cluding successful engine in-take integration trials conducted

at Rolls-Royce’s Filton site in Bristol. Meanwhile, BAE is ex-pected to receive a roughly £15 million contract around the time of the Farnborough air show to study technology re-quirements linked to a proposed Anglo-French future combat air system. Its partner Dassault will also receive an award of similar value to conduct work under the bilateral effort, which is ex-pected to draw on the pair’s cur-rent experience with developing and preparing to fly their re-spective Taranis and Neuron UCAS demonstrators.

Additional work to support the development and testing of un-manned systems technologies will be conducted using BAE’s Mantis medium-altitude, long-endurance demonstrator. The company is in-vesting up to £5 million this year to return the aircraft to use, and is planning to fly it in UK airspace for the first time early in 2013.

For more about unmanned air vehicle operations, visitflightglobal.com/uav

Northrop Grumman has se-cured orders worth a com-

bined $87.8 million to supply APG-68(V)9 fire-control radars to be installed on Lockheed Martin F-16s for the air forces of Iraq, Oman and Thailand.

Northrop will supply 22 radars for use with the Iraqi air force’s on-order fleet of 18 F-16C/Ds, and 15 for Oman’s second batch of 12 aircraft.

Six more will be supplied to the Royal Thai Air Force, which Flight-global’s MiliCAS database reports as flying 54 legacy F-16A/Bs. Deliveries will conclude by March 2015, Northrop says.

Oman has also requested a po-tential $86 million purchase of 55 Raytheon AIM-9X Block II short-range air-to-air missiles to be used by its existing fleet of 12 F-16C/Ds.

Bell Helicopter has delivered its first OH-58D Kiowa war-

time replacement aircraft to the US Army. The programme, which includes both remanufac-turing OH-58As and building new D-models, was initiated to replace combat losses experi-enced during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

While the army is authorised to maintain an OH-58D fleet of 368 aircraft, a significant number have been lost due to crashes, enemy fire and fatigue.

“Right now we are 42 aircraft short of our 368. We also have ap-proximately seven more, pending attrition, that we have to do anal-ysis on,” says the army.

Under its current plan, the service will fund the conversion of 23 A-model aircraft to the D

standard, plus a total of 26 “new-metal” Kiowas, to match the po-tentially 49-unit deficit.

Production rates should allow for one delivery per month through fiscal year 2014, de-pendent on Congressional fund-ing appropriations.

The need to recapitalise the OH-58D fleet is particularly acute for units that have recently re-turned to their US bases from combat deployments, often after leaving aircraft in theatre for use by their replacements.

The first delivery will be made to a unit based at Ft Reilly, Kan-sas, which is crewed to operate 30 aircraft but currently only flies nine.

Corp

us C

hristi A

rmy

Depot

The US Army’s Kiowa fleet has a shortfall of around 49 aircraft

BAE S

yste

ms

Radar cross-section trials have delivered “very promising” results

Northrop secures F-16 radar dealsCONTRACTS

ROTORCRAFT ZACH ROSENBERG WASHINGTON DC

Bell delivers first OH-58 wartime replacement

To learn more about our rotorcraft data service go to flightglobal.com/helicas

UNMANNED SYSTEMS CRAIG HOYLE WARTON

Taranis advances to stealth testing as first flight slipsUnmanned strike demonstrator to perform debut sortie in 2013, while new Anglo-French study contracts are expected

FIN_260612_014-015 15 21/6/12 18:21:20

FIN_260612_016 16 21/6/12 09:45:32

DEFENCE


Sustained growth to return in 2013, says BombardierBUSINESS AVIATION P18

UNMANNED SYSTEMS

First US Navy MQ-4C Triton unveiledNorthrop Grumman unveiled the US Navy’s first production MQ-4C

Triton unmanned air vehicle at its Palmdale manufacturing facility in

California on 14 June. Being acquired via the service’s broad area

maritime surveillance programme, the Triton is a navy-optimised de-

rivative of the RQ-4 Global Hawk originally developed for the US Air

Force. The type will partially replace an aged fleet of Lockheed P-3

Orion maritime patrol aircraft, along with Boeing’s 737-based P-8.

One of two test articles built in advance of a projected 68-unit produc-

tion order, the first Triton will be followed by a second example which

is roughly one month away from roll-out, says Northrop.

Nort

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The repainted aircraft have been flown to Broughton, north Wales

Two BAe 146-200QC transports have entered conversion at

Hawker Beechcraft Services’ Broughton site in north Wales, with the pair scheduled to enter use with the UK Royal Air Force by March 2013.

Acquired from TNT Airways for use in Afghanistan, the quick change passenger/freighter air-craft have been painted in RAF colours and transferred from Bel-gium under an urgent operational requirement deal.

BAE Systems Regional Aircraft was awarded a contract worth £15.5 million ($24.3 million) to modify them for military use, and has subcontracted the conversion work to Hawker Beechcraft.

Each of the adapted BAe 146Ms will carry fewer than the civilian type’s standard 96 passengers, due to the hot temperature and high-altitude environment and volume of equipment carried by combat personnel in Afghanistan. The baseline QC aircraft can alterna-tively carry up to 10,600kg (23,300lb) of equipment and sup-plies on its cargo deck, loaded via a large freight door.

The ex-commercial aircraft will partially cover for the retirement from service of the RAF’s last Lockheed Martin C-130K tactical transports in December 2012.

For aircraft maintenance, repair and overhaul news and data, visit flightglobal.com/mro

Oslo has formally committed to Lockheed Martin’s F-35A

Joint Strike Fighter, after secur-ing guarantees from the USA over opportunities for Norwe-gian industry.

Key to the deal for as many as 52 aircraft – which at an estimat-ed NKr60 billion ($10 billion), would be the largest public pro-curement in the country’s history – was confirmation from the US authorities of their support for the integration of the Kongsberg-de-veloped Joint Strike Missile (JSM) on to the F-35. The anti-ship and land-attack missile will be suita-ble for carriage in the F-35’s inter-nal weapons bays, and from un-der-wing pylons.

The guarantee was delivered to Norwegian defence minister Espen Barth Eide in a letter from his US counterpart Leon Panetta.

“Securing such support has been an important pre-condition for many of our partner nations before they themselves commit to supporting the JSM,” Eide says. “With such support finally in place, there is now a significant potential for the missile among future operators of the F-35.”

Norway estimates the total market potential for the JSM to be NKr20-25 billion.

Two aircraft have been ordered under an agreement announced on 15 June, with two more ex-

pected to follow in 2016, says the Norwegian defence ministry. The assets will be based in the USA “as part of a joint training centre”, it adds. Up to 48 additional air-craft could be purchased to re-place the Royal Norwegian Air Force’s Lockheed F-16AM/BMs.

On 14 June, Norway’s parlia-ment approved a “significant in-crease in defence spending” of about 7% to 2016 to finance the purchase. Money saved through the withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan will also be redistrib-uted to pay for the F-35, which was initially selected in 2008.

Another aspect of Norway’s pre-order demands for the JSF has also been met by Washington. The US Department of Defense’s almost $490 million contract to acquire long lead-time items for the programme’s seventh lot of low-rate initial production in-cludes funds to cover the incor-poration of a drag chute into the F-35A. This will support the type’s ability to stop on icy run-ways in Norway.

The commitment also includes parts for 24 conventional take-off and landing F-35As for the US Air Force (19), Italy (3) and Tur-key (2), six short take-off and ver-tical landing (STOVL) F-35Bs for the US Marine Corps and one for the UK, plus four carrier variant aircraft for the US Navy.

CONTRACT DOMINIC PERRY LONDON DAVE MAJUMDAR WASHINGTON DC

Norway orders F-35As after securing support for Kongsberg missile

TRANSPORTS CRAIG HOYLE LONDON

Ex-TNT BAe 146s enter conversion for Royal Air ForcePassenger/freighter aircraft to be flown in Afghanistan from early 2013 as partial cover for retirement of last C-130Ks

FIN_260612_017 17 21/6/12 18:09:26

BUSINESS AVIATION


Keep up to date with all the latest business and general aviation news at flightglobal.com/bizav

AFRICAN SURGEAir Charter International says

charter requests from Africa

have risen by 25% in the past

12 months as the market for air

travel from the continent takes

off. “We believe the higher de-

mand is resulting from busi-

nesses realising that executive

charters, as well as cargo char-

ters, are valuable tools that can

underpin their day-to-day work,”

it says.

EMBRAER MILESTONEBusiness and general aviation

product support company

Hawker Pacific has completed

“a world-first”, 48-month in-

spection on an Embraer

Lineage 1000 at its facility at

Seletar Aerospace Park,

Singapore. The programme re-

quired complete removal of the

corporate interior along with

detailed inspections.

JET AVIATION APPROVALJet Aviation Dubai has clinched

approval to perform mainte-

nance on Indian-registered

Gulfstream GIV-SPs, GV-SPs,

G200s, G500s, G550s;

Embraer Legacy 600s/650s

Dassault Falcon 900EXs and

2000s; and line maintenance

on the Falcon 7X.

CAE GETS NODCAE has received Level D ap-

proval from the Australian Civil

Aviation Safety Authority for its

5000-series Beechcraft King Air

350 full-flight simulator based

at Melbourne.

ONPOINT AGREEMENTNetJets has signed a 15-year

$400 million OnPoint solution

agreement with GE Aviation for

the maintenance, repair and

overhaul of the CF34 engines

on its ordered Bombardier

Challenger 605 fleet.

DAUPHIN SIMEurocopter and French helicop-

ter operator Héli-Union have

inaugurated a new simulator for

the Dauphin AS365 N3/N3+

based at Angoulême, France.

IN BRIEF

Canadian airframer Bombardier says business jet industry de-

liveries “will return to sustained growth starting in 2013, with the large aircraft category demonstrat-ing the fastest growth”.

In its latest annual forecast, re-leased on 19 June, the manufac-turer predicts deliveries of 24,000 business jets valued at $648 bil-lion by 2031 in every segment in which it competes. The manufac-turer produces ultra-long-range, long-range, super-large, large, su-per-midsize, midsize, super-light and light types.

“The market forecast antici-pates 9,800 aircraft deliveries worth $266 billion from 2012 to 2021, and 14,200 deliveries worth $382 billion from 2022 to 2031,” says Bombardier.

The manufacturer is scheduled to deliver five new aircraft types over the forecast period, starting next year with the midsize Learjet 85, the super-light Learjet 75 and light cabin Learjet 70. These will be followed in 2016 and 2017 by the top-of-the-range Global 7000 and 8000 respectively.

While the airframer is “confi-

dent in the strong, long-term po-tential of the business aircraft in-dustry”, current market indicators are mixed, it cautions. “Confi-dence needs to be fully restored for business jet deliveries to in-crease strongly and enable the in-dustry to realise its full poten-tial,” says Bombardier.

Shipments this year are ex-pected to lag behind order intake, it continues, as manufacturers strive to maintain acceptable backlog levels. Consequently, 2012 business jet deliveries are expected to be on a par with last year’s tally, Bombardier predicts.

During the next 20 years North America is predicted to receive the greatest number of new business jet deliveries, at about 9,500 aircraft. Europe will come in second place with 3,920 aircraft, followed by China, which is forecast to receive 2,420 new business jets by 2031.

“Bombardier also expects key growth markets, including Brazil, India, Russia and the CIS, Indone-sia, Mexico, South Korea and Tur-key to receive a significant share of business jet deliveries during the next 20 years,” it says.

Embraer has received US Fed-eral Aviation Administration

production certification to assem-ble the entry-level Phenom 100 and 300 light business jets at its Melbourne, Florida facility. Pre-viously, US-built Phenoms were validated under the FAA type certification granted to those air-craft produced in Brazil.

“This is a significant milestone for Embraer and is the culmina-tion of a series of achievements in the last year,” says Ernest Ed-wards, president of Embraer Ex-ecutive Jets. “We opened this facil-ity just over a year ago, delivered the first US-produced Phenom 100 in December and the first US-produced aircraft to go to an inter-national customer in March.”

Indian maintenance, repair and overhaul provider Air Works has

acquired an undisclosed stake in Dubai-based business aviation services company Empire Avia-tion Group (EAG). The Rs1.2 bil-lion ($22 million) investment is part of a wider strategy by the companies to expand into each other’s lucrative home markets.

