Aerospace America APR2010

April 2010

A P U B L I C A T I O N O F T H E A M E R I C A N I N S T I T U T E O F A E R O N A U T I C S A N D A S T R O N A U T I C S

Reflections on the universe...and ourselves

HUBBLE at

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APRIL2010

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COVERAtlantis astronauts John Grunsfeld and Andrew Feustel replace a fine guidance sensor on the HST. For 20 yearsof Hubble history, turn to page 30. Footage captured with the IMAX 3D camera aboard STS-125.

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Aerospace America (ISSN 0740-722X) is published monthly by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. at 1801 Alexander Bell Drive, Reston, Va. 20191-4344 [703/264-7577].Subscription rate is 50% of dues for AIAA members (and is not deductible therefrom). Nonmember subscription price: U.S. and Canada, $163, foreign, $200. Single copies $20 each.Postmaster: Send address changes and subscription orders to address above, attention AIAA Customer Service, 703/264-7500. Periodical postage paid at Herndon, VA, and at additionalmailing offices. Copyright © 2010 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc., all rights reserved. The name Aerospace America is registered by the AIAA in the U.S. Patentand Trademark Office. 40,000 copies of this issue printed. This is Volume 48, No. 4.

EDITORIAL/COMMENTARY 3Working toward compromise.

INTERNATIONAL BEAT 4Europe tackles runway capacity issue.

ASIA UPDATE 8India joins the race.

WASHINGTONWATCH 11Season for endings?

CONVERSATIONS 14With Dietmar Schrick.

SPACE UPDATE 20A boost for commercial human spaceflight.

ELECTRONICS UPDATE 22Geography drives ISR technology.

ENGINEERING NOTEBOOK 26SOFIA’s smooth ride shakes up astronomy.

OUT OFTHE PAST 44

CAREEROPPORTUNITIES 46

April 2010

AIAAMeeting Schedule B2

AIAA Courses andTraining Program B4

AIAA News B5

Meeting Program B13

Calls for Papers B27

BULLETIN

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HUBBLE AT 20:REFLECTIONSONTHE UNIVERSE…ANDOURSELVES 30Transformed after the early discovery of a near-fatal flaw, Hubble continuesto provide dazzling images and science breakthroughs.by Leonard David

WINDTUNNELS:DON’T COUNTTHEMOUT 38The nation’s wind tunnels, even in a period of growing decline, still offer vitalinsights that computers cannot match.by Edward Goldstein

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When we were young, nothing thrilled us as much as shiny new toys. Thenewest bicycle in the store window made our trusty old one seem shabby andboring. Never mind that sometimes, when we got it home, we found that it wastoo difficult to pedal, or we would fall down all the time, or that our parentscouldn’t really afford it. It was new and we wanted it.

The space shuttle is getting old, and after having served us well for so long,many believe it is just about ready for a well-deserved retirement. Constellation,on the other hand, was big, and shiny, and new…but our government reallydoesn’t seem to be able to afford it, and, even if it someday lives up to itsbilling, like most other government programs, it would probably take far longerand cost far more than predicted to get there.

The Obama administration has ordered the cancellation of the entireConstellation program, turning instead to private industry to lead us back intospace. As these companies work toward development of rockets and crewcarriers, the government would purchase rides to the space station onRussian Soyuz launch vehicles.

Many legislators oppose this approach, as it represents lost jobs, a wasteof the billions of dollars already spent on Constellation, and a massive flow ofnew dollars out of the country. They argue that work should continue on Con-stellation, to protect jobs and maintain U.S. access to space. However, theAugustine Commission has already established that this program will cost farmore—and take far longer to complete—than first anticipated.

But in the search for a replacement system for the space shuttle, did weoverlook maybe not the newest, but certainly one of the most reliable options?The evolved expendable launch vehicles built for the Air Force, Lockheed Mar-tin’s Atlas V and Boeing’s Delta IV, have outstanding safety records. Is therenot some possibility of taking some of the funding that had been allocated toConstellation’s Ares I rocket and using it to human-rate these launch vehicles?

Rather than shutting down the Orion crew exploration vehicle, could worknot continue, while reconfiguring it to be accommodated by one of the EELVs?Could work also continue on the launch abort system, to make sure that weadd another layer of safety for its precious cargo?

And while these developments proceed, could we not ask the venerableshuttles to take just a few more trips into space before finding homes in muse-ums and space parks? Restarting assembly of the external tanks would alsorestart some lost jobs.

In the interim, private industry can continue to build, test, fly—crash—andfly again, until they get it right.

It might not save all the jobs that would be lost by termination of Constella-tion, but it should save many. And we might still have to hitch a ride now andagain from Russia, but not every time.

As we get a little older, we start to realize that shiny and new really isn’twhat matters. Solid and dependable trumps it every time.

Elaine CamhiEditor-in-Chief

is a publication of the American Instituteof Aeronautics and Astronautics

Elaine J. CamhiEditor-in-ChiefPatricia JeffersonAssociate EditorGreg WilsonProduction EditorJerry Grey, Editor-at-LargeChristine Williams, Editor AIAA Bulletin

CorrespondentsRobert F. Dorr, WashingtonPhilip Butterworth-Hayes, EuropeMichael Westlake, Hong Kong

Contributing WritersRichard Aboulafia, James W. Canan,Marco Cáceres, Edward Flinn, TomJones, Théo Pirard, David Rockwell,Frank Sietzen, J.R. Wilson

Fitzgerald Art & DesignArt Direction and Design

Craig Byl, Manufacturing and DistributionDavid W. Thompson, PresidentRobert S. Dickman, Publisher

STEERING COMMITTEEMichael B. Bragg, University of Illinois;Philip Hattis, Draper Laboratory; Mark S.Maurice, AFOSR; Laura McGill, Raytheon;George Muellner, Boeing; Merri Sanchez,National Aeronautics and Space Administra-tion; Mary Snitch, Lockheed Martin

EDITORIAL BOARD

Ned Allen, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics;Jean-Michel Contant, EADS; EugeneCovert, Massachusetts Institute of Technol-ogy; L.S. “Skip” Fletcher, Texas A&M Uni-versity; Michael Francis, United Technologies;Christian Mari, Teuchos; Cam Martin,NASA Dryden; Don Richardson, DonrichResearch; Douglas Yazell, Honeywell

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Send materials to Craig Byl, AIAA, 1801Alexander Bell Drive, Suite 500, Reston, VA20191-4344. Changes of address should besent to Customer Service at the same address,by e-mail at [email protected], or by fax at703/264-7606.Send Letters to the Editor to Elaine Camhiat the same address or [email protected]

April 2010, Vol. 48, No. 4

®

Working toward compromise

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program, which has helped increase ca-pacity at Lisbon and Prague airports byfactors of 20% and 40% respectively, ac-cording to Eric Miart, program managerof the airport operations program at Eu-rocontrol. ACE relies on taking accuratemeasurements of the performance of theairport operation, assessing capacity andintroducing best practice techniques tocontrollers, pilots and airport operators.

Improving traffic flow and safetyThe tools for increasing runway capacitylevels have been in place for some time.Apart from building rapid exit taxiwaysand other taxiways running parallel tothe main runway, some new technolo-gies coming into operation offer substan-tial improvements on legacy systems.

For example, A-SMGCS (advancedsurface movement guidance and controlsystems)—which provide routing, guid-ance and surveillance to aircraft under allweather conditions—have been in opera-tion since the early years of the decade.Precision Runway Monitoring-Alternative(PRM-A) is an accurate multilaterationsurveillance system that gives the preciseaircraft position information needed to si-multaneously separate planes on ap-proach into closely spaced parallel run-ways. And light detection and ranging(LiDAR) systems measure the Dopplershift of light scattered from atmosphericparticles to identify wake vortex occur-rences and separate aircraft on approachbased on actual, rather than theoretical,wake vortex occurrences.