“We are fully confident that by working closely together, Air Works and EAG can build a strong franchise in the emerging aviation markets of India and the Middle East,” says Air Works managing director Vivek Gour.

EAG co-founder and executive director Steve Hartley says: “This partnership will help EAG to broaden our business base and service offering in the Middle East and India and beyond. The timing is absolutely right as the global avi-ation sector recovers, and this move will help accelerate EAG’s growth and development as a re-gional and international player.”

FORECAST KATE SARSFIELD LONDON

Sustained growth to return in 2013, says BombardierAirframer forecasts deliveries of 24,000 business jets by 2031, but warns that current market indicators are mixed

Bom

bard

ier

Deliveries of the midsize Learjet 85 will begin next year

For more information on Embraer’s Phenom 100, visit flightglobal.com/phenom100

CERTIFICATION

Milestone for US Phenoms

STRATEGY

Air Works builds Empire with buy

FIN_260612_018-019.indd 18 21/6/12 13:13:44

BUSINESS AVIATION


Piaggio to stretch P180’s range for special missionsGENERAL AVIATION P20

NetJets’ global fleet totals 760 aircraft serving 7,000 customers

NetJets’ record-smashing spend-ing spree this month on $9.6

billion of business jets from Bom-bardier and Cessna is reminiscent of the heydays of private aviation in general and fractional owner-ship in particular. Headline-grab-bing orders for dozens of new jets were the norm at trade shows in the late 1990s and mid-2000s for the world’s largest business air-craft operator and fractional pro-vider, helping boost production lines and profitability of those manufacturers with products on NetJets’ shopping list.

WHAT LOYALTY?The loyalty to established brands – Dassault, Gulfstream, Hawker Beechcraft (HBC) and Cessna – by then chief executive Richard San-tulli was undiminished until his abrupt departure in 2009. But the economic downturn marked a change of strategy for NetJets and investor parent Berkshire Hatha-way. As customer numbers dwin-dled, it was forced to slash its vast order backlog. While all NetJets suppliers suffered cancellations, HBC and Dassault bore the brunt.

Flightglobal’s Ascend Online database shows Netjets’ order for Dassault Falcons has plummeted

Fractional provider’s record-breaking spending spree is great news for Bombardier and Cessna, but a major blow to others

Canny NetJets plays the field FRACTIONAL OWNERSHIP KATE SARSFIELD LONDON

since 2008 from 91 to zero. In the same period, its order and option total for HBC types fell from 236 aircraft to two super-midsize Hawker 4000s. Indeed, NetJets’ cancellation in 2009 of a tranche of Hawker 400XP orders played a major part in the decision to sus-pend production of the light cabin business jet.

As an added blow, the French and US airframers have been ex-cluded from NetJets’ latest outlay. In contrast, Bombardier has been welcomed into the NetJets family for the first time and chalked up nearly $14 billion of orders and op-tions in the past 15 months from two record-breaking deals. These include 120 Global 5000s, 6000s,

7000s and 8000s and 225 Chal-lenger 300 and 605s that will form part of the company’s large-cabin, long-range and midsize offering. “This is a clear endorsement of Bombardier’s product line,” says vice-president analysis at Teal Group Richard Aboulafia. “The Challenger 300 order in particular represents another blow to the Hawker 4000, which once looked set to benefit from NetJets.”

SHOPPING AROUNDAs a further kick to HBC, Em-braer’s Phenom 300 looks set to be NetJets’ key light jet offering, the company having placed an order for up to 125 of the type. HBC and Dassault declined to comment on the recent deals, but NetJets chief executive Jordan Hansell insists its purchase decisions are purely objective. “When we make pur-chase decisions, we bring in all the relevant departments from across the company to do a top-to-tail analysis of all the competing aircraft and how they will best meet the needs of our customers.”

But Aboulafia believes NetJets’ buying habits are “extremely fick-le”. Before the Phenom 300 order he says “they had ordered scores of Citation jets and Hawkers”, which “came with much fanfare and celebration, but resulted in exactly nothing”. “NetJets’ recent purchases are an indication the company shops around for the

best deal possible, meaning that large orders like these will likely come with heavy discounts and lower profit margins,” he adds.

Flightglobal Ascend analysis shows the price for winning a NetJets order can be high. As part of the deal for the Phenom 300s, Embraer took on 25 Citation Ultras, the youngest of which had been in service with Netjets for 11 years, it says. Embraer has sold these air-craft on to a broker, “but most of them remain unplaced”. Mean-while Embraer has only delivered one Phenom 300 to NetJets. As part of the Global 5000/6000/7000/8000 deal, Flightglobal Ascend points out that Bombardier ended up the owner of over 60 “high-mileage” aircraft. Meanwhile not a single Global has been delivered to the fractional provider. Hansell says the new aircraft will form part of a “top-to-tail” overhaul of its fleet. “We will need new aircraft over the horizon when the market fi-nally recovers,” he says.

NetJets’ global fleet totals 760 aircraft serving more than 7,000 customers. Part of company strategy is to limit the number of fleet types within each of its light, medium and large-cabin/long-range categories to “no more than two to improve our operational efficiency”. As the Global family is set to dominate the upper end of the NetJets sta-ble when deliveries begin in the fourth quarter, this puts the large cabin Gulfstream G450/G550 – for which NetJets has 63 orders – in a precarious position.

Aboulafia says: “NetJets now seems to be on the right track. They have the best chance of achieving profitability, although that will likely involve scaling back their ambitions to help firm up pricing. That’s the only way forward, given the realities of the market.”

NetJ

ets

NETJETS ORDERS AND OPTIONS

Light cabin Orders Options

Phenom 300 50 75

Midsize cabin

Hawker 4000 2 –

Citation Sovereign 26 –

Citation Latitude 25 125

Challenger 300 75 125

Large cabin/Long range

Bombardier Challenger 605 25 50

Bombardier Global 5000 15 15




Gulfstream G450 30 –

Gulfstream G550 33 –

Total 316 445SOURCE: Flightglobal Ascend

For news from the business and general aviation sectors, go to flightglobal.com/bizav

FIN_260612_018-019.indd 19 21/6/12 13:13:47

GENERAL AVIATION


Explore 100 years of aviation history as it appeared in the original pages of Flight: flightglobal.com/archive

NEPTUNE CRASH PROBESUS safety investigators are

studying two separate

Lockheed P2V Neptune aerial

firefighting tanker accidents on

3 June, both involved in efforts

to extinguish or contain wild-

fires. The first – a Neptune

Aviation Services P2V-7 (regis-

tration N14447) – was flying

under contract to the US Forest

Service when it crashed near

the “White Rock fire” in Iron

County, Utah killing both pilots.

Later in the day, a P2V (registra-

tion N355MA) built in 1957 and

owned by Minden Air, sustained

damage after landing with par-

tially extended landing gear at

Minden-Tahoe airport, Nevada.

Both crew were uninjured.

Catastrophic structural failure

was a key element in several

high-profile tanker crashes in

the early 2000s, leading to re-

tirement of certain models and

increased structural attention

on the remaining aircraft.

BELL’S CHINA SCHOOLBell Helicopter and Guanchen

Aviation have signed a memo-

randum of understanding to

open China’s first Bell-authorised

flight training school in China.

The school will be in the city of

Anyang in China’s eastern Henan

province. Following an internal

training cycle, the school will

provide initial and recurrent type

training for the Bell 206L and

Bell 407. More types could be

added to the school’s curriculum

in the future, says Bell.

DA42 WING WORRIES The US Federal Aviation

Administration filed a notice of

proposed rule-making for a pro-

posed airworthiness directive

covering Diamond Aircraft’s

DA42, DA42 NG and DA42 M-NG

piston twins. Operators are re-

quired to identify and correct

“excessive voids in the adhesive

joint between the centre wing

spars and the upper centre wing

skins”. The condition, it says,

could cause the wing to fail,

leading to loss of control of

the aircraft.

IN BRIEF

Piaggio Aero is developing two extended-range versions of its

P180 Avanti II for the surveillance market – a growing business it sees as compensating for stagnat-ing executive aircraft sales. It hopes to have the variants in serv-ice by 2015.

Although it is still working on details, the Italian company plans to install upright fuel tanks at the rear of the cabin in the space oc-cupied by the lavatory and ward-robe on the VIP version of the six-seat twin-pusher turboprop. It will also extend the wing, togeth-er with the vertical tailplane and the canards at the front of the fu-selage, although the fuselage will not change. One version will add 400lb (180kg) of additional fuel and about 250nm (460km) to the aircraft’s 1,470nm range. A sec-ond variant will allow for 800lb of extra fuel, adding 500nm.

SYSTEMS SUPPLIERSPiaggio also has the option of up-rating its 850shp (630kW) Pratt & Whitney Canada PT-6A engines, which have been flat rated from 1,600hp. Two systems suppliers have been selected – Saab and Selex Galileo.

Chief executive Alberto Galassi hopes to announce a launch deal for what he calls “the first child of a new family” at February’s IDEX defence exhibition in Abu Dhabi.

The company has struggled to sell VIP versions of its midsize

business aircraft in recent years. Deliveries of the twin-pusher tur-boprop fell to only 11 aircraft in 2010, recovering slightly to 14 last year. However, Piaggio has been encouraged by interest from the government and parapublic market, which has been increas-ingly viewing the P180 as a more fuel-efficient alternative to jets and larger aircraft for missions such as marine surveillance and flight inspection, says Galassi. He expects special-mission aircraft to make up about half of all P180 deliveries within a few years.

“Although it has been designed as a business aircraft, it is a very flexible platform suitable for many applications, including long-endurance patrol as well as defence and surveillance,” he says. “We are expecting a big de-mand in coming years.”

At last November’s Dubai air show, Piaggio signed a deal for

five special-mission P180s with Flight Inspections and Systems, the Russian agency which carries out airborne inspections of the country’s ground-based air navi-gation equipment. The first has just been delivered and negotia-tions are under way for a follow-up order of up to 50 more aircraft. Piaggio has also just handed over the last of three specially config-ured P180s to Italy’s ENAV, which carries out similar missions in Italy as well as for Kenya, Libya, Malta and Romania.

The aircraft is fitted with 20 ad-ditional sensors and a cabin con-sole built by Oslo-based Norwe-gian Special Mission. As well as flight inspection aircraft, the Ital-ian military and other agencies fly a total of nine P180s in mari-time and territorial surveillance configuration. A further 18 are in service as air ambulances. See Feature P24

COVER STORY MURDO MORRISON ROME

Piaggio to stretch P180’s range for special missionsItalian airframer believes thriving sector will make up for stagnant VIP aircraft market

Gama Aviation’s long-standing contract to provide aerial

medical support for the Scottish Ambulance Service has been re-newed until 2020.

The Farnborough, UK-head-quartered company has been pro-viding the service since 1993.

Gama’s Scottish fleet includes two Beechcraft King Air 200Cs based at Aberdeen and Glasgow air-ports, and a pair of Eurocopter EC135T2s based at Glasgow and Inverness. The light, twin-engined helicopters will be replaced in 2014 with the larger, longer-range

EC145T2s. These aircraft will be supported, when required, by two EC225 Super Puma medium twins, which are based in Shet-land and Aberdeen.

Pia

ggio

Italian agency ENAV operates three P180s for flight inspection

For news from the business and general aviation sectors, go to flightglobal.com/bizav

Gama renews Scottish medevac dealAIR AMBULANCE KATE SARSFIELD LONDON

FIN_260612_020 20 21/6/12 13:00:18

TECHNOLOGY


Space tourism to be a trillion-dollar marketBUSINESS P22

DESIGN DAN THISDELL LONDON

Engineering is headed for a mash-upInspired by music sampling, one design student is creating a simple tool to digitise, combine and analyse 3D objects

For those seeking a glimpse into the future – or simply out

to enjoy the often-humbling blast of creative energy generated by mostly young people being trained to shape the world – the student show at London’s Royal College of Art rarely disappoints.

This year’s end-of-term event at the college’s Kensington cam-pus was no exception, underscor-ing – on its 175th anniversary – its global reputation as a crucible for the fusion of design, engineer-ing, materials and ideas.

Design department projects are often aimed at challenging estab-lished ways of thinking. What, asks Mark McKeague, will cities of the future sound like when we all drive electric cars?