But if a 300% increase in airport ca-

4 AEROSPACE AMERICA/APRIL 2010

ONE OF THE TOUGHEST CHALLENGES OF

the Single European Sky ATM Research(SESAR) program is the doubling or tre-bling of airspace capacity by 2025 over2005. In the three dimensions of Euro-pean airspace this is tough, but feasible.In the two dimensions of the runways atEurope’s major airport hubs, the goal oftrebling capacity looks virtually impossi-ble; for environmental reasons it will sim-ply not be practical to build new runwaysto cope with future demand.But if this issue is not addressed,

then the entire $30-billion SESAR pro-gram is threatened—without enough run-way capacity, all SESAR will do is moveincreasing amounts of air traffic moreswiftly between the bottlenecks on theground.

So Europe’s air traffic management(ATM) experts are contemplating someradical technologies and procedures toensure that airports do not become thebottlenecks to future growth.

Surprising differencesThere are some startling differences be-tween the current runway throughputrates of Europe’s largest airports. Itwould be tempting, looking at these fig-ures, to say the simple answer to therunway congestion problem is to analyzehow London/Heathrow traffic is man-aged and then replicate this elsewhere.Heathrow’s ability to manage 89 aircraftmovements an hour off two runways iseven more remarkable considering thehigh percentage of larger (and thereforeslower and more widely spaced) planes

using the airport. The number of aircraftmovements at Heathrow is closely com-parable to those at Detroit MetropolitanWayne County Airport, but Detroit hassix runways, and the aircraft that use itare much smaller, on average, thanthose at Heathrow.But every airport is different; the en-

vironmental and curfew constraints andthe airport runway and taxiway layoutmake accurate comparisons nearly im-possible. Heathrow’s runway perfor-mance levels have been realized througha mixture of applying new technology,refining procedures and, increasingly,collaborative decision-making (CDM)tools designed to involve all stakeholdersin maximizing runway efficiencies.“We had the target at Heathrow of

achieving an average of less than 50 sec-onds’ occupancy time across a widerange of aircraft,” says Peter Tomlinson,airport technical expert at the U.K.’sNATS (National Air Traffic Services),which oversees the ATM system at theairport. “One of the ways we looked toreach this target was to identify who wasthe ‘best-in-class’ among the aircraft op-erators using a particular aircraft typeand then try to replicate that airline’sprocedures across the board. It is sur-prising how different the procedures arefor the same aircraft—when the check-lists are completed, for example—andthis can have a major difference on run-way and taxiway occupancy times.”Using the best-practice model has

been a core element of Eurocontrol’s air-port airside capacity enhancement (ACE)

Europe tackles runway capacity issue

Average dailyAirport Runways Aircraft movements Reporting period movements per runway

Paris Charles de Gaulle 4 518,018 January–December2009 354.8London Heathrow 2 462,835 October 2008-September 2009 634.0Frankfurt 3 463,111 January-December 2009 422.9Madrid 4 435,179 January-December 2009 298.0Amsterdam/Schiphol 5 391,000 January-December 2009 214.2

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AEROSPACE AMERICA/APRIL 2010 5

pacity is to be achieved without treblingthe number of runways and taxiways, anentirely new way of managing airportoperations will be needed. Already underway in Europe is research on developinga network-enabled information systemthat will link new ground-based and air-borne technologies along with best-in-class procedures for radically enhancingairport capacity levels. Ultimately thegoal will be to automate the entire run-way/taxiway operation, ensuring thatboth are being used to their optimal ca-pacity, whatever the weather, and with-out degrading the required safety levels.

“Whatever the improvements, safetyhas to be improved, and especially theprevention of runway incursions,” saysEric Miart. “Risk increases as a square ofthe increase in traffic; if traffic doubles ortriples, then risk increases by a factor offour or nine respectively.”

Network enhancementIn Europe the catalyst to the develop-ment of a common information networkencompassing pilots, controllers and air-port operations managers is the Euro-pean Airport CDM (www.euro-cdm.org)program promoted by Eurocontrol, Air-ports Council International Europe andthe International Air Transport Associa-tion. The largest weakness in the currentEuropean ATM capacity managementsystem is a lack of coordination betweenairports and ATM network managers.

The Central Flow Management Unit,based in Eurocontrol’s Brussels head-quarters, operates a continental flowmanagement system by matching aircraftoperator flight plans with the availablecapacity of airspace sectors and airportrunways. It forecasts where potential sec-tors may become overloaded and calcu-lates alternative operations—such as de-laying takeoff times or rerouting aircraftin flight—to keep supply and demand inbalance.

One of the major current weaknessesin the system is a lack of accurate infor-mation on actual airport operations—thetime the aircraft pushes back from theterminal, its progress through the airporttaxiway system and the time when it rollsonto the runway for takeoff. The key

control tower and the airport will providethe essential framework to a new runwayand operations management system.The network needs to evolve from aplanning tool to an operational system;but once this is done, increasing levels ofautomation can be introduced.

For example, A-SMGCS systems arenow used mainly to improve surveillanceof aircraft and ground vehicles at airportsin bad weather. However, ultimately (de-fined as “level four” operations) they canevolve to provide automatic conflict res-olution and automatic planning and guid-ance for pilots and controllers. The FAA,Eurocontrol and ICAO are working ondeveloping standards and procedures forthese levels of operation.

Airborne additionsNew airborne technologies will need tobe added to the information network.For example, the FAA is funding re-search into how electronic flight bagscan be evolved to show airport movingmap displays and own-ship positions, sopilots can see the exact location of theiraircraft on the airfield. But in the future,the networks will have to be developed

piece of information here is the TargetStart Up Approval Time (TSAT), whichlets ATC, airport and airline colleaguesknow exactly when the aircraft is ready tomove from the terminal. By feeding thisinformation into a central planning tool itwill be possible to calculate accuratelywhether the aircraft will meet the takeoffslot-time it has been given—and, if not,how traffic can best be managed to ac-commodate changes to slot times.

NATS has been testing a version ofwhat it calls a TSAT-generator. “Oncewe know when the aircraft will be readyto move, we can project the taxiing time,look at how this would work in an un-constrained demand situation, then feedin the various variables,” according toTomlinson. “We can calculate the opti-mum sequence and then work out ex-actly what time the aircraft needs toleave the gate. We think this will give usan extra two departures an hour whilereducing the amount of time the aircraftwaits at the gate by 50% and taxi timesby 6 minutes.”

It seems like a modest improvement,but the development of a CDM informa-tion network linking the cockpit, the

Aircraft queue fortakeoff at Heathrow.


to incorporate new automated airbornesystems.

For example, the Airbus A380 fea-tures an automated “brake-to-vacate” fa-cility that combines satellite positioningwith the on-board airport database andflight-control management system. Thepilot selects a runway exit point and thesystem manages the braking process toensure the aircraft reaches the chosenexit point at the optimal speed, havingfactored in runway and weather condi-tions. According to Airbus, the systemminimizes runway occupancy time andallows up to 15% more departures to bescheduled.

The European Commission is alsohelping to fund a research program called“Green-wake,” where an airborne LiDARalerts pilots to wake vortex and windshear occurrences on final approach.This is part of the wider WakeNet3 (www.wakenet3-europe.eu) commission-fundedresearch program (2008-11) that exam-ines how crosswinds, wind shear andwake vortex conditions can be meas-ured, reported and acted upon promptly.

Looking aheadOther, more esoteric planning and oper-ational tools are waiting in the wings.“NATS is working with the McLarenFormula One racing team, using raceteam prediction software and puttingthis into an airport environment,” ac-cording to Tomlinson. “It allows us topredict the future of airport operationswith a high degree of accuracy over half-hour, 1-hr and 2-hr time slots. We canthen color-code the areas of the airportwhere we see potential capacity prob-lems arising.”

At the moment, at least, the airportand runway capacity problem has abatedbecause of the recent downturn in the airtravel market. But growth will return,probably later this year, and with it thepressure on Europe’s hub runways willreemerge.