Or what, asks Jaemin Paik, will our families be like when tech-nology pushes lifespans to 150 years? How, wonders Joseph Pop-per, would life be for an astronaut on a one-way voyage into very deep space? Eirik Helgesen ob-serves that an Alcoa plant in Ice-land produces 940t of aluminium a day, but none is used locally – what could local craftsmen do with the offcuts?

However, one tantalisingly practical concept for real-world engineering comes from Ben Alun-Jones. Inspired by sam-pling and remixing in computer programming and music, Alun-Jones is developing a set of com-puter tools capable of combining

readily available scanning tech-nology and increasingly afforda-ble 3D printing machines to cre-ate 3D counterparts to the “mash-ups” so popular with mu-sicians and listeners.

At the heart of Alun-Jones’ idea is inexpensive, video camera-based spatial mapping technolo-gy like that found inside a Micro-soft Xbox Kinect gaming console. By “photographing” gamers in action, Kinect translates motion into commands. The same soft-ware, says Alun-Jones, can, when

fed a video image of an object, be adapted to command a 3D printer to make a copy.

To demonstrate his “Remix” system, Alun-Jones switched on the video camera in his iPhone and walked around a marble bust of Hadrian in the British Muse-um. His system then printed a copy for display at the RCA, pic-tured above.

Using this technique, he says, anyone could produce a library of shapes much as they hold a music

library or photo album today. Then, with other software he has developed, those shapes can be cut and “mashed” into new, novel forms – and printed out.

Alun-Jones, whose undergradu-ate degree is in electrical engineer-ing, notes that while today’s com-puter-aided design (CAD) programmes are far more capable, they take lots of training to use. But he hopes that by reducing a set of about five computer tools he is working with to only one, which may even be held on a smartphone, he can “democratise design”.

As it stands, he says, Remix is “just the first step of taking physi-cal objects into the digital realm”. But, he believes: “CAD isn’t the future. Everything is moving to mobile [technology]. If you can capture it on your mobile, why not design it on your mobile?”

With Kinect boxes costing less than $100 and 3D printers going for as little as $5,000, a smart-phone-based design studio may not be so far away, although for the moment elaborate shapes such as the bust of Hadrian de-mand lots of computer time.

Alun-Jones recognises that, as in the music industry, digital mash-up technology could prove hugely disruptive in engineering. And he admits Remix could make life easier for the proverbial Chi-nese intellectual property thief to whip out an iPhone and bring home a copy of, say, an Airbus

A320 winglet – giving even greater importance to the “no photogra-phy” signs at factory gates.

MANY ITERATIONSBut he believes copyright holders should not be too afraid of getting ripped-off, because easy-to-use digital design tools promise great things for legitimate use. Digitised shapes are scalable, he notes, so if something can be seen from a sat-ellite or through a microscope it can be mashed into a new design.

Moreover, he says, the image his software produces is a mesh of the surface but it should be possi-ble to feed that mesh into software capable of analysing stress and mechanical properties based on assumptions about thickness and materials. “That’s hard,” he says, “but not a huge leap.”

What Alun-Jones wants to see is for engineers to scan successful solutions – bridge trusses or birds’ skeletons, say, might be in-teresting to aircraft designers – and use them as component parts of new forms.

That technique is, of course, familiar to CAD users. But armed with Remix, a mobile phone and a desktop 3D printer, imagine how quickly – and cheaply – those designers could work through many iterations of a de-sign idea.

Ben A

lun-Jones/D

an T

his

dell/

Flig

htg

lobal

Frames like this one from a walk-round iPhone video of a marble bust, left, made the copy at right; Remix tools could give him horns

Even the sky isn’t the limit for Kinect gaming technology: flightglobal.com/kinect

“With Kinect boxes costing less than $100 and 3D printers as little as $5,000, a smartphone-based design studio may not be so far away”

FIN_260612_021 21 21/6/12 12:52:48

BUSINESS

flightglobal.com

Good week

Bad week


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ONLINE TICKETING According to online pay-

ment services provider

WorldPay, two-thirds of

airline merchants are

seeing fraud levels hold

or increase and 1.5% of

booking revenue is lost

to fraud. And, warns

WorldPay, losses look

set to increase, with 29%

of airlines reporting that

incidents of fraud have

risen in the past year.

Fortunately, most cus-

tomers would be happy

to accept more robust

security checks and

slower processing when

buying tickets online.

BAMBINOS Alitalia is

reaching out to parents

with free travel for chil-

dren up to age 12 on all

domestic and interna-

tional flights between 2

July and 30 November.

The promotion kicks off

a fare restructuring that

slashes 44 fare options

to only five fixed-price

offers on the Rome-Milan

route, where the carrier

competes head-to-head

with rail. Alitalia adds

that deliveries are on

track to complete a fleet

renewal plan in which it

will retire its Boeing

MD-80s by early 2013.

PERSONAL SPACEFLIGHT DAN THISDELL LONDON

Big bucks and bold goingSuborbital tourism may be the first step to a trillion-dollar industry

Space tourism – taking private citizens beyond the Earth’s

atmosphere for a fee – is destined to become a trillion-dollar mar-ket. So says Andrew Nelson, any-way, who actually said “multi-trillion” to a packed house at the Royal Aeronautical Society earli-er this month.

Perhaps Nelson would make such a bold claim, being the chief operating officer at Xcor Aero-space, the Mojave-based rocket engines maker which is develop-ing the Lynx two-seat reusable suborbital spaceplane. But even allowing Nelson some wiggle room for exuberance, thousand-billions are really big bucks – the gross domestic product of the USA, for example, is a little more than $14 trillion. Or, as Nelson told the RAeS’s space tourism conference last week, the global electricity generation market is worth only some $300 billion, airlines in 2009 turned over about $500 billion, e-commerce rings up a short trillion and luxury goods rake in about $1.2 trillion.

That last figure, though, in-cludes $270 billion spent on “ex-periences in luxury travel”, a chunk of money at the heart of Nelson’s argument. Space tour-ism, he insists, is not only about a few rich dilettantes riding to the edge of space for the ultimate “I-was-here” photo opportunity; rather, these early adopters are paving the way for ordinary trav-ellers and for business opportuni-ties as unimaginable today as to-day’s internet-enabled activities would have been 20 years ago.

MONEY MATTERSIf Nelson knows of what he speaks – and his career includes 20 years in aerospace engineering and consultancy and eight on Wall Street – it is time to start thinking of space tourism as merely the beginning of a dramat-ic era of technical and commer-cial development. Speaking later in the day, Virgin Galactic com-mercial director Stephen Atten-

Better book now

Rex

Featu

res

Rex

Featu

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borough put forward a compel-ling argument for suborbital tourism as only a beginning. Gov-ernment technology often gets an industry started, he argued, but it is rarely the best way to exploit new capabilities. Telecoms and the internet are but two examples and: “Space is important.”

Evidence of that importance comes in the form of more than 500 deposit-paying Virgin “astro-nauts” waiting for a service that is not yet active, and about 400 more signed up to fly with other suborbital services. Tom Shelley, president of Space Adventures, the US company that has flown seven people in Russian rockets to destinations as ambitious as the International Space Station, told the conference he is con-vinced that, once flights begin, the “gates will open”. Attenbor-ough reckons that even at $200,000 a ticket, Virgin will struggle to meet demand.

Shelley is in no doubt there are plenty of wealthy people to fuel such growth. At the top of the market, Space Adventures has one customer lined up for a $150 million round-the-Moon trip and is in talks with another to fill a Soyuz flight.

Lower down the price spec-trum, $50 million orbital flights may prove harder to sell, but the consensus is it is only a matter of time before suborbital flights be-come widely affordable. Along the way some businesses will, of

course fail, says Nelson. But what ultimately suggests the industry as a whole is on to a winner is that companies involved are ex-tremely customer-focused. Shel-ley describes Space Adventures as a tour organiser, a type of com-pany that is nothing if not cus-tomer-focused.

Virgin Galactic, as Attenbor-ough pointed out, has Richard Branson at the helm and his “deep appreciation of entrepreneurial risk control, transportation, safety, procurement and brand”. And, he added, its first move in 2004, even before formally setting Burt Rutan and Scaled Composites to work developing its hardware, was to test the market. When a few peo-ple paid $200,000 up front to be among the first to fly, Virgin Galac-tic decided to press ahead.

Customer focus has resulted in a better product, he said, particu-larly a larger spacecraft than first envisaged that is capable enough to open doors to other business opportunities. These include car-rying research payloads or launching orbital satellites or, in a hint at another aspect of that tril-lion-dollar market, long-haul travel in suborbital space.

Dreams like that may no longer be the realm of science fiction. Nelson showed a picture of the Pan-Am space clipper from the film 2001: A Space Odyssey and said, without raising any eye-brows in the room: “One day it’s going to happen.”

FIN_260612_022-023 22 21/6/12 12:49:23

BUSINESS

flightglobal.com

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“Europe poses a very serious downside to outlook”

International Air Transport

Association chief economist

BRIAN PEARCE sees recovery

in air freight and improving

prospects in North America but

expects European carriers to

lose $1.1 billion this year


PEOPLE MOVESOBE for avionics, Bargate Murray, Inmarsat, Sigma Space

Hawkes: CAA man earns OBE

Mills: Inmarsat Global Xpress

DEFENCE CUTS HURT TOO MUCH, WARNS LOCKHEEDBUDGET Lockheed Martin chief executive Bob Stevens has spoken

out strongly against the $500 million US defence budget cuts that will

kick in from January 2013 unless Congress intervenes. He says

Lockheed has closed 139,000m2 (1.5 million ft2) of facilities and will

close another 270,000m2 by the end of 2014. It has also cut its work-

force by 18% in the past three years. He also warned the cuts could

leave many of Lockheed’s 40,000 suppliers financially unstable.

NORTHSTAR HOPES FOR BUYOUT SAVIOURRESTRUCTURE Gears and transmission parts maker Northstar

Aerospace has entered bankruptcy protection in a bid to sell the

company to private equity investor Wynnchurch Capital for approxi-

mately $70 million, pending higher bids placed before 14 July.

Lenders agreeing to debtor-in-possession financing include Boeing,

with $7 million. Northstar made a pre-tax profit of $3.1 million on

sales of $143 million in the nine months to end-September 2011

but had long-term debt at that date of $48 million, up from only $12

million at the start of 2010.

LEIBHERR BOOSTS MICHIGAN CAPACITYMAINTENANCE Liebherr Aerospace has doubled the size of its

Americas customer service centre at Saline, Michigan to 9,300m2

(100,000ft2). The facility maintains air management, flight control/

actuation and landing gear systems for Airbus, AgustaWestland, ATR,

Bombardier, Dassault, Embraer, Eurocopter and Gulfstream aircraft.

UMECO EYES A350 SURGESUPPLY CHAIN Composite materials supplier Umeco posted a

14% rise to £81.7 million ($129 million) in aerospace and defence

sales in its year to end-March. The company is gearing up to supply

the Airbus A350 programme and is marking growth from Boeing 787

production. During the year, Umeco sold its Pattonair distribution

business and is set to be acquired itself, by Cytec for £274 million.

BOEING EXPANDS TRAINING CAPACITY IN CHINATRAINING Boeing has expanded its Flight Services airline training

business in China. The airframer has set up a 787 training suite for

pilot and maintenance training and installed a Boeing 747-400 full-

flight simulator at its Shanghai training campus. The new equipment

adds to the existing 757/767 full-flight simulator at the facility.

CAE TO OPEN SEOUL SIMULATOR FACILITY

EXPANSION Canadian training equipment and services provider

CAE will open a pilot training centre near Seoul’s Gimpo International

airport, with a Boeing 737-800 full-flight simulator and integrated

procedures trainer. CAE’s second civil aviation training facility in

Korea will be operational from autumn of 2012.

BOMBARDIER TO SET UP SHOP IN CASABLANCAMANUFACTURING Bombardier is to set up a component manufac-

turing plant in Casablanca. Components to be made have not been

detailed, but the eight-year, $200 million investment at the Midparc

Casablanca Free Zone should start first production in 2013.

WORLDWIDE, AVIAPARTNER TO MERGEGROUND HANDLING Worldwide Flight Services and Aviapartner are

to merge, creating a near €1 billion ($1.27 billion) revenue business,

which the companies claim will be Europe’s largest and the world’s

second-largest ground handling services company.