If the future anticipated traffic levelsare to be met then without the appear-ance of five new runways at Europe’smajor hubs, the development of network-enabled airport CDM operations is morethan just a helpful aid to improving ca-pacity. It is an empirical necessity.

Philip [email protected]


Events CalendarAPRIL 12-15Fifty-first AIAA/ASME/ASCE/AHS/ASC Structures, Structural Dynamicsand Materials Conference; 18th AIAA/ASME/AHS Adaptive StructuresConference; 12th AIAA Nondeterministic Approaches Conference;11th AIAA Gossamer Systems Forum; Sixth AIAA MultidisciplinaryDesign Optimization Specialist Conference, Orlando, Fla.Contact: 703.264.7500

APRIL 12-15Twenty-sixth National Space Symposium, Colorado Springs, Colo.Contact: 719.660.6380

APRIL 20-22AIAA Infotech@Aerospace 2010, Atlanta, Ga.Contact: 703.264.7500

APRIL 25-30SpaceOps 2010 Conference: Delivering on the Dream (hosted byNASA Marshall and organized by AIAA), Huntsville, Ala.Contact: 703.264.7500

MAY 4-6ASTRO 2010—15th CASI Astronautics Conference, Toronto, Ontario,Canada.Contact: G. Languedoc, 613.591.8787; www.casi.ca

MAY 11-12Inside Aerospace—An International Forum for Aviation and Space Leaders,Arlington, Va.Contact: 703/264-7500

MAY 11-13Integrated Communications, Navigation and Surveillance Conference,Herndon, Va.Contact: James Dieudonne, 703/983-6578, [email protected]

MAY 13-15Fifth Argentine Congress on Space Technology, Mar del Plata, Argentina.Contact: Pablo de Leon, 701/777-2369; [email protected]

MAY 31-JUNE 2Seventeenth St. Petersburg International Conference on IntegratedNavigation Systems, St. Petersburg, Russia.Contact: Prof. V. Peshekhonov, www.elektropribor.spb.ru

JUNE 1-4Fourth International Conference on Research in Air Transportation,Budapest, Hungary.Contact: Andres Zellweger, [email protected]

JUNE 7-9Sixteenth AIAA/CEAS Aeroacoustics Conference, Stockholm, Sweden.Contact: Hans Bodén, [email protected]

JUNE 8-10Third International Symposium on System and Control in Aeronauticsand Astronautics, Harbin, People’s Republic of China.Contact: Zhenshen Qu, [email protected]

JUNE 14-18ASME TurboExpo 2010, Glasgow, Scotland, U.K.Contact: www.turboexpo.org



THERE IS NO WAY THE AEROSPACE AND

defense manufacturers of India (or anyother nation) can hope to leap into directcompetition with industry titans such asBoeing or EADS. Even joining the sec-ond tier with companies such as Brazil’sEmbraer and Canada’s Bombardier isdifficult enough, with China’s AVIC (Avi-ation Industries of China) and Japan’sMitsubishi now just reaching that level af-ter many years of effort and frustration.Nevertheless, India’s developments

in spaceflight—including its January an-nouncement of plans for a manned mis-sion in 2016—are the harbinger of re-newed efforts to match its giant neighborChina’s surge into the internationalarena in aerospace technology. Thequestion now is whether it can step up tothe plate in attracting foreign invest-ment, partners, and new technology topropel it into the top ranks.

The X-factorIn theory, there seems no good reasonwhy India should not have been able toparallel China’s steps up the technologyladder over the years. Both took on li-cense production of military and civil air-craft types at various times, and bothhave—at least in principle—huge domes-tic markets to develop that could under-pin the production of passenger aircraftlocally.In practice, their separate paths of

economic development and their re-liance on Western or former Soviet alliesfor access to training and technologyhave led to very different mindsets, andhence to very different approaches to ac-quiring and applying expertise.It is not merely a matter of technical

or scientific knowledge and ability; bothapproaches embody these factors. Nor isit a matter of industrial capacity; again,both China and India are perfectly capa-ble of churning out different kinds ofhigh-tech “widgets” or other gadgets.But being able to produce reliably,

even monotonously, complex items that

in Harbin. It is also renewing attempts,first made in the 1970s, at developing itsown regional and larger jet airliners, thistime buying modern foreign systems as itdeems necessary and learning to inte-grate them into its own state-of-the-artoverall design.

Both nations have made progress to-ward high-grade production via manu-facturing automobiles, partnering withforeign makers. While India is now theworld’s fourth-largest exporter of cars af-ter the U.S., Japan and South Korea,China has gone further and faster downthis road in terms of new technology. In-dia now needs something similar as away of driving its technology base for-ward and broadening it from its acknowl-edged information technology and soft-ware-based excellence, building on itsstrengths: a pool of skilled engineeringtalent, and low costs.

A new approachNew Delhi’s latest approach to attractingforeign interest into its aerospace anddefense industries is to encourage itsown private companies to take part. Un-til 2001, aerospace and defense werethe preserve of public sector units con-trolled by the government, the largest ofwhich was the government-controlledHindustan Aeronautics Ltd. (HAL)—the600-lb gorilla in the room, with the fi-nance, the expertise and the industrial“magnetism” to attract the best talent.

Since then, private investment hasbeen allowed, combined with a defenseoffset policy introduced in 2006 and fol-lowed up by significant liberalization in2008.The result should be a win-win situa-

tion for all concerned—the governmentis happy to give tax breaks to attract for-eign investors with new technology andexpand the country’s high-tech manufac-turing base, while foreign companies arehappy to be able to seek alternatives toHAL, thus enlarging their pool of part-nership options.

themselves involve the integration ofcomplex components and systems, andthen to sell and support those productsin the world marketplace, needs some-thing else—call it the X-factor if you will.It is something that has been learnedover many years by the U.S. and Eu-rope, and later by Canada and Brazil.Japan with its regional jet project will

have to show that it has learned it, hav-ing tried with other aviation projectsthat, no matter how technically excellentthey were, failed to impress markets be-yond its shores. Russia, too, is now seek-ing to win the world’s confidence—itsmilitary products are well known fortheir capabilities, but its civil airlinershave not won admiration beyond a verylimited group of customers, and so Rus-sian aerospace makers are also seekingto upgrade their products’ reputations.

Avenues to progressThis leaves China and India at the backof the queue, still partnering or seekingto partner with foreign manufacturers,but trying to gain work shares that in-volve more than just being “screwdriver”operations, simply assembling aircraft orcomponents from kits or supplied draw-ings. In this regard, China is furtherahead than India; both have assembledforeign-designed military aircraft (MiGsand Sukhoi designs in both countries,British Aerospace Hawks and SepecatJaguars in India). Both have assembledforeign-designed airliners in the past—various Antonov fixed-wing models andMD80 twinjets (though a very limitednumber of the latter) in China, and smallBritish HS748 turboprop airliners in In-dia. Both have also put together variousRussian and Western helicopters in se-ries production.But China took the lead in the 1980s

with manufacturing major componentsfor U.S. and European aircraft makers. Itis now reaping the reward by partneringwith Europe’s Airbus to produce A320airliners on a new production line set up

India joins the race

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The government has also been en-couraging the establishment of aerospaceparks and special economic zones withtax advantages (so far seven have beenformally proposed), all in India’s southernor midcountry sectors. This approachshould come as no great surprise, giventhat India’s high-tech industries wereoriginally clustered around Bangalore,where the old airport is owned by HAL.

There is no shortage of potential tak-ers, although HAL is going to continueto be a big winner. The current contestto pick India’s next major fighter aircraftillustrates the point: The so-called med-ium multirole combat aircraft contestfeatures six types from four continentsfor a projected buy of 126 units, ofwhich only 18 will be built overseas, withthe remaining 108 manufactured underlicense by HAL.