BUSINESS BRIEFS

Miranda Mills, who was UK national director for Astrium’s Earth observation division after spending 14 years with Airbus, has joined Inmarsat as VP Aerospace for the Global Xpress network, based in Nyon, Switzerland. London law firm Bargate Murray has hired former JetEx Flight Support general counsel Alfred Merckx to head up a new aviation department to focus on business aviation and complement the firm’s superyacht practice. Former senior-level NASA engineer Michael Hagopian has joined Sigma Space as senior VP engineering.

Former CAA head of avionics Daniel Hawkes has been appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the Queen’s 2012 birthday honours list. Hawkes began his aviation career as an apprentice with BOAC, qualifying in 1962 as a radio maintenance engineer before joining the Concorde project to test avionics systems. He joined the CAA’s predecessor the Air Registration Board as an airworthiness surveyor in 1970 and spent 34 years with the regulator before becoming an advisor to Eurocontrol and chairing its group on unmanned aircraft in European airspace.

Piaggio aims P180 at special-missions marketFEATURE P24

Kelly

Bra

nnan

Inm

ars

at

IATA

FIN_260612_022-023 23 21/6/12 12:49:26

flightglobal.com

COVER STORY


MURDO MORRISON ROME

Piaggio believes the P180 VIP turboprop can crack the special-missions market as states look for lower-cost solutions for surveillance and inspection

PIAGGIO’S STRATEGIC RESTYLING

Italy’s air traffic services provider ENAV has a fleet of three Piaggio P180s

Alberto Galassi quickly sketches two graphs on the whiteboard in his Rome office. The first – a sharp downward curve stubbornly an-

chored at the bottom – represents the busi-ness aviation market’s sharp fall from grace during the past three years and current stag-nation. The other – a mirror image – illus-trates the glowing prospects for the special-missions market, including air ambulances, maritime patrol and flight inspection aircraft, explains the Piaggio Aero chief executive.

It is a market the Genoa-based maker of the P180 Avanti II believes it can crack in a big way. The $7 million twin-pusher turbo-prop – conceived in the 1990s as a fuel-effi-cient but aspirational VIP transport, with a touch of Italian design classic about it – was never intended as a special-missions plat-

FIN_260612_024-027.indd 24 21/6/12 11:52:29


PIAGGIO

form. Piaggio, however, has enjoyed some success in the market.

Of 220 P180s in service, 32 are in special-mission configuration, including 18 air am-bulances and nine maritime/territorial sur-veillance aircraft. The Polish air rescue service and Royal Canadian Mounted Police use three P180s in medevac configuration; all the others are deployed in Italy by the military or other state agencies.

Galassi, however, believes this number can only grow as more governments and parapublic organisations look for lower-cost solutions to a range of surveillance and other mission requirements – something in-creasingly possible because sensors and on-board systems have become much smaller and lighter in the past decade.

It means equipment which previously re-quired a platform the size of a Boeing 737 or ATR can now be accommodated on a mid-

size business aircraft such as the Avanti II. He believes non-VIP variants will represent about half of Piaggio’s deliveries within a few years.

Piaggio is so confident about market pros-pects it plans to develop two new extended-range variants of the P180 specifically for special mission, and is targeting a 2015 in-service date (see General Aviation P20).

LAUNCH CUSTOMERThe company, which is majority owned by Abu Dhabi’s state investment arm Mubadala and India’s Tata group, hopes to announce a launch customer at next February’s IDEX defence show in Abu Dhabi. Although Ga-lassi will not reveal the customer, the fact Mubadala is fairly hands-on in terms of Pi-aggio strategy and the choice of IDEX pro-vide some clues.

The flight inspections area is one to

Bill

yPix

“A VIP version of the extended-range P180? Never say never”ALBERTO GALASSI Chief executive, Piaggio Aero

FIN_260612_024-027.indd 25 21/6/12 11:52:31


COVER STORY

These allow ENAV to take a relief crew on missions far from its base at Rome’s secondary Ciampino airport. ENAV is responsible for about 40 Italian airports.

The organisation, which employs a total of 18 pilots and eight systems operators, is also expanding its overseas activities, earlier this year signing contracts to validate and calibrate the radio signals from airport navigation sys-tems in Kenya and Romania.

ENAV also carried out work in Libya earlier this year to get the air navigation infrastruc-ture up and running again after the civil war. Based on this third-party success, the organi-sation is targeting a 30% increase in revenues next year, something that would necessitate a fourth P180.

The fleet of P180s will perform about 2,000h a year, roughly 700h each. A typical mission lasts about 3-3.5h, with 6h the usual daily limit. A total inspection of an airport’s equipment can take up to three days, including the flight to the city, although some are much quicker, often involving an urgent calibration of a single piece of misfunctioning kit.

The P180s have replaced ageing Cessna

The P180s use about 400 litres per hour – about half that needed by the Citations on a similar mission. Part of that is down to lighteronboard equipment

which Piaggio is paying particular atten-tion. At last November’s Dubai air show, the company announced the delivery of the first of five P180s ordered by Flight Inspections and Systems (FIS), the Russian agency tasked with carrying out airborne inspections of ground-based navigation aids at the country’s airports. Negotiations are taking place for a follow-up order for up to 50 aircraft, which are likely to include the new variants, some of which may be assembled in Russia. FIS operates Soviet-era Antonov An-26s and An-24B turboprops.

Closer to home, the flight inspections arm of Italy’s air traffic provider ENAV, which per-forms similar duties to FIS in Italy as well as under contract in Kenya, Malta and Romania, has just taken delivery of the third of three P180s, the first of which arrived in 2009.

The aircraft, which is fitted with an on-board mission system by Norwegian Special Mission, flies with a crew of three: a captain, first officer and flight technician.

The latter sits at the console and takes read-ings from the ground-based navigation aids,

including radar and instrument landing sys-tems, analysing them in real time as the air-craft performs a series of orchestrated flightpaths over the airport.

Some 20 additional sensors on the fuse-lage, including a vertical camera on the air-craft’s belly, record the radio signals being transmitted from below. If necessary, equip-ment can be calibrated by ground staff as the aircraft passes over using information from the on-board computer. The data provides the information civil aviation authorities need to re-certificate the equipment, most of which is required to be inspected every six to 12 months.

ECONOMY STYLEThe outfitting of the P180s’ cabins and the in-stallation of sensors were carried out at Piag-gio’s factory in Genoa. Aside from the console – which costs almost as much as the green air-craft itself – the Avanti comes with four addi-tional economy-style seats – comfortable enough, but a far cry from the leather arm-chairs on the VIP version – and a rear lavatory.

Sensors on the P180’s fuse-lage record radio signals transmitted from below

ENAV employs a total of 18 pilots

Bill

yPix

FIN_260612_024-027.indd 26 21/6/12 11:52:35


PIAGGIO

WE JOINED an ENAV crew –

headed by the organisation’s

flight operations director Capt

Enzo Maria Feliziani and com-

prising a co-pilot and mission

system operator – on a short

flight inspection sortie over the

small Perugia airport in

Umbria, about 119nm

(220km) north of ENAV’s

Rome Ciampino base.

The purpose of the flight

was to check three aspects of

the airport’s navigation guides,

and after completing the

26min journey from Ciampino

we performed three manoeu-

vres. On most missions about

20 runs would be carried out,

but all are a variation of the

three basic sweeps.

The first, known as “alpha”,

involved a low-level approach,

descending from 3,500ft to

50ft to test the glidescope.

“Charlie six” is an arc between

two points 45˚ from the runway

axis, flown at 2,500ft. This is to

check the localiser signal has

sufficient width. The final ma-

noeuvre, “lima” for level flight,

is a loop from 2nm to 10nm

from the end of the runway to

test the width of the glidepath.

A debriefing following the

flight, at which the flight in-

spection data was collated,

confirmed all the equipment at

Perugia was working well with-

in official parameters.

Perugia’s sleepy airport

made it a relatively easy mis-

sion for the ENAV crew. At busi-

er airports, the flight

inspection division has to work

closely with air traffic controller

colleagues to slot in its test

runs between arriving and de-

parting airliners.

MISSION MURDO MORRISON PERUGIA

JOINING ENAV FOR A LOW PASS OVER PERUGIA

ON THE WEBSIGNAL READING

For a video of our flight

over Perugia and an inter-

view with Capt Feliziani

about why the organisa-

tion opted for P180s, go

to flightglobal.com/enav

Citation jets, the last of which, a Citation VI, will be phased out this summer. ENAV’s di-rector of flight operations Capt Enzo Maria Feliziani says the P180s use about 400 litres (105 USgal) per hour – about half that needed by the Citations on a similar mission.

Part of that is down to the onboard equip-ment – although the console adds 227kg (500lb), the kit is lighter than the previous-generation versions installed on the Citations. In addition, the acquisition cost of a new, sim-ilarly sized Cessna Excel would be about twice that of the P180, says Feliziani.

Back at Piaggio’s Rome office, Galassi re-mains as downbeat about the immediate pros-pects for business aviation as he is optimistic about the special-missions market. It is one reason the company’s long-mooted jet project remains on ice.

Although design work has been carried out on the project, Piaggio has signed up suppli-ers, and Galassi even spoke at the Dubai air show of a special-missions variant. He con-cedes: “You will not see a launch this year.” The jet – thought to be based on a larger plat-form than the P180 – would take Piaggio into a highly competitive light jet segment in which several brands are struggling, includ-ing the Hawker 400XP and Premier IA and Embraer Phenom 300.

Neither does Galassi see much of a market for a VIP version of the extended-range P180: most executive flights on an Avanti are rela-tively short because of the cabin size, and cus-tomers would not sacrifice speed for added endurance, he believes. “But never say never,” he adds.

An ENAV flight technician takes readings from ground-based navigation aids

Bill

yPix

Bill

yPix

FIN_260612_024-027.indd 27 21/6/12 11:52:40

flightglobal.com

SPECIAL MISSIONS


ANDREW HEALEY LONDON

Perhaps because purpose-built un-manned air vehicles have become a fact of life in the skies over Afghanistan, the introduction last December of a full-

size helicopter, converted into an “optionally piloted” airborne delivery truck, generated little attention. Yet the unmanned Kaman Aerospace K-MAX represents, arguably, not only a greater technical achievement but a bigger step towards a future where commercial aircraft with empty cockpits ply their trade.

Expensive piloting skills are no longer re-quired within Marine Unmanned Aerial Vehi-cle Squadron 1. Whenever one of the two K-MAX currently attached to its Cargo Resup-ply component is tasked, an NCO (not pilot-qualified) climbs in and starts it up. He then switches control to another NCO at the nearby main operating base, climbs out and walks away. NCO No 2 presses a button to send the helicopter off on its flight plan. At its destina-tion, a grunt in a foxhole guides it to the land-ing zone with a games console. When it lands back at base, another operator gets back in and shuts it down.

K-MAX has completed its first six-month trial in Helmand and has already been extend-ed to the end of the fiscal year (in September); the contract allows for one further extension. Since its arrival in December 2011, it has flown over 400 missions and transported 1.3 million pounds of kit, both to and from USMC combat outposts. Payloads range from a single 4,200lb (1,900kg) sling load to 28,800lb lifted in a single day. During March alone it ferried over half a million pounds of cargo. It can lift up to 6,000lb of cargo at sea level, or 4,000lb at 15,000ft density altitude.

AUTOPILOT FUNCTIONThe helicopter flies five or six missions on the trot, invariably by night and at altitude, guid-ed either by its autopilot along GPS way-points, or by a ground controller. “Handling” of the flight controls remains an autopilot function throughout.

With the flightplan uploaded it can take off and depart autonomously from the main op-erating base. As it approaches the forward op-erating base (FOB), marines will put “eyes on the aircraft” using NVG, initiate a positive handover from the main operating base and use a hand controller – familiar to video gam-ers – to input simple left-right, up-down com-mands to position loads over the selected landing zone – or anywhere else they want it.

K-MAX features a four-hook cargo carousel that allows it to deposit loads at multiple loca-tions during a single round-trip. The platform can be re-tasked at any stage. The outbound loads typically contain food, water and am-munition but there is the opportunity for two-

PILOTLESS POTENTIAL

Kaman’s unmanned K-MAX matures a half-century-old concept and

heralds a future of UAV flexibility

The K-MAX can lift up to 2,700kg of cargo at sea level

Kam

an A

ero

space

FIN_260612_028-029.indd 28 21/6/12 12:02:02


K-MAX

The helicopter remained “populated” – air-space and safety regulations prohibit un-manned flights on US soil. The individual was finally dispensed with after a short period of in-country trials in December.