In contention are the Lockheed Mar-tin F-16 and Boeing F/A-18 from theU.S., Saab’s Gripen from Sweden, Rus-sia’s MiG-35, France’s Dassault Rafaleand European consortium Eurofighter’sTyphoon. A decision is expected later

this year.The government had also tasked

HAL with designing and building morethan 180 light utility helicopters for itsmilitary forces. But this project has nowmorphed into somewhat smaller andmore complex chunks, with Europe’s Eu-rocopter saying it is bidding to supply(whether complete or license-built in In-dia was not stated) about 90 aircraft,with U.S. maker Sikorsky also a con-tender for this deal. Meanwhile, Anglo-Italian helicopter maker AgustaWestlandis seeking a joint venture with India’s gi-ant conglomerate Tata Group to producelight helicopters for the Indian military aswell as for export. Tata has been seekingpermission to build an aerospace manu-facturing plant near Hyderabad in south-ern India’s Andhra Pradesh state.

Other linkages include a defense elec-tronics joint venture between EADS andMumbai engineering giant Larsen & Tou-bro, as well as between L&T and Boeingand L&T with Raytheon. In terms of air-craft production, major Indian motorcy-cle maker Hero Motors is seeking to

build light aircraft in a special aerospacesection in central Madhya Pradesh. Also,Indian car maker Mahindra & Mahindrahas had several agreements with foreignhigh-tech companies, including Britain’sBAE Systems, but it has a partnershipwith India’s state aerospace researchcompany, National Aerospace Laborato-ries, to produce a light aircraft with 2-18seats. NAL is to develop and certify theaircraft for domestic use, while MahindraAerospace (a subsidiary of Mahindra &Mahindra) is to seek certification abroadand take charge of serial production.

Surprising gainsWhile to many people in India all of thisprobably seems—and indeed is—verymuch state of the art, to most observersoutside the country it seems pretty smallbeer. Its significance is not so much whathas been achieved so far, but that it ishappening at all. For example, HAL hasbeen discussing plans to build a 70-90-seat regional jet for several years, but sofar nothing has resulted. India’s govern-ment bureaucracy has a well-earned rep-

Boeing F/A-18

Saab Gripen

Lockheed Martin F-16

Dassault Rafale

Mikoyan MiG-35

These aircraft are in contentionto become India’s next majorfighter, with most units to bebuilt by HAL.

Eurofighter Typhoon


companies have echoed the opinion thatthe 26% limit needs to be overtaken withsomething more like 49%, based on thepremise that technology transfers needto be well rewarded if they are to be realand not just disguised attempts at ex-ploiting cheap labor in India.

Tata is probably the only Indian com-pany other than HAL that could makeserious inroads into manufacturing air-craft, not just because of its size but be-cause of its background in aviation—thenational carrier, Air India, was originallya division of the Tata Group. But goingvia the civil rather than military route ismade more difficult by taxation; a for-eign sale to the Ministry of Defense is ex-empt from tax, while spare parts for air-liners are subject to import duty. This iscurrently a barrier to India promoting it-self as a major center for maintenance,repair and overhaul—another avenuethat can lead to significant technologytransfers and training.

The PricewaterhouseCoopers studyalso looks at whether India can emulateChina’s sprint toward aerospace emi-nence, but comes to no real conclusion,

utation for stifling initiative, so the recentand current wave of liberalization is sur-prising for the gains it has made to date.

Even government-controlled entitieshave benefitted, with HAL, for instance,being among a relative handful of suchcompanies to be granted so-called Nav-aratna status, allowing it considerablecommercial freedom in such matters assetting up joint ventures with privatecompanies. As HAL officials note, HALhas actually been responsible to a con-siderable extent for building up high-techexpertise in the private sector by subcon-tracting work that it did not have suffi-cient capacity to complete on its own.

Constraints and barriersLast year, accounting and corporate re-search giant PricewaterhouseCoopers is-sued a study on Indian defense and aero-space industry and investmentopportunities; it pointed out that thelimit of 26% on foreign ownership mightrestrict investors’ enthusiasm for jointventures, though it added that this limitmight give Indian companies more lev-erage in negotiations. In practice, Indian

BAE Hawks for the Indian air force are builtat HAL production line in Bangalore. Photoby Ajai Shukla.


except to say: “The fragmented natureof the Indian aerospace sector has beena hindrance in India achieving self-reliance in its aerospace capabilities.” Itpoints out that China has made a con-certed effort to acquire technology fromoutside via joint ventures as well as de-veloping its own resources, and has de-liberately focused on building capabilitiesof all kinds.

“China also centralized its aerospaceactivities under one ministry at the gov-ernment level; the majority of ordersfrom its government drove economies ofscale and encouraged exports,” the studysays. But in India, “With so many au-thorities as stakeholders in the develop-ment of this sector, there is no single na-tional aeronautical policy or plan thathas emerged to focus on industry’sgrowth and self-reliance.”

India’s recent liberalizations of de-fense and aerospace investment aretherefore a hugely welcome breath offresh air. But win-win or not, it is goingto need time to generate an Indian equiv-alent of Embraer or Bombardier. Thelearning process takes literally years.

Michael WestlakeHong Kong

[email protected]



THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION SAYS IT IS

killing the Constellation human space-flight effort. The program was meant toprovide a next-generation replacementfor the familiar shuttle, which is being re-tired this year. Now the administrationwants to partner with the private sectorto develop what NASA AdministratorCharles Bolden calls “quicker, cheaper,homegrown capacity to put astronautsinto orbit.”

Major shift for NASAPresident Barack Obama has not madea public statement about his space policyeven though the shift from Constellationto commercialization is the biggestchange for NASA since the agency wascreated 52 years ago. Bolden, however,has made repeated trips to Capitol Hillto defend the policy.

The administration’s FY11 budgetproposal calls for the space agency tooutsource rocket development for humanspaceflight to commercial companies.This shift ends any immediate prospectof travel to the Moon or Mars and termi-nates the Ares I booster and the Orioncrew exploration vehicle.

It is unclear whether the new policycan survive the scrutiny by Capitol Hillspace proponents like Sen. Bill Nelson(D-Fla.) and Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.). In hearings at the end of February,senators and outside experts includingNASA Advisory Council member MilesO’Brien criticized NASA for no longerhaving a destination. Bolden said thespace agency still hopes to go to Marsbut acknowledged that the current plandoes not take U.S. astronauts to anyspecific place. Sen. David Vitter (R-La.)said the outsourcing plan is a “waste ofmoney” without a goal. One congres-sional staffer said NASA has a “nebu-lous” sense of direction.

Bolden told Congress that his agencyis making preparations to dismantle theConstellation program, even thoughsome lawmakers say he needs their per-

mission to do so. Among those legisla-tors are Rep. Pete Olson (R-Texas), 19other Republicans and four Democrats,who wrote to Bolden citing a provisionincluded in a 2010 omnibus spendingbill that bars NASA from terminatingany part of the space shuttle replace-ment effort without formal congressionalapproval. Bolden sent a letter in re-sponse to this claim that NASA is break-ing the law, saying that he and the WhiteHouse will fight any Capitol Hill opposi-tion to the administration’s proposedbudget.

Some point out that the aerospaceindustry has not yet tested or flown a pri-vate sector, crewed vehicle that can as-sure sustained flights in LEO and servicethe ISS, which is the essential short-termgoal for U.S. human spaceflight.

One bidder for a private sector rolein space is Elon Musk’s company,SpaceX, which wants to launch astro-nauts on its Falcon 9 rocket. “SpaceX isout to prove that a commercial ap-proach will work,” says Jeffrey Johnson,an analyst on space issues at Bingham-ton University in New York. But al-though the first Falcon 9 was being pre-pared for a test launch at press time,critics were asking whether any privatecompany can complete a crewed vehiclethat meets reliability, safety and costspecifications by 2013, the date prom-ised by SpaceX. Said one spaceflight vet-eran, “If this gambit fails, we have noPlan B and no access to the InternationalSpace Station except by renting spaceon Russian Soyuz vehicles.”

Support for the White House plancame from an unexpected quarter: For-mer Speaker of the House Newt Gin-grich and former Science and Technol-ogy Committee Chairman Robert Walkeropined in The Washington Post that theadministration’s plan “deserves strongapproval from Republicans” because “itdoes what is obvious to anyone whocares about man’s future in space andwhat presidential commissions have been

recommending for nearly a decade.”Even though NASA will receive

more money in FY11 than in FY10, theagency will cut some jobs and assess the“role and size” of its astronaut corps—suggesting that some of the most re-cently named astronauts may never getto fly in space. One Washington ob-server estimated that termination ofConstellation’s Ares I booster and Orioncrew capsule will “put 20,000 engineersout on the streets.” The end of shuttleflights will cost about 7,000 jobs in theregion around the Kennedy SpaceflightCenter.

Just four shuttle missions remain onNASA’s agenda following the February21 landing of Endeavour and its six as-tronauts, commanded by Marine CorpsCol. George D. Zamka, finishing theSTS-130 mission that effectively com-pleted construction of the ISS.

The mission boded well for relationsbetween NASA and its European part-ners. STS-130 delivered the European-designed Tranquility life-support modulealong with a seven-window cupola in-tended for use by robot arm operators.One astronaut compared it to complet-ing the final room of a house under con-struction. The space station is now 98%complete, with a pressurized volume of28,947 ft3, nearly the same as the inte-rior of a Boeing 747 widebody jetliner.

Season for endings?

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden

WATCHlayout410rev.qxd:AA Template 3/15/10 1:14 PM Page 3

protest any award to Boeing, whileEADS said it would not offer a tanker in-dependently of its U.S. prime contractor.Many analysts believe that either air-

craft could do the job but that Boeing’swould offer a lower price while NorthropGrumman’s would have greater rangeand load-carrying capacity. Northropchief executive officer Wes Bush said therules in the current tanker competition—the service’s third since 2001—favoredthe smaller Boeing entry.Deputy Defense Secretary William

Lynn said Pentagon officials “are disap-pointed” by Northrop’s withdrawal. Typ-ical of supporters of the Northrop bid,Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) told re-porters: “The Air Force had a chance todeliver the most capable tanker possibleto our warfighters and blew it.” Typical

of those favoring the Boeingentry, Rep. Norm Dicks (D-Wash.) said he had been as-sured by Defense SecretaryRobert Gates that the Penta-gon would proceed with theplanned tanker acquisition,even after being left with justone aircraft as a candidate.On March 4 Dicks was

named chairman of theHouse appropriations sub-committee that writes thePentagon’s budget, replac-ing Rep. John Murtha (D-

Pa.), who died unexpectedly after sur-gery on February 8. Murtha’s career wasmarked by power and controversy, andhe established himself as a strong friendof the defense and aerospace industries.In 1974 Murtha became the first Viet-nam veteran in the House of Represen-tatives. He drew praise and criticism forusing Capitol Hill’s earmarks process tobring federal dollars to his Pennsylvaniadistrict. Supporters marveled over his at-tention to detail on aerospace and mili-tary concerns. The Wall Street Journaldubbed the congressman a “defense stal-wart.” Murtha had been receptive to theidea, now defunct, of a ‘split” tanker pur-chase for the Air Force, with Boeing andNorthrop both providing aircraft.Murtha was “exasperated” that the

government was taking so long to givetroops the new refueling airplane theyneed. In a telephone interview with thisauthor two years ago, Murtha said, “Ourairmen need a new tanker on the ramp,ready to fly, and they need it now.”Dicks is another defense expert and,

like Murtha, is renowned for earmarks.He is an unabashed champion of Boe-ing, the largest manufacturer in his state.Kyung M. Song of the Seattle Timespegged Dicks as “A much more expan-sive personality than Murtha was, thetype who instinctively holds elevatordoors ajar for late dashers.” Dicks is ex-pected to maintain close watch on theKC-X competition as the Air Force con-templates its next step.

F-35 JSF delayPentagon officials announced in Febru-ary that they are implementing a delayof about one year in the F-35 LightningII Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program,

KC-X tanker programOn March 8 Northrop Grumman an-nounced that it would not offer a bid inthe Air Force’s KC-X competition tobuild a new air refueling tanker. Themove appears to open the way for rivalBoeing to win a $35 billion contract for179 tankers based on the company’s767-200 widebody jetliner. The KC-Xtanker would begin replacing the currentfleet of about 450 Eisenhower-era KC-135R Stratotankers.Northrop had been teamed with Air-

bus parent EADS to offer a version ofthe Airbus A330-200 to be manufac-tured in a new assembly plant in Birm-ingham, Alabama. Boeing will assembleits tankers in Everett, Washington, andfit them out in Wichita, Kansas. North-rop also announced that it would not


STS-130 delivered the seven-window cupola to the space station, providing astronauts witha whole new perspective.

Rep. John MurthaThe Boeing KC-767 would be assembled in Washington.


fighter program.“It would be disingenuous of me to

say when we underperform, it’s exclu-sively industry’s problem,” Schwartz saidat a press conference. “Our inability tomanage requirements [is] reflected, ourability to manage funding is reflected.”The Marine Corps is slated to receive

its first F-35B models in 2012; the AirForce is expected to receive the F-35Ain 2013 and the Navy the F-35C in2013. But technical glitches groundedthe first Marine F-35B to reach the test

facility at Patuxent River,Md. for several weeks,and the F-35C hasnot yet made itsmaiden flight.

In the Feb-ruary restruc-turing, Gatesrelieved Ma-rine Maj. Gen.David Heinz,the JSF programmanager. Many in

Washington saw thisas a show of determina-

tion by Gates, not a reflection on Heinz,who did not cause JSF’s problems.Gates said he would raise the programmanager’s job from two- to three-starrank. To replace Heinz, Gates was ex-pected to name Vice Adm. David J. Ven-let, a naval flight officer with an aerial vic-tory to his credit: On August 19, 1981,Venlet was back-seater on one of twoNavy F-14 Tomcats that shot down twoLibyan Sukhoi Su-22 “Fitters” over theGulf of Sidra.Gates withheld $614 million in per-

formance award fees from prime con-tractor Lockheed Martin. “A number of

Leaders in the Air Force and Navy,warning of a “fighter gap,” want to re-sume production of “legacy” fighters likethe F-16 Fighting Falcon, order largernumbers of F-22s, or increase theNavy’s F-18A/F purchase. None ofthese steps is seen as likely, given Gates’efforts to make JSF succeed.

New TSA chief nominatedPresident Obama has selected retiredArmy Major Gen. Robert A. Harding tolead the Transportation Security Admin-istration. Before retiring from the mili-tary, Harding was deputy to the Army'schief of intelligence and earlier served asdirector for operations in the Defense In-telligence Agency. He retired from theArmy in 2001, after 33 years of service.In 2003, he founded Harding Secu-

rity Associates, a defense and intelligencecontracting firm he sold in 2009. Theappointment follows the withdrawal ofthe previous nominee, Erroll Southers,who faced a confirmation battle.