Kaman has ploughed a solitary furrow to-wards the goal of unmanned helicopters since 1957 (search for “You asked for it” on YouTube to see how simple they made it look. Even the TV presenter got the hang of it). Dur-ing tests at White Sands during the 1970s, a pilotless UH-1 served as a testbed for roles such as artillery spotting and comms relay, and surveillance using a video camera and, later, an EO/IR turret. As for the autopilot, the absence of a tail rotor made the integration of dual-redundant actuators on each flight-con-trol linkage less problematic that it might oth-erwise have been.

Marines serving with the Cargo Resupply Detachment of MUAVS# 1 have helped create new procedures for the aircraft, for safety, landing zone and airspace coordination. One controller says he has been surprised and im-pressed by the aircraft’s performance: “The precision of the system is amazing.”

Notwithstanding the relative skill-sets in-volved, Kaman UAS product group general manager Terry Fogerty has noted how, once an NCO operator takes charge of the K-MAX for the first time, the mood alters in a familiar

For all the latest news on developments in unmanned air vehicles, pay a visit to flightglobal.com/uav

K-MAX AT A GLANCE

Empty weight 2,334kg/5,145lb

Useful load 3,109/6,855

Max gross weight (with load) 5,443/12,000

Hover IGE (4,000ft/35°C) 5,443/12,000

Hover OGE 5,216/11,500

Max airspeed (with load) 148kph/80kt

Max endurance (no reserve) 2hr 41min

Range (with load) 400km/214nm

SOURCE: Kaman Aerospace

way traffic, for example if the patrol needs to return equipment for repair.

During earlier trials in Arizona, the heli-copter dropped 10 GPS-guided JPADS (para-chute-steered payloads), two of which were released remotely from the ground control station. Four parachutes with containers, each weighing 1,100lb, were airdropped at two- to three-second intervals, from 2,000ft AGL at 60kt airspeed.

FAST, RELIABLEMaj Kyle O’Connor, detachment officer for MUAVS# 1, who is overseeing the deploy-ment, says that the Marine Corps had been looking for ways to get trucks off the road for some time. “We wanted a fast, reliable plat-form to resupply our combat outposts without putting Marines in more danger of IEDs.”

Serviceability has been high, with the heli-copter requiring less than one maintenance man-hour per flight hour. “It’s such a new sys-tem that there isn’t a lot of reliability data,” says O’Connor. “The latest extension will give us more time to gather performance data from [within] the operational environment.”

The K-MAX first came to the notice of the USMC in 1998, when Kaman demonstrated its BURRO (broad area unmanned responsive re-supply operation) concept in the Arizona desert. The idea was to resupply Marines be-yond the line-of-advance during a beach as-sault, without putting lives at risk. It is a tactic currently little in demand. These trials never dispensed with the pilot altogether, but there was talk of a single, manned K-MAX supervis-ing a gaggle of load-carrying UAVs.

AFGHAN CAMPAIGNIn March 2007, to make it more attractive to the requirements of the Afghan campaign, it formed a strategic partnership with Lockheed Martin, with the latter taking the prime con-tractor role. The corporation integrated a mis-sion-management computer, datalinks (for line-of-sight and beyond-line-of-sight commu-nications) and developed the ground control stations. The first critical demonstration of the team’s handiwork was made to the Corps’ war-fighting laboratory in January 2010, at the Dug-way proving grounds in Utah.

way: “They are accustomed to having a ‘back-up’ riding in the helicopter during training. Once he walks away from the aircraft, they no longer have that safety net. It’s like a student pilot during his first solo flight – with no in-structor alongside. It’s an interesting dynamic: even though you are trained and ready for the next step, there is still some trepidation.”

GREATER DEMANDAs NATO forces prepare to withdraw from Afghanistan, the K-MAX will be working alongside them. “As the drawdown occurs, there will be fewer vehicles and thus a greater demand for air transportation,” says Maj O’Connor. “With K-MAX extended, we hope to use it to assist in retrograde operations.”

Whether or not USMC commanders keep the rotorcraft as a permanent addition to its unmanned aerial assets, the technology has been proven in a highly demanding environ-ment. In theory at least, the “optionally pilot-ed” concept can be applied to any number of aircraft types. Boeing has demonstrated its MD530F Little Bird (which first flew in 2004) supporting roles such as resupply, reconnais-sance and surveillance. Last November it also landed on a moving trailer, to illustrate a po-tential maritime capability.

Fogerty says 55 years since it first took flight in Arizona, the idea’s time has finally come. “Overcoming public resistance will be our greatest challenge. But even if we have a way to go before passengers will accept a pilot-free service, in 15-20 years I can see a Fedex Boe-ing 747 flying without one. It’s only a matter of time.”

“We wanted a fast, reliableplatform to resupply ourcombat outposts”MAJ KYLE O’CONNORDetachment officer, MUAVS# 1

A six-month trial in Helmand, Afghanistan has been completed

Cpl I

saac

Lam

bert

h/3rd

MAW

FIN_260612_028-029.indd 29 21/6/12 12:02:05


SPECIAL MISSIONS

JOHN CROFT BRIDGEVILLE

US military requirements may have driven growth in its special-mission modifications during the past decade, but Dynamic Aviation is confident slashed defence spending can be compensated by commercial business

The fact that the Bridgewater Air Park, a privately owned, public-use gener-al aviation airport in rural Virginia, has its own nine-member police

force is testament to the special missions work that airport owner Dynamic Aviation performs here.

Inside Dynamic’s hangars, maintenance and modification work is taking place on nu-merous Beechcraft King Air 90, King Air 200 and Bombardier Dash 8 twin turboprops by hundreds of technicians and mechanics. Some of the work is secret, some is not.

Since 2002, Dynamic’s largest growth en-gine has been the US military, with modifica-tion work primarily dedicated to sidecars or pods for intelligence, surveillance and recon-naissance (ISR) packages, most likely to be flown over Iraq and Afghanistan.

DYNAMIC DELIVERY

However, other core portions of the busi-ness have also grown in that time, including modification, maintenance and leasing ar-rangements for agricultural spraying opera-tions, photo missions or even “bird dog” work for aerial firefighting.

“Our core is service,” says Dynamic Avia-tion president and chief executive Michael Stoltzfus. “If the customer has an idea for modifying [those aircraft], we can respond to that need, anywhere in the world.”

Despite the inescapable cutbacks affecting the military sector, Stoltzfus is taking a glass-half-full outlook, seeing the slowdown on the military side as giving the family-owned com-pany more time to do what it has done since his grandfather started an aviation business in 1937 – coming up with creative solutions to make aircraft productive for any special mis-sions, whether commercial or military.

“There are some other niche markets

we’ve had interest in getting into,” says Stoltzfus, “but we have been too busy the past couple of years with responding to ISR needs. We continue to put off some of these other ideas we have. We believe what’s going to occur is, as things [in the military] taper off, we’re going to be able to take our mind space and resources and invest in some other niche markets, both civil and military, do-mestic and international.”

He adds that while there is less “new work” coming from the defence side today, “there’s certainly still new work”.

VIETNAM FIGHTERSDynamic Aviation was started by Stoltzfus’s father and uncle in 1967 in nearby Harrison-burg, Virginia, primarily building training aids for high-school vocational classes from parts pulled from wrecked Vietnam War fighters.

In 1981, Dynamic began modifying and fly-ing Beech 18s for spraying insecticide to tack-le the gypsy moth and mosquito problem in the mid-Atlantic area. In 1992, it added sterile insect release capability – an autocidal tech-nique where sterile flies are released from an aircraft to eradicate problem insects such as the screw-worm fly and medfly.

In 1998, Dynamic began providing Beech

The Bombardier Dash 8 twin turboprop is a core platform for Dynamic Aviation

Dyn

am

ic A

viation

FIN_260612_030-031.indd 30 21/6/12 12:05:20


the single 837m (2,750ft) runway to 1,220m, although the extension is now designated as an overrun area, with white chevrons painted along its length.

While Stoltzfus is unwilling or unable to identify his customers, the company retains ownership of more than 100 aircraft in the US Federal Aviation Administration registration database including N45E, a King Air 200 pub-lic websites reveal is part of the US Army’s Desert Owl operation in Iraq.

Desert Owl was deployed to find com-mand-wire improvised explosive devices (IEDs) using synthetic aperture radar and ad-vanced image-processing algorithms to detect when terrain has been disturbed, as when someone plants an IED on or near a road.

The GlobalSecurity.org website states that the Desert Owl system includes the King Air 200T, or C-12 in military parlance, fitted with a PenRad 7 synthetic aperture radar sys-tem and the L-3 MX-15 electro-optical/infra-red sensor.

The site says Desert Owl provides full-mo-tion video feeds in the electro-optical and in-frared modes, as well as laser illuminator and designator “for precision targeting”.

Dynamic often works as a subcontractor to SAIC for the ISR aircraft modifications, a rela-tionship highlighted by SAIC’s facility on Dy-namic’s campus at Bridgewater.

SAIC’s website displays several King Air

DYNAMIC AVIATION

John Croft contributes commentary on civil aircraft programmes to the FlightBlogger blog flightglobal.com/flightblogger

King Air 90 aircraft to the US government as lead planes for aerial firefighting water bomb-ers. Another new commercial capability the company added in 1998 – aerial photogra-phy and airborne data acquisition for mis-sions such as geophysical surveys – eventu-ally paved the way for ISR work in the aftermath of the September 2011 terrorist at-tacks in the USA.

“After 9/11, we got a strong feeling in the gut that there were going to be major needs,” says Stoltzfus. “We couldn’t articulate what those needs were at that point, though.”

GOVERNMENT BUSINESSDynamic’s sterling reputation in the airborne data acquisition community led to discus-sions with a government “customer” in 2003, leading to a one-year contract for a King Air 200 (US Army C-12) ISR sensor package mod-ification in 2004.

At the time, the company had 150 employ-ees, a number that has rapidly risen to 750 today, with about 350 on the campus in Bridgewater on any given work day. The non-unionised workforce typically works single-shift days.

“During the first contract, we established in the customer’s mind that we could respond rapidly,” says Stoltzfus. “Down-range we had phenomenal dispatch reliability compared with other assets at the base we were on. In niche markets, if you serve them well, every-one is talking to each other, and now we have a broad customer base.”

Stoltzfus says all of Dynamic’s businesses grew in the 2002-2007 timeframe, but “not to the level the ISR biz has grown”. He says the company is involved in five business seg-ments and 15 markets, each with “one or two” competitors. Rapid growth in facilities at Bridgewater was matched by an extension of

and Dash 8 aircraft which have been modi-fied with pods or sidecars developed and in-stalled by Dynamic, including a Dash 8-200 with nose extension, payload sidecars and other modifications. Stoltzfus says the side-cars are a standard offering through SAIC and allow the customer to carry “any sensor he wants”.

Stoltzfus adds that Dynamic generally uses a five-step process for its aircraft deals: buy it on speculation of a future sale; overhaul it; modify it; fly it; and maintain it. “The custom-er comes to us with an idea and we already have the aircraft on spec,” he says. “Engineers work with the customer, and we use the shops here to make the modifications.”

Facilities at Bridgewater include a welding shop, machine shop, avionics shop, sheet metal and composites shop, and an engines shop. Most of the modifications are “one-offs”, says Stoltzfus, and use the FAA’s Form 337 method for airworthiness certification.

PILOT PROJECTSThe aviation shop installs a standard pre-wired panel layout for all King Air 200s, which includes two Garmin 600 primary flight displays and space mid-panel for ISR equipment controls. Stoltzfus says he plans to eventually install the Garmin systems in all of Dynamic’s aircraft.

Pilots make up a significant portion of Dy-namic’s workforce. Stoltzfus says there are about 200 pilots on staff. Those working the military programmes in combat theatres will typically be on-station for 60 to 90 days, re-turning home to have the same amount of time off.

Special-missions training for King Air 200 pilots takes place at Bridgewater using two fixed-base simulators with King Air cockpits driven by Merlin Simulation systems. The simulators are used daily for about four hours per day.

Stoltzfus himself has 6,000h of pilot time, checked out to fly the Beech 1900 and DC-3, and a flight engineer’s rating in the DC-6 from when he worked for Northern Air Cargo in Anchorage 17 years ago. He says he was a “late-comer” in his family – he decided to start flying at 20 when others had started at 16, the minimum age to solo a powered air-craft in the USA.

As for what new special missions work he intends to pursue, Stoltzfus will not say. Whatever the company gets involved in, how-ever, the rural can-do mindset is sure to make Dynamic a top competitor. “You find out what the job is, put your head down and get the job done,” says Stoltzfus. “Every day, we get out of bed and go in and create value.”

“If the customer has an idea for modifying aircraft, we can respond to that need, anywhere in the world”MICHAEL STOLTZFUS President and chief executive, Dynamic Aviation

Beech aircraft were an early driver of Dynamic’s modifications business

Dyn

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FIN_260612_030-031.indd 31 21/6/12 12:05:22


DAVID LEARMOUNT LONDON

A projected rise in air travel demand is intensifying concern about availability in sufficient numbers of pilots adequately prepared for the modern operating environment

GROWING PAINS

Worry about future pilot and engi-neer supply for airlines has been around since the 1990s, but something has always happened

to postpone the predicted shortage.Industry experts today, however, look at the

number of forward orders for new aircraft, pre-dictions of world fleet expansion, and sus-tained growth in the Asia-Pacific region and cannot see a further postponement unless the world economy moves from sluggish growth into depression – and that is not, at present, being predicted.

The number of new pilots required to be trained in the next 20 years is 450,000 world-wide, according to the Professional Aviation Board of Certification (PABC). Simulation and

training giant CAE estimates the requirement at 20,000 new pilots a year, which is roughly the same as PABC’s prediction.

Meanwhile, Martin Eran-Tasker, technical director of the Association of Asia Pacific Air-lines, presenting at the Flightglobal Safety in Aviation – Asia conference in Singapore in May, pointed out that the Asia-Pacific region alone had a need to train 184,000 fully trained pilots and 250,000 aircraft technicians in the next 20 years, with China’s specific needs being, respectively, 72,000 and 110,000.

Eran-Tasker says government figures show that the number of would-be pilots presenting themselves for training, and the number of li-cences being issued, are both going down be-cause the appeal of piloting as a career is plummeting.

He ascribes this to industry instability, the

high entry cost, unsocial working patterns, and the fact that piloting is now less well paid than some other professions.

PABC’s Asia manager, Capt John Bent, is trying hard to spread the message that training is not only a numbers game. Bent, also among the speakers at the Flightglobal Safety in Avia-tion – Asia conference, insists that quality is also vital, but that this fact is not, at present, being taken seriously.

He says airlines are implementing safety management systems (SMS) – which represent a reactive system of risk management – but training – the proactive way of lowering risk and ensuring reliable operations – continues to be budgeted based on regulatory minimum standards. Many airlines have moved “beyond compliance” in other fields, but not in training. Bent says he struggles with the absence of logic in this approach to risk management.

Meanwhile, most airlines are not making practical plans for the provision of sufficient numbers of expert staff in the future, let alone for assuring the necessary quality, and of con-cern is that the third-party training industry A

irTe

am

Image

s

Cathay Pacific’s director of flight operations has stressed the importance of performance-based navigation

FIN_260612_032-034.indd 32 21/6/12 12:15:44


PILOT TRAINING

thorities – including the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) – has even begun to consider the possibility of extending further the operating life of commercial aviation pilots.

Opening the conference, the director gen-eral of the Civil Aviation Authority of Singa-pore, Yap On Heng, talked about aviation’s rapid and continuing expansion in the region, explaining the three reasons for this. The first is the emergence of China and India as eco-nomic powers, the second is the continuing liberalisation of air services throughout the region, but the third – and underrated – influ-ence is the low-cost-carrier factor, which is still developing rapidly.

Heng explains: “Low-cost carriers emerged in Asia in the early 2000s to tap the growing appetite for travel, and opened up a brand new market for regional travel. They have now become a force in the Asian aviation in-dustry. Take Singapore for instance: LCCs were non-existent there a decade ago, but since their emergence they have grown to con-tribute 46% of the passenger traffic between Singapore and ASEAN cities in 2011.

The rapid expansion of Asian low-cost car-riers have a domino effect on the aviation sys-tem – with their higher demand for aircraft, their additional load on air navigation servic-es, and their need for more flight crews and aircraft maintenance engineers. Throughout Asia, new airports are being built and existing ones expanded to cater to the LCC boom.”

MONEY TALKSAt the other end of the scale, Heng notes, the region is generating large numbers of high net-worth individuals, so business aviation is likely to expand exponentially. Business jets need two pilots and a team of mechanics, just like jumbo jets do.

Bent’s concern, along with the looming human resources shortage, is training appro-priateness and quality. Appropriateness be-cause, as he points out, since 1982 it has been recognised that pilot training needed a radical update because the nature of the piloting job, the aviation environment and the aircraft themselves has changed significantly.

In 1982, ICAO set up a Pilot Licensing and

Training Panel (PLTP) that sat until 1986, but failed to convince the ICAO Air Navigation Commission and the Council that change was necessary.

Since that rejection of change by ICAO in 1986, there has been a far greater revolution. There are significant changes in the flightdeck environment, aircraft technology, and air navi-gation, but still no training changes have been adopted by national regulators to reflect the new ways of working.

AVIONICS ADVANCESThe changes in the job are massive: for in-stance, fly-by-wire and integrated avionics systems arrived with the Airbus A320 series in 1988, and were embraced by Boeing in its 777 series a few years later; avionics advances made flight engineers redundant even in the largest widebody airliners; satellite-based navigation is now the norm even if it still re-quires conventional back-up; and pilots have been expected to adopt performance-based navigation (PBN) without any basic prepara-tion for it, despite the fact that modern air traf-fic management will increasingly rely upon precision navigation techniques to process traffic safely in busy airspace.

Indeed, Cathay Pacific’s director of flight op-erations Capt Richard Hall has warned that the full and highly skilled use of PBN capability will be essential to enable Asia-Pacific air nav-igation service providers to cope safely and ef-ficiently with the predicted explosive regional traffic growth. He talks of “narrowing corri-dors” as airspace becomes busier.

Bent refers to “national regulatory require-ments lagging behind this fast-changing in-dustry”, to “legal lock-in to established prac-tice”, and a perception that change is a risk in its own right.

There is now much talk about this need for change, but nothing has actually been done. Bent quotes Bill Voss, head of the Flight Safety Foundation, as testifying to a US Senate sub-committee that pilot training “is dangerously outdated”.

Voss warned the committee that rules and practices that favour quantity – like the accu-mulation of flight hours – over quality in

does not have the capacity to produce the pilot and engineer numbers required. On the other hand, the accelerating worldwide con-solidation in this highly fragmented industry might create a more resilient training sector, one with greater capacity for investment in future expansion.

The recent takeover by simulation and training giant CAE of the Oxford Aviation Academy (OAA) group of flight training or-ganisations and type rating training organisa-tions – itself a product of progressive consoli-dation over the last few years – is an example of this. CAE has been particularly strong in type and recurrent training and OAA in ab initio, so the two are complementary.

As an exercise in examining whether the fears of expert staff shortage are real or imagi-nary, Bent lists the milestones in the indus-try’s pilot supply situation since 1997. He ex-plains why, for the last 15 years, the airline industry has repeatedly been able to scoff at the pilot shortage warnings.

In 1997, the Air Transport Association warned of an impending pilot shortage. In 2001, following 9/11, air travel slumped and large number of experienced pilots were fur-loughed. The SARS epidemic and fuel crisis reversed recovery in 2003 and 2004, and later the pilot retirement age was increased to 65,

extending the careers of the baby-boomer gen-eration of pilots who were about to retire.

In 2007, US regional airlines started to run out of pilots, and flying training organisations to run out of instructors. In 2008, the global fi-nancial crisis led to “negative growth”.

Now, a few years later, Bent’s chronicle has started to show some underlying indicators that point the other way.

In 2011, air travel growth resumed and heavy forward orders were placed for all cate-gories of aircrafts. And this year, growth con-tinues and the arrival of non-negotiable age 65 retirements for the post-war baby-boomer gen-eration has begun to make a difference.

Moreover, military-trained pilots and engi-neers continue to reduce in number as the air transport industry grows and the military sector shrinks.

At the Flightglobal conference, Bent joked that the airlines now would push for a pilots’ retirement age of 70, to delay the day of reckon-ing – again. Maybe this is not so far from the truth. On the other hand, although it might eventually happen, right now none of the au-

Most airlines are not makingpractical plans for providingsufficient numbers of expertstaff in the future

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Dragonair is a recent convert to evidence-based training

FIN_260612_032-034.indd 33 21/6/12 12:15:46


PILOT TRAINING

David Learmount’s running commentary on airline operational and safety matters can be found at flightglobal.com/learmount

terms of measurable piloting perform-ance produced and maintained through com-prehensive training, would not have a benefi-cial effect on airline safety standards.

Some – usually large – airlines choose to make recurrent training more relevant to their specific operational needs and experience by adopting an advanced qualification pro-gramme, also known as flight operations qual-ity assurance.

But these carriers are in the minority and may always be. So the failure of national avia-tion authorities to update regulatory require-ments condemns to an inherently higher risk of serious accidents all those who train ac-cording to outdated rules.

MODERNISATIONDespite its failure with the PLTP in 1984, ICAO has acted recently to draft more modern training standards.

It has created the multi-crew pilot licence (MPL), the first pilot licence in history to de-fine all the competencies necessary to meet the performance and knowledge parameters that its holder must be able to demonstrate.

ICAO is also working on clearer guidance on flight simulation training devices and how, as their technical fidelity advances, they may be permitted to supplement or replace train-ing in aircraft more widely than at present.And, in collaboration with the International Air Transport Association, ICAO is develop-ing a training and qualification initiative.

Captain Dieter Harms owns the title − if any single pilot should be awarded it − of “the fa-ther of the MPL”. At the Flightglobal confer-ence he delivered a definition of pilot core competencies: “A group of related behaviours, based on job requirements, which describe how to operate modern multi-crew transport airplane safely, effectively and efficiently. They describe what proficient performance in all phases of flight operation looks like. They in-clude the name of the competency, a descrip-tion, and a list of behavioural indicators.”

And why, according to Harms, should com-petency-based training succeed where what he calls “inventory-based training” has failed? This is his explanation: “It is based on the insight that inventory-based training and the repetition of past accident scenarios [are] insufficient to pre-pare pilots and crews to successfully handle the infinite number of unforeseeable situations. And that only the existence and the continuous application of a set of core competencies enable pilots and crews to operate safely, efficiently and effectively and manage the threats of mod-ern civil aviation.” The fact that threat and error management is a component of the MPL course from beginning to end also helps.

Meanwhile, the PABC is preparing globally standardised examination questions to test the knowledge base required by professional

transport pilots in today’s environment, and the ICATEE (International Committee for Avi-ation Training in Extended Envelopes) is working with the UK Royal Aeronautical So-ciety on how to prepare pilots to manage flight at the edges of the normal flight envelope.

So all this work is being done, but still nothing is happening at the regulatory end or the airline frontline.

Bent explains: “Unharmonised national regulatory requirements are lagging behind this fast-changing industry; there is legal lock-in to established practice, and a perception that change equals risk.”

If the world, or even individual states, de-cides to modernise the rules on type and re-current training requirements, Bent says, the next problem will be instructor supply. There will be a need to retrain existing instructors, train new ones in large numbers, and retain them by making instructing a valid career choice, with adequate rewards.

Even now, there is a necessity to retrain in-structors who are going to work with MPL stu-dents; the manner of teaching pilots through a defined competency-based curriculum toward a competency-based licence is different from the traditional test-based pass/fail system.

Bent addresses how modern line pilots

should be kept up to speed with their job. He is a fan of cutting-edge thinking among train-ing planners and practitioners at the Royal Aeronautical Society, IATA, ICAO, and air-lines like Emirates that have adopted evi-dence-based recurrent training.

This draws on evidence from flight data mon-itoring and other SMS inputs to identify the training exercises the crews manifestly need. Cathay Pacific, Dragonair, Air France, Qantas, Virgin Australia, Qatar Airways and Air Transat are recent converts to evidence-based training.