Robert F. [email protected]


which has experienced cost increasesand technical difficulties.Much is at stake. Assembly of the

Air Force F-22 Raptor and Navy F-18E/F Super Hornet will end in2012, leaving the JSF as the onlyU.S. fighter in production. At theheight of the Cold War in 1956, 26production lines in the U.S. wereturning out 10 types of fighters.Of 168 test flights planned for JSF

in calendar year 2009, just 16 werecompleted. A Pentagon report says F-35unit costs have increased 54% since thecontract was awarded in 2001, whileLockheed officials say the figure is 38%.Gen. William Fraser, head of the USAFAir Combat Command, said in Februarythat initial operating capability, or IOC—the milestone that marks an airplane’sentry into service—will “slip significantly”from its one-time goal of 2013.Intended for the Air Force, Marine

Corps and Navy and a dozen overseasusers, JSF is the most ambitious aircraftprogram in history when measured indollars, with likely sales of about 4,500aircraft totaling more than $700 billion.Deputy Defense Secretary Lynn says

JSF’s development schedule will slip“12-13 months” beyond what officialsexpected when they restructured theprogram in February. Air Force chief ofstaff Gen. Norton Schwartz signaled hisimpatience by warning that the programmay breach the Nunn-McCurdy Act,which requires the DOD to report toCongress any cost increase of 15% ormore and also requires a congressionalreview of alternatives. Schwartz alsofaulted his colleagues in the Pentagon,shortly after the secretary relieved theMarine two-star general in charge of the

key goals and benchmarks were notmet,” Gates told reporters, adding, “thetaxpayer should not have to bear the en-tire burden of getting the JSF programback on track.” In a statement, Lock-heed Martin said it has been workingwith military officials “on a plan to getthe program back on track” and is “com-mitted to stabilizing F-35 cost [and] af-fordability and to fielding the aircraft ontime.” A source told the author of thiscolumn that Lockheed hopes to recoupsome of the withheld funds by meetingrevised incentive goals.

Rep. Norm Dicks

Vice Adm.David J. Venlet

The F-35 is facing delays and cost overruns.

Gen.Norton

Schwartz


“In my opinion, there is still a long way to go until wewill have reached a fully transparent and open market,as we see it in Europe.”

managed through the last, difficult yearwithout major bruises. Large order back-logs at all original equipment manufac-turers [OEMs] and a very flexible produc-tion planning process—combined withour abilities to counter the global stagna-tion in orders by moderately reducingthe independent workforce—enabled usto finish 2009 with rather good, or atleast acceptable, results. Without a doubt2010 will get more difficult for our na-tional aerospace industry, as we expectsome process-critical SMEs to collapsedue to a lack of free capital and goodcredit ratings.

As to your second question: Thegeneral procurement policies of all majorOEMs have decisively changed. In all re-cent programs—regardless of whetherthey are commercial or military—engi-neering and aerostructure specialists andsuppliers are facing bigger challenges.OEMs are streamlining their supplychain, which is more and more globallyset up. They are reducing depth of value-creation, focusing on core competenciesthey have defined for themselves. OEMsare channeling their supply through amuch-reduced number of partly system-capable tier-one suppliers they directlydeal with. The complete chain below thatlevel has to reshape itself under the guid-ance of these tier-one suppliers. To fulfilltheir needs, the national supplier indus-try has to consolidate.

This process is under way at differ-ent speeds in different European coun-tries. Nevertheless, there are quite anumber of niche suppliers with excellentmarket shares, being firmly positioned inthis rapidly changing environment inGermany.

Is the market becoming more or lessopen? In other words, how easy it forGerman companies to win business in

the U.S. compared to a few years ago?European aerospace industry can

be very successful in the United States.Let’s just take Eurocopter as an excellentexample. The company has been lead-ing the U.S. market in the most impor-tant helicopter segments for severalyears now. The company’s productshave a proven track record and success-fully serve in many areas of the commer-cial and para-public sectors.

Procurement agencies and cus-tomers look for the best value-for-moneyproducts. So Eurocopter could succeed—

via EADS North America—in winning aU.S. army tender for new light utility hel-icopters with the military version of itstwin-engine bestseller the EC145, in acontract covering initially almost 200 air-craft. The USAF is also considering in-troducing the UH-72A. The helicopter isbuilt in EADS’ U.S. facilities and isequipped and serviced with U.S. partnercompanies—the industrial program beinga good example of seamless Euro-Amer-ican cooperation.

In the commercial aviation sectorAirbus has an excellent market position,too, as U.S. operators have long realizeddecisive product advantages of Airbusaircraft: ecoefficiency, consistent cockpitarchitectures for flexible personnel plan-ning, efficient training as well as cost-efficient fleet management.

But the defense-related businessmay be very difficult for European ven-dors. The latest example is the U.S.tanker tender, which will now go into athird round, with EADS and its U.S.partner Northrop Grumman possibly notparticipating. In this case we see a clearpolitical impact on the procurementprocess. On the customer side, this ten-der is driven by a desperate need to re-new an old fleet of aircraft by the bestpossible solution in the market, which

Germany’s aerospace companies, likethose of North America and Europe,are operating in an increasingly com-petitive global climate, with new firmsemerging in Asia and the Middle Eastcompeting for the first time for com-plex manufacturing work. Are thesenew companies a threat or an oppor-tunity? And what is the right responseto increasing global competition?

The situation is indeed ambiguousto some extent. On the one hand, exist-ing industrial joint ventures or coopera-tion in the fields of research, codevelop-ment and manufacturing are part of ournecessary efforts to increase Europeanindustry’s independence of Eurozone-re-lated cost structures and globally stream-line our supply chain. On the otherhand, some of the new companies, es-pecially in China, are competing withour local and regional industries in sev-eral fields. So it’s both a threat and anopportunity.

The right response to this challeng-ing situation is to secure synergies wher-ever feasible and to protect knowledgeand core competencies as far as possi-ble. For our supplier industry and our en-gineering companies, there will be noway around developing a global footprintto remain competitive in the long run.Aircraft and engine manufacturers haveto focus on their core competencies—de-sign, materials, ecoefficiency and sys-tems integration. In these fields we havethe longest window of opportunity to re-main at the leading edge.

Most European aerospace companieshave avoided cutbacks and consolida-tion in the wake of the airline reces-sion. What has been the impact of therecession on German aerospace man-ufacturers, and how have they coped?Especially for small and medium-sized enterprises [SMEs], is the rela-tionship changing between niche sup-pliers and the major manufacturers?

Compared to other branches of in-dustry we are still lucky. Overall, we have


Dietmar Schrickterview by Frank Sietzen

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Dietmar Schrick is the managing directorof the German Aerospace IndustriesAssociation, BDLI (Bundesverband derDeutschen Luft- und RaumfahrtindustrieeV).He earned a degree in engineeringfrom the University of Applied Sciencesin Düsseldorf in 1973 and then undertookpostgraduate studies at the NiederrheinUniversity of Applied Sciences. In 1975he joined Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm(MBB) as an engineer and in 1984 wasappointed head of the MBBmarketingdepartment for helicopters and aircraft.

In 1987 Schrick was appointed consultantto the MBB corporate strategic planningbusiness unit and head of marketing andforeign relations.He became head ofcorporate strategic planning and foreignrelations in themilitary airplanes divisionand in 1999 director of the Manchingplant,where front-line fighters for theGerman air force are assembled. In 2003he was appointed amember of theexecutive board of EADSMilitary AirSystems, responsible for product support,and a director of Dornier Flugzeugwerft.He becamemanaging director of BDLIin January 2007.

we consider the modern Airbus to be.In my opinion, there is still a long

way to go until we will have reached afully transparent and open market, as wesee it in Europe. But future competitivethreats coming from emerging aero-space nations such as China, India andothers will force the U.S. and Europe toa more intense partnering to protectWestern technology and industrial com-petitiveness. On this point, the U.S.Aerospace Industries Association, theAerospace and Defense Industries Asso-ciation of Europe and the German Aero-space Industries Association (BDLI) fullyagree.

How are R&D budgets holding up?Does industry continue to have accessto sufficient capital to fund researchprograms such as SESAR, Clean Skyand so on?

Basically there is money available.Indeed, not all available funding has beenused. This is because the economic crisishas deeply affected the cash and capitalsituation of many smaller companies. Asall major European research tenders arebased on a 50% cash investment by thecompany that wants European Unionfunding, many companies simply cannotafford to make use of these EU funds. Inthe long run, available budgets will surelynot be sufficient. In general, these daysthere are funding opportunities bothfrom European and national sources.

Nevertheless, in the short term thefinancial situation of the industry—inconjunction with many challenging pro-grams such as the A350XWB andA400M—is leading to a shortage ofmatching research capital, both humanand financial. Midterm and in the longrun, these capacities will be free againfor further future projects, but it is likelythat the continuous availability of re-search support and the expediency offunding will not be self-evident any morein the future.

SESAR and Clean Sky are pro-grams that support the larger companies

very well. Small and medium-sized com-panies, who want to engage in active re-search through the EU framework, de-pend on other programs called “collab-orative research.” As this work has totake place before the major programssuch as Clean Sky with regard to theirtechnology cycle, they will have to bekept up.

Is the strength of the euro a problemfor you, or are aerospace transactionsbetween European partner aerospacecompanies now taking place in euros?What can be done about the competi-tiveness of Europe’s aerospace sectorif the euro remains high against theU.S. dollar?

The currently varying euro/dollarratio is a clear problem for our industry.

Companies like Airbus, for example,may lose billions in marginal rises of theeuro/U.S. dollar ratio. There is a cleartrend for OEMs—even in the frameworkof military programs—to pay suppliers inU.S. dollars. European aircraft compa-nies like Airbus and Eurocopter alreadyhave a large share of their value creationgenerated in the dollar zone.

To give you an example: Today, theAirbus A350XWB cost base is nearly70% in U.S. dollars. Major U.S. suppli-ers involved in the A350XWB pro-gram—whether they produce for us inthe U.S. or not, and excluding enginework—include Spirit, Honeywell, Rock-well Collins, Moog, Parker, B/E Aero-space, Goodrich and Atkins. We havecontracted with the above-listed suppli-ers work packages that represent in


Graham Lake Interview by Philip Butterworth-Hayes


value around 45% of the total purchaseprice of the aircraft.

Hedging is another mechanism toreduce currency-related financial risks.

Has the ILA Berlin Air Show been im-pacted by the recession? How impor-tant is it that this show continue to de-velop, especially given the centrifugalforces of Paris and Farnborough?

All the shows that we evaluated orparticipated in last year have sufferedfrom the general economic setbacks, atleast in size. Nevertheless we are very op-timistic that we will be able to achieve2008’s success for the ILA show. To en-sure optimal value for the money, wehave further optimized the setup of theILA Berlin Air Show. We will have ninenew sections at the show. They includecommercial air transport, spaceflight, de-fense and security, equipment, enginesand materials, alongside the internationalsuppliers center [ISC], general aviationincorporating the HeliCenter, the careercenter and an extensive conference pro-gram. The Path of Innovation will be pre-senting selected innovation projects thatfocus on the environment.

The ISC will offer an InternationalBuyers’ Day [June 9]—a new feature in2010—which will make it possible forISC exhibitors to exclusively engage indirect business-to-business talks with buy-ers from leading international OEMs andfirst-tier suppliers. The career center willprovide a superb platform for small andmedium-sized companies. Here, booths,lecture slots in the conference roomsand a spacious, informal lounge area areavailable for companies to get in touchwith their future employees. A variety ofadditional measures are intended toboost potential employees’ fascinationwith aerospace.

Are you finding it difficult to recruitnew people to the industry? After all,aerospace no longer has quite thesame reputation for innovation itonce had, and media/IT jobs now payjust as well. How should we all try tochange the image of aerospace withinsociety to attract new people and al-lay some of the public’s worry aboutthe environmental consequences ofunrestricted aviation growth?

Although currently there are largenumbers of people on the job market,due to the latest economic crisis, we arefacing great difficulties in recruiting in-dustry-specific skilled personnel, espe-cially engineers. This turns out to be acentral challenge for our industry to en-sure our competitive strength in the dec-ades to come. I am convinced that aero-space itself has not lost its fascination. Inthe 1990s our industry went throughsome difficult times: job cuts, political de-bates on new military programs and oldnational enterprises vanishing and beingreplaced by multinational companies.Continuity and long-term visions werenot well communicated.

At the same time, other industriescame up with fascinating, very innova-tive technology—biotech, new energytechnologies, automobile innovations,just to name a few. Today, we are com-peting with many attractive job pack-ages. We must communicate the uniquefascination of designing and engineeringthe world’s most complex products at anearly stage in the education process.Apart from that, we have to stress morein our communications that the workingenvironment in multicultural, multina-tional and globally located team struc-tures is a unique chance for personal skilldevelopment and cultural experience.

For these reasons we established—among other activities—Germany’s big-gest aerospace job platform, the ILA Ca-reerCenter, two years ago. We see theenvironmental aspects of research, prod-uct design and production activities asbeing important drivers for attractingyoung people to a career in our industry.

Are manufacturing members comingunder increasing pressure to reducetheir carbon footprint? If so, are thesenational, European or global pres-sures, and what impact are they hav-ing on investment and profitability?

“Carbon footprint” is a key phrasein political discussions on air transportand future environmental politics. In ourindustry, it is on top of our agenda. In airtransport, environmental-friendliness anda low carbon footprint also mean eco-nomic efficiency in operations. This co-herence has been a decisive driver in oursales figures in recent years. An eco-

nomic crisis like the one in 2009 evenboosted “green” production and opera-tion of transport systems. Ecoefficiencybecomes a competitive advantage, lead-ing to a general trend in developinggreen technologies. I am absolutely surethat those companies that do not realizethis will be out of business in themidterm.

Less known to the broad public, andeven to parts of the industry, anotherchallenge has arisen from new environ-mental legislation in the EU. Of course,we fully support these new laws and reg-ulations, as their primary goal is to pro-tect people and nature from substancesof very high concern. Since product lifecycles, certification processes and safetyregulations are extremely long in our in-dustry, a 1:1 implementation of thesenew regulations brings along an enor-mous and disproportionate burden. Atthe same time, there is no provable con-tribution to the protection of the envi-ronment and health.

This is an issue; the European aero-space industry should closely cooperatewith its counterparts in other regions ofthe world to jointly encourage reason-able legislative frameworks.

How important is it that we improvethe links between industry and aca-demic institutions so we can get moretheoretical research more quickly andefficiently into the market? What rolecan BDLI play in this?

A future, and demand-oriented, vo-cational education and training policy inthe aerospace sector is a key factor inmaking our industry fit for the future.The aerospace industry, unlike any othersector, requires a growing number ofqualified technicians and engineers to beable to carry out current and futuremultinational and complex programs. Atpresent, almost 2,000 qualified techni-cians and engineers are needed in Ger-many and must be recruited.

The German aerospace industry hasbeen carrying out comprehensive recruit-ment measures at trade shows for manyyears now. In addition, many BDLI mem-ber companies are actively involved innational initiatives, or have companyproject days to attract potential new re-cruits—whether they be elementary



school students or university graduates—to the varied vocational field of aerospaceengineering. There are also many activi-ties in creating and interlinking exchangeplatforms with the educational sector.

Special events like the Germany-wide Girls’ Day or Engineers’ Day aredesigned to create awareness and inter-est at an early stage of young girls’ andboys’ education.

At the student level, universities andstudent-led initiatives such as BONDINGand EUROAVIA enable students to per-form active networking within the aero-space industry’s environment. Closecooperation between science, appliedresearch and industry allows educationalinstitutions and industry to jointly ensurethat new recruits can be sensitized at anearly date and receive need-driven, time-optimized training. Both the universitiesand industrial enterprises involved willbenefit from the synergies created interms of job relevance and developmentcompetence. Sponsored institutes for

specific aeronautic sciences are addingto this effect.

The BDLI strategically supportsthese efforts through its own ILA Career-Center initiative, which serves as an in-ternational contact platform for OEMs,equipment and material suppliers and allthose career starters, university gradu-ates and other specialists seeking jobs orworking in the aerospace industry.

How much of Germany’s aerospaceoutput relies on government con-tracts? Will the government, throughthe military or through other stateconcerns, have a bigger or smaller sizeof the market in the next five years?