EXPECTING SURPRISESBent maintains that the modern recurrent train-ing need, above all else, is “training for the unex-pected”. Modern flying is routine and unevent-ful because of the unprecedented reliability of modern airframes, engines, avionics and flight management systems (FMS), even if there is a high workload in some flight phases.

Bent’s theory is that “the startle factor” of un-expected events is often the initial cause of that modern killer phenomenon − loss of control.

“If the pilot was able to control the startle factor, it is likely that the natural stability of the aircraft would stop a divergence from con-trolled flight before a pilot could amplify it,” he says.

But how is it possible to train for the unex-pected? In fact, it’s an issue of ensuring, through training, that the pilots maintain a confidence in their own judgement so they never losing sight of the primary task, which is to keep the aircraft within its flight envelope, while addressing whatever else has occurred.

“Unharmonised nationalregulatory requirementsare lagging behind this fastchanging industry”CAPT JOHN BENT PABC Asia manager

Emirates has adopted evidence-based recurrent training

Rex

Featu

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FIN_260612_035 35 21/6/12 09:46:41

flightglobal.com

TRAINING

FlightSafety visual systems offer continuous global high-resolution satellite imagery


FRANCES FIORINO WASHINGTON DC

Training providers are boosting their scale and systems to serve the many with immersion in real-life scenarios

REALITY CHECK

Flig

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afe

ty In

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ational

Wanted in next 20 years: about 500,000 airline pilots and 600,000 maintenance techni-cians to safely fly and maintain

a world fleet of 40,000 highly complex aircraft carrying billions of passengers.

Keeping pace with the industry’s forecast will require training providers to grapple with technological and regulatory challenges in order to deliver highly skilled, competent aviation professionals.

FlightSafety International has been in busi-ness for 61 years and gone through several downturns and recovery cycles, says Flight-Safety executive vice-president Eric Hinson: “There will always be a demand for high-quality professionals, whether pilots, cabin crew or maintainers, and in all facets of aviation, be it business aviation, commercial or military.”

FlightSafety provides flight simulators, visual systems and displays to commercial, government and military organisations and provides more than a million hours of training annually to pilots, technicians and aviation professionals from some 150 countries. It of-fers training at 40 learning centres in the USA and 10 other countries, has a fleet of advanced full-flight simulators (FFSs) and, as of early June, had built more than 800 simulators.

WIDER FIELDSTo support demand, FlightSafety last year added a 19-bay, 375,000ft2 (34.8m2) design, manufacturing and support facility in the USA at Tulsa, Oklahoma, staffed by 700, mostly engineers and technicians.

“Our focus now is how do we build a device that produces a better pilot and on higher fidel-ity visuals that have wider FOVs [fields of view]. We want to make that synthetic environ-ment as realistic as possible,” says FlightSafety

vice-president of simulation Rick Armstrong. “FlightSafety has its own visual/optics com-pany and has invested in what it calls a rigid mirror or glass mirror system, which allows in-creased, almost unlimited FOV. We are also in-creasing the fidelity of visual models. Comput-ing power today allows you to go beyond high definition. 3-D visuals are possible.”

FlightSafety vice-president of operations Greg McGowan notes increasing demand for more customised training. This is driven by a number of factors, including operators’ SMS [safety management system] initiatives. “They are asking for company-specific items to be in-cluded in their training programme,” says McGowan. “The challenge from a training point of view is having to overlay or compare approved training programmes under Parts 142 and 92, then make adjustments to satisfy both [regulatory and safety management system pro-gramme] requirements.”

FlightSafety, which pioneered electric motion systems, is working to improve motion fidelity, icing models and aerodynamic models “that are more closely aligned to what aircraft and pilots see [in upsets]”, adds Armstrong.

FlightSafety opened a new facility near Tulsa last year

FIN_260612_036-039.indd 36 21/6/12 12:23:05


SIMULATION

The Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) avia-tion safety chair Charles Hogeman says: “We want to see that the devices used for training and the training itself is as close to the real world as possible. We want the highest fidelity training devices used to train pilots to fly air-craft under different scenarios.” ALPA repre-

sents more than 53,000 pilots at 37 US and Ca-nadian airlines. He notes that the term “automated cockpit” does not mean the aircraft are easier to fly. Rather, operating them requires a different skill set to manage the automation.

And one of the biggest challenges ahead for simulator manufacturers is replicating the complex avionics systems on new aircraft in a synthetic environment, says Armstrong: “The avionics systems on modern aircraft are just a

quantum leap in terms of their complexity. And in the sims, we have to do things that the actual avionics don’t do, such as repositioning for flight.”

FlightSafety is seeing strong market activity in corporate, helicopter and military sectors, says Armstrong, which is likely being driven by “the value proposition of training in simula-tors versus aircraft”.

Over the past couple of years, Hinson notes, FlightSafety has seen a significant increase in demand for well-qualified maintainers. Re-quirements for maintainers have changed with the increasing sophistication of aircraft coming to market, says Hinson: “No longer does a can-didate obtain the A&P [airframe and power-plant licence] and then get OJT [on-the-job training]. They are now required to know spe-cifically how to maintain the exact aircraft they will be working on.”

FlightSafety has developed extensive main-tenance training programmes and dedicated training centres, and plans more. It has part-nered with Pratt & Whitney Canada to offer en-gine training around the world. Engine training is matched with appropriate aircraft types, and

Flig

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“The training paradigm isreally trying to be moreoperational”JEFF ROBERTS CAE group president

customers can get airframe and engine training at one location, which has been a boon to main-tenance training.

RISING SOPHISTICATIONCanadian simulator maker and training pro-vider CAE is “committed to being very cus-tomer-centric [and] flexible to help customers achieve goals identified in their business model”, says group president Jeff Roberts.

“Customers are seeking products and serv-ices that help them enhance safety and help them deal with the changing demographics of the pilot community, with the increased so-phistication and capability of the aircraft they are flying and the dynamic physical environ-ment they are operating in,” he adds. “The training paradigm is really trying to be more operational, to provide more realism and sce-nario-based training, and create more ‘holis-tic’ or richer training experiences – and mak-ing those capabilities available in more and more ways, be it distance learning, or line-oriented flight training.”

CAE continues to invest an average of 10% of revenue in research and development be-

FIN_260612_036-039.indd 37 21/6/12 12:23:07

flightglobal.com

TRAINING

CAE HAS developed the

Simulation Operations Quality

Assurance (SOQA) tool, which

debuted in April at World

Aviation Conference and Trade

Show. It is flight operations

quality assurance (FOQA) for

the simulation training environ-

ment, aiming to help custom-

ers evaluate the effectiveness

of its simulator programmes

as well as improving training.

CAE chief safety officer Lou

Nemeth describes it as “a

training system performance

tool. It is many tools. It is a

simulator, a data capture sta-

tion and it has the ability to

generate reports from a data-

base. It is a visualisation tool

and can help identify unsafe

indicators in a system. It’s a

tool to justify new training and

new behaviours.”

SOQA can help identify

when standard operating pro-

cedures – such as lowering

flaps at prescribed airspeed

– are not being followed. It al-

lows trainers insight as to why

they are not being followed

and how to get crews back on

track. SOQA enables trainers

to aggregate data across the

same aircraft type at an indi-

vidual operator or across op-

erators. A sim cockpit video,

outside aircraft view, flight con-

trol movements and readouts

are available for review by the

instructor and flight crew.

Addressing privacy con-

cerns, Nemeth says that, as

with FOQA, it is up to the op-

erator to decide how and for

how long data are stored: “As

an ab initio trainer of pilots. I

am not bound by the same

kind of union and liability is-

sues that an airline has. So I

would want to keep data for a

long time. That data are valu-

able to me to determine ad-

equacy of training.”

TRAINING TOOL

CAE TRAINS SIGHTS ON QUALITY


Military reporter Dave Majumdar recounts his experience of flying a Boeing F/A-18F simulator at flightglobal.com/superhornetsim

cause it believes “technology can and is a differentiator and can and will be an efficien-cy and effectiveness-of-training driver”, notes Roberts. He adds that CAE believes in being a “glocal” (for global-local) company: that is, being a global player while working with cus-tomers to develop their local markets with people and infrastructure on the ground.

In the commercial arena, CAE has 35 facili-ties around the world with 145-150 FFSs fo-cused exclusively in commercial aviation. The company trains about 1,400 pilot candi-dates per annum. In May, it acquired Oxford Aviation Academy, its seven training facilities and 40 simulators. The combined businesses have been rebranded as CAE Oxford Aviation, replacing CAE Global Academy. The deal in-cludes Parc Aviation, which has 1,200 avia-tion personnel around the world with 50 air-

lines. This means CAE is also in the aviation personnel sourcing business, providing crews on demand for airlines.

UNMANNED FUTUREOne new idea is the operation of unmanned aircraft systems in the National Airspace Sys-tem (NAS). The FAA director of flight stand-ards, John Allen, predicts that “UASs will have as much of an impact on aviation as the jet engine”.

The military introduced the jet in WWII, but it was not until the 1950s that infrastruc-ture to accommodate the jet existed.

“Now, out of the military come UASs and we are adjusting NAS procedures and getting manufacturers to adjust equipment for opera-tion in the NAS,” says Allen.

But UASs will be part of the landscape –

which means the industry must prepare for UAS pilot training. In the military world of UAS, pilots control the aircraft from ground stations. The concern is whether UAS crews would require a pilot’s licence and attendant knowledge to operate in the skies populated by manned aircraft.

Perhaps the most controversial training regulatory challenge that has emerged is the Airline Safety and FAA Extension Act of 2010 (Public Law 111.216). The legislation, referred to as the “1500 rule”, and its associated FAA proposed rulemaking – Docket No FAA 2010-0100 at www.regulations.com – requires first officers to obtain an air transport pilot certifi-cate – and log its required 1,500 flight hours – to qualify for the right seat. A first officer with 250 hours would qualify for a right-seat job.

According to industry estimates, a private pilot licence alone can cost about $10,000; ob-taining all the certificates to qualify for an air-line job, about $60,000, and a four-year degree, $160,000. The FAA has proposed decreasing the required flight hours to 750.

Supporters of the ATP provision say the hours-based training is a reliable tried and true training method, involving the acquisi-tion of certificates and ratings and flight hours to progress through the ranks and migrate up to the majors.

Hours-based training is prevalent in the USA, but the rest of the world, says CAE’s Roberts, seems to opt for more specific, fo-cused training models, such as the multi-crew pilot licence. The MPL is a intensive, compe-tency-based, ab initio programme that trains zero-time pilots for a job as a first officer.

Opponents of the 1500 rule argue that qual-ity training that addresses specific job require-ments of airline operations is needed.

ALPA, which supports the 1500 rule, also supports the advanced qualification pro-gramme (AQP) as an alternative to traditional training methods. AQP allows airlines to em-ploy technology and a methodical curriculum development process and better prepares the pilots to fly for that airline, says Hogeman.

CAE graduated the first MPL class of cadets from AirAsia in July 2011. FlightSafety has not seen much demand for MPL, but Hinson predicts that “eventually, the market will move towards this kind of solution”, adding: “We are prepared to provide it based on cus-tomers’ needs.”

Whatever happens in the evolution of train-ing, an industry official says, “we have to be willing to take a little risk and explore the ca-pabilities of these devices in conjunction with background and thinking and experience of pilots. We cannot be static or we set ourselves up for failure.”

This screen view shows data from a Boeing 737 upset recovery training session

CAE

FIN_260612_036-039.indd 38 21/6/12 12:23:08


SIMULATION

PROFILE

INTRODUCTORY SIMULATION TRAINING A FAMILY AFFAIR FOR FRASCAFAMILY-OWNED AND operated

Frasca International has been in

simulator making since 1958, and

continues to adapt to an evolving

training market guided by founder

and chairman Rudy Frasca.

Frasca has extended its reach

from the first simulator Rudy Frasca

built in his garage to a global mar-

ket. Its diverse product line now

spans full-flight simulators (FFSs)

and flight training devices (FTDs) for

fixed-wing – piston- and turbine-pow-

ered – and rotary aircraft. Products

for fixed-wing pistons include the

Cessna 172 Skyhawk Level 5 and

Diamond DA40/DA42 FTDs, and

for fixed-wing turbines: the Cessna

208 Caravan Level B FFS, the very

light jet (Embraer Phenom/Cessna

Mustang) FTD, and the CRJ

Canadair Regional Jet FTD. In the

rotary realm, Frasca offers a

Eurocopter EC135 FTD as well as

the Eurocopter EC225 and Sikorsky

S92 Level B FFS.