Approximately 25-30% of theturnover generated in our industry lastyear derived from government and de-fense-related business. This area has re-mained stable and showed a moderategrowth rate during last year’s economiccrisis. As an industry this balance betweencommercial and government business


helps us to cope with the latest market cy-cles better than some other industries,which were strongly affected lately.

How important is regional governmentsupport to aerospace industry through-out Germany? Are there new aerospaceclusters developing?

Most of our companies and sites inGermany profit from a generally positiveenvironment and public perception. Poli-tics has long realized the importance of theaerospace industry as a general technol-ogy driver. There are some clusters devel-oping, and we welcome this general devel-opment of regional competence centers,as this ensures a solid technology basis forour industry, especially for our SMEs.

BDLI takes an active coordinatingrole in this setup, through its regional fo-rum, a platform for regional associations.BDLI thus assures that budgets for re-search are assigned efficiently and sup-ports an effective development andbundling of competencies.


the industry in 2004, but at that timethere was an inherent unwillingness todiscuss the question of what the visionwould end up costing U.S. taxpayers.As part of an effort to collect feed-

back on the VSE from industry and aca-demia, the Bush administration estab-lished a nine-member space policy ad-visory panel of scientists and businessleaders. The President’s Commission onMoon, Mars and Beyond, chaired by for-mer astronaut Pete Aldridge, held a se-ries of public hearings in 2004 to helpformulate a blueprint for the vision.Ultimately, the commission pub-

lished an extremely superficial report,more a collection of vague ideas andpossibilities in support of the vision thana detailed plan for how that vision wouldbe implemented and funded and how itwould benefit the U.S. It was an exercisein rubber stamping the VSE rather thandetermining whether or not the strategywas realistically possible and why it wasworthwhile to undertake.From the start of the VSE, our sense

was that no one in the Bush administra-tion wanted to talk about its potentialcost, because estimates that ranged inthe hundreds of billions of dollars wouldbe politically unpalatable and would de-rail the program before it ever got off theground. But everyone knew that to makeeven the first phase of the VSE happen,NASA’s budget, which at that time wasstill less than $16 billion, would have togrow at a pace significantly higher thanthe annual rates of inflation over thecourse of at least a decade.

The silver liningIt was determined that the details of howto come up with the funding needed forthe VSE would be left up to future ad-ministrations. It was also decided that adetailed rationale for why the effort wasso important to the U.S. would eventu-ally become self-evident. After the lossof the shuttle Columbia, morale atNASA was low. The VSE was designed


THE VISION FOR SPACE EXPLORATION (VSE),first announced to the public by Presi-dent George W. Bush on January 14,2004, officially ended on February 1,2010, with the cancellation of its cor-nerstone program, Constellation.The VSE, which envisioned return-

ing astronauts to the Moon and eventu-ally using the lunar surface as a launchsite for manned missions to Mars, wasintended as a way to rebuild slumpingmorale at NASA and provide a roadmap for the future after the 2003 loss ofthe shuttle Columbia. Another goal ofthe strategy was to reenergize the pub-lic’s interest in human spaceflight and re-capture the sense of excitement and na-tional pride felt during the Apollo era ofthe late 1960s and early 1970s.Six years and $9 billion later, the

Obama administration has decided to ter-minate Constellation by canceling workon its core elements—the Orion crew ex-ploration vehicle and Ares I rocket.Orion/Ares I would have been the fol-low-on system to the space shuttle fleet,scheduled for retirement by the end ofthis year. It would also have served as thebasis for development of a more power-ful system designed to transport astro-nauts and supplies to the Moon by 2020.The decision to terminate Constella-

tion will essentially leave NASA withoutits own manned space transportationsystem for the first time in half a century.Some within government and industryare interpreting this as the beginning ofa marked decline in America’s spaceleadership and the start of a trend thatwill see countries such as China and In-dia catch and even surpass the U.S. inthe area of human spaceflight. We seethe exact opposite.

The root causeThe reality is that the VSE has neverbeen adequately funded, and was nevergoing to succeed without a massive infu-sion of funding for NASA, a move thatwas not going to happen anytime in the

near future given the immense demandson the federal budget (including twowars), the growing U.S. budget deficits,mounting debt and the continuing stag-nation of the economy. So the choicewas between funding an increasingly ex-pensive R&D program with insufficientbudgets, in hopes of eventually produc-ing an Orion/Ares I system, or decidingto radically change the strategy for theway NASA conducts human spaceflight.In a report submitted to Congress in

October, a U.S. human spaceflight pol-icy review panel headed by Norman Au-gustine noted, “The U.S. human space-flight program appears to be on anunsustainable trajectory. It is perpetuat-ing the perilous practice of pursuinggoals that do not match allocated re-sources.” We think that this observationgoes to the heart of why the current ad-ministration felt it had to end Orion/Ares I and change course.The Augustine panel concluded that

the budget for Orion/Ares I would haveto be increased by at least $3 billion ayear to keep the program relatively ontrack. The Obama administration wasonly willing to grow NASA’s overallbudget from $18.7 billion in FY10 to$19 billion in FY11, which means theagency was simply not going to be givenanywhere close to the amount of moneyneeded to keep Orion/Ares I alive.In addition, the panel’s recommenda-

tion that the administration allocate $11billion more for manned space explo-ration than it had previously budgeted forFY11 through FY15 reflects a common-sense realization that there will be pro-gram delays that add to costs.The point is that the U.S. has finally

arrived at a crossroads where there is avast disconnect between the country’shuman spaceflight goals, as broadly out-lined by the VSE and Constellation, andthe financial investment the U.S. gov-ernment is willing and able to make. It isa crossroads that could easily have beenforeseen by the Bush administration and

A boost for commercial humanspaceflight

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gram as it has always existed had to beoverhauled. There was growing talkabout NASA becoming less the domi-nant player and gradually allowing com-mercial industry to lead.In 2008, NASA awarded contracts

to Orbital Sciences (OSC) and Space Ex-ploration Technologies (SpaceX) to pro-vide cargo launch services to and fromISS through 2016. This was a majorstep toward the agency growing moredependent on the commercial space-flight industry and thus becoming moreof a facilitator of the industry’s growthrather than a competitor. The contracts,worth a total of $3.5 billion, have fueledthe development of SpaceX’s Falcon 9rocket and Dragon capsule andOSC’s Taurus II and Cygnus cap-sule. They not only have pro-vided development funding forthe systems but also have senta clear signal to industry thatthere is now a new and po-tentially lucrative market forISS cargo transport services.This new market has

been made possible preciselybecause in seeking a cargo

transport service provider NASAhas been forced to look to thecommercial spaceflight industry asan alternative to Russia and itsSoyuz rocket/capsule. With theshuttle fleet nearing the end of its life-time and Orion/Ares I many years fromcompletion, NASA was facing a gap ofsix to seven years without its own spacetransportation vehicle.During that time, the agency would

be forced to lease space aboard Russianvehicles to ferry its astronauts and cargoto and from ISS. In May 2009, NASAactually signed a contract with the Rus-sian space agency worth $306 millioncovering two Soyuz missions in 2012 totransport astronauts to ISS and two re-turn flights in 2013.In short, NASA was forced by cir-

cumstances beyond its control to turn toU.S. commercial industry to meet a needthat the agency could no longer meetwithout relying on the Russian govern-ment. The question that had been linger-ing before the Obama administration’sdecision to end Constellation was,“What happens to the emerging com-

mercial space transportation services in-dustry when Orion/Ares I is completedand NASA becomes the dominantplayer again?” That question has nowbeen rendered irrelevant.

A second Moon raceA major concern of some who opposethe cancellation decision is that the U.S.is ceding its world leadership position inthe area of human spaceflight and spaceexploration. Without its space shuttle,NASA next year will be completely re-liant on the Russians for gaining accessto ISS—a facility that has cost the U.S.government more than $100 billion tobuild and assemble over the past quarter-

SpaceX is developingthe Dragon crew vehicleand Falcon 9 launcher