VARIED CLIENTSClose to 100 universities in the

USA use Frasca devices – including

the University of North Dakota and

Embry-Riddle Aeronautical

University at its Prescott, Arizona

and Daytona, Florida campuses.

General aviation primary flight train-

ing schools also deploy Frasca

products: Batavia, Ohio-based

Sporty’s, which has been in the

business of flight education for over

50 years, has installed Frasca’s

Mentor Cessna 172S advanced

aviation training device at its flight

academy at Clermont County air-

port. In May, Sporty’s partnered

with Frasca to develop simulator

training programmes for flight stu-

dents. Frasca’s mixed customer

base also spans Houston-based

Bristow Group, the Angolan and

Philippine air forces , and the

German federal police. Frasca has

delivered over 2,500 FFSs/FTDs.

Based at a 70,000ft2 (6,500m2)

facility at Urbana, Illinois, Frasca

employs 180 people and produces

an average of 80 devices each year.

Its business is split about 50:50

between helicopters and fixed-wing

aircraft, says president and chief

executive John Frasca, who heads

what he labels a “vertically inte-

grated company” with a goal of

“building high quality simulation to

meet customer requirements. And

the general push is for higher and

higher fidelity—and that can be in

the aerodynamics, in the visuals.”

At the low – but still demanding

-– end of the spectrum, customers

want the training envelope expand-

ed from what it was 10 years ago

– “primarily instrument flight, a little

visual, the ability to see the runway

when you come out of the clouds.

Now, visual is the principal require-

ment: they want to see everything

out the window and do all VFR ma-

noeuvres,” says Frasca.

Budgets may be more sensitive

for the smaller operators, but they

still demand fidelity, laying empha-

sis on use of Level 6 and 7 FTDs.

Frasca says “a tremendous

amount” of introductory training,

such as VFR turns, can be done in

the simulator. Because a limited

amount of testing is allowed in an

FTD, students would learn and prac-

tise manoeuvres in the FTD and

then schedule flight time to prac-

tise and be tested for proficiency.

“In that market, where you are

flying low and slow, imagery must

be pretty darn good,” says Frasca.

“We use satellite imagery, and on

the Mentor advanced aviation train-

ing device, we use actual Garmin

1000 avionics. Customers want to

see all the sources of data line up.”

Frasca has made its own visual

systems and built the systems’

databases for 25 years. The fidelity

requirement led Frasca to make its

own control loading systems. It with

spring control loaders in the early

FTDs that Rudy Frasca built, then

evolved to electric systems with

brushless DC motors.

MISSION PROFILEThe high end of the market opts for

FFSs, and Frasca is creating mis-

sion scenarios to fulfil the demand

by oil company, aeromedical and

law enforcement customers for

mission training – to fly to an oil rig,

an accident site or crime scene in

all-weather, day-night conditions.

The company also flight-tests

aircraft such as the Sikorsky S-92

and Eurocopter EC225 to collect

data packages because, as Frasca

explains, civil aviation authorities’

requirements are much more data-

driven. “We now have to prove the

digital data collected on the aircraft

matches the digital data collected

from the simulator.”

And new product development

continues. One new Frasca training

tool is the SAFTEVAT (VAT for virtual

air traffic) aimed at making ATC

communications in the simulation

environment more realistic.

In the business more than 50 years, Frascahas delivered some 2,500 flight trainingdevices

Rudy Frasca: a guiding light since 1958

Frasca’s very light jet FTD can replicate Phenom cockpits

Frasca

Frasca

FIN_260612_036-039.indd 39 21/6/12 12:23:10

Ben Alcott, Head of Group Safety Services Civil Aviation Authority (CAA)

Phil Barton, Head of FRMS easyJet

James Burin, Director of Technical Programs Flight Safety Foundation

Jean-Marc Cluzeau, Head of Flight Standards EASA

Patrick Davis, Manager Operational Risk – Corporate Safety and Quality British Airways

Régis Fusenig, Head of Safety Cuture Air France

Captain Billy Nolen, Managing Director Employee Safety and Regulatory Affairs American Airlines

Carl Downing, Training Manager Technical and CRM, Thomson

Aaron McCarter, Director of Safety North American Airlines

Steve Solomon, Director Flight Operations Thomas Cook

Rob Spence, General Manager Safety and Security Virgin Atlantic Airways

Captain Morten Ydalus, �� Scandinavian Airlines

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FIN_260612_040 40 21/6/12 15:15:10

STRAIGHT&LEVEL


From yuckspeak to tales of yore, send your offcuts to [email protected]

advantage, should he choose a career in daredevil aerobatic flying, that Robbie Rizk beats Evel Knievel hands down as a great stage name.

Beeb’s blunderNice bit of factual aviation drama on BBC Radio 4 about Joan Allen, who made a solo trip from England to Singapore in 1948 in a Fairchild Argus – except for the Beeb’s website referring to it as an Angus Fairchild.

Home advantageIf you live in the UK you may have seen British Airways’ new Olympics advertisement campaign, a video of a BA Boeing 777 taxiing through the streets of the capital to the soundtrack of London Calling by the Clash, which has the sign-off: “Don’t fly : support Team GB.”

Controversial, complacent, counter-productive? The campaign has certainly got people talking.

Birdseed certainly seems confident enough in its national treasure status to advise the Great British Public against using its services, at least during

the games. But it got us thinking about other possibly backfiring (fictional) ad campaigns.

How about the NBAA’s “Business aviation: reassuringly expensive”, or Boeing’s “787 Dreamliner – worth waiting for ”? North Korea’s flag carrier might have “Air Koryo. The right choice. The only choice”.

There have been plenty of real examples of ads that had the opposite effect to that intended.

In the 1970s, the late unlamented British Rail ran a campaign entitled “We’re getting there”. It was a nice play on words, but only served to remind passengers how awful the service was to start with.

Now, childrenMore from Airbus’s recent Innovation Days event in Toulouse, where the airframer’s head of media relations Stefan Schaffrath got more than he bargained for when he jokingly introduced his colleague Christian Scherer as “head of the Harry Potter department”.

Scherer – whose actual title is executive vice-president of strategy and future programmes – responded by thanking the “head of the Mickey Mouse department”. Ouch.

Italians get help from on high“Selex Systemi Integrati secures Euro 2012” a gushing press release informs us, rehashing the news from two years ago that the Finmeccanica company won the deal to supply the air traffic control systems around several Ukraine airports to help prepare the country for this month’s European football championships.

As many of you read this, the result of Sunday’s England v Italy match will be known. If Italy clinched it, expect conspiracy theories about spy-in-the-sky signals above Kiev warning the Azzurri strikers of the dreaded English offside trap, and their defence every time Rooney drifts wide into an unmarked position.

High RizkMany of us have reached that point in life where pilots – like policemen – have started to look impossibly young. But Robbie Rizk takes it to ridiculous levels.

Robbie, who is aged just 13, won the beginners class at the recent UK National Glider Aerobatic Contest held at Buckminster Gliding Club near Grantham in Lincolnshire.

He has also claimed a record as the youngest person ever to take part in a national aerobatics contest – he had to fly with a safety pilot because the legal minimum age to fly solo is 16.

Robbie, whose father George is an instructor with the club, has been gliding since he was 11. The youngster has the added

Bingo Airways, a new Polish charter airline, has launched services with an Airbus A320. We wish it luck and agree that – if you must

name your start-up after a game of chance – Bingo Airways certainly has more of a ring to it than Pokair, Blackjack Airlines or

FlyRussian Roulette.

AirTe

am

Image

s

Hydro demoThe Daily Mail will begin a

series of demonstrations with

hydro-aeroplanes.

The object of the

demonstration is

to afford the

public opportunities of seeing

the newest and perhaps most

appreciated branch of flight,

and to bring home to the

country the vital importance

of the waterplane to the Fleet.

Dinghy for ditchesAn emergency dinghy must be

provided for the use of carrier

pilots in the event

of the machine

sinking through

loss of buoyancy.

A floating aeroplane is much

more easily seen by searching

air or surface craft than a

dinghy, and as much of it as

possible should remain above

the surface.

Tyne most fineThe world’s most efficient

turboprop – the Tyne – is doing

a tremendous

task on major air

routes throughout

the world. It is

possibly the most complex and

“difficult” gas turbine put into

production, with two

independent shafts, high

pressure-ratio and

temperature, and a foolproof

reversing propeller system.

Hot and highThe US Drug Enforcement

Administration has taken

delivery of an

MBB BO.105LS

helicopter for use

in combating

marijuana trafficking in

Hawaii. It is expected to notch

up 60hr/month flying in hot

and high conditions.

100 YEAR ARCHIVEEvery issue of Flight from 1909 can be viewed

online at flightglobal.com/archive

Gliding to a promising career

Buck

min

ste

r G

lidin

g C

lub

FIN_260612_041 41 21/6/12 18:14:14

flightglobal.com 26 June - 2 July 2012 | Flight International | 43

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The successful candidate will be given an excellent salary along with

Accommodation and Flights. The rotation is 6 weeks on, 6 weeks off.

Bristow Helicopters Ltd is a leading international provider of helicopter transport and support services. The company especially values its ability to operate in demanding environments to the highest levels of quality and safety performance in flight and on the ground.

Focus on the client -

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To Apply• Please submit an online application

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Candidates interested in applying are kindlyrequested to apply to:[email protected]

There are always newchallenges on the horizon

SimulatorTechnical Inspectors

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Contract and Permanent recruitmentfor the Aviation industry

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WORKING WEEK

flightglobal.com

How did you get into the aviation industry?In 1962, I learnt to fly to help save travelling time for my printing and advertising company and soon owned a Cessna C180 light aircraft. I became infatuated by the GA industry. I got into aircraft sales of Commander and Piper aircraft and, since 2005, Pilatus.What motivates you to keep working aged 76?It’s the people. We have great customers and I have a great team which sells and handles a great product. It’s also great to see my grandson Matt become the third generation of the family to work in aviation. At 21 he has qualified as a commercial pilot and has 400 hours logged already on PC-12s. I can honestly say that I look forward to every working day. I regard myself very fortu-nate to be in that position.Is there an average working week for you?Not really, as we never have av-erage customers and they dictate where and what we are doing. Daily I will talk to people who approach us with the interest of purchasing a PC-12, or stay in touch with many of the 42 own-ers who have purchased through us. The full maintenance and service facilities at Bournemouth ensure that we see many of the aircraft on a fairly regular basis.

We usually have a practical demonstration flight to arrange,

and fly where we fit in with a po-tential client’s travel require-ments so that they can fully ap-preciate the benefits of PC-12 ownership. It’s a remarkable air-craft due to its comfort as a nine-seat aircraft, its useful payload, range, speed and ability to use both airports and small airstrips.What are the biggest current challenges?They are the same as ever, but of course compounded by the state of the economy and the reluc-tance of banks to lend. The desire

to purchase is still strong; the ability to purchase is a different matter. Your page has not enough space to accommodate what would be a full and frank answer as to my views on banks! I will just say that despite them, we sold six new PC-12s and four pre-owned aircraft in 2011.What of the future?There’s a lot on the horizon. We know that the PC-12 will contin-ue to excite customers who need its unique blend of comfort, op-erational practicality and low op-

erating costs, and then we look forward to promoting the first Pi-latus executive jet – the PC-24, which is expected to be launched in the near future. ■

WORKING WEEK BOB BERRY

A lifelong love for general aviationBob Berry is chairman of Pilatus Centre UK, the Bournemouth-based distributor of the Swiss-made Pilatus PC-12 business aircraft and has spent 50 years in the aviation industry, much of it in aircraft sales

At the age of 76, Berry considers himself fortunate to continue to look forward to every working day

For more employee work experi-ences visit flightglobal.com/workingweek

If you want to feature in Working

Week, or know someone who

does, email murdo.morrison @flightglobal.com a brief de-

scription of yourself and your job.

26 June--2 July 2012 | Flight International | 51

Opportunities in Stress and Structure Analysiswww.jobs.eads.com

FIN_260612_303 51 21/6/12 10:00:34

flight-int-3mm-bleed-new2 indd 3 5/29/12 11:08 AMFIN_260612_304 304 21/6/12 09:29:40

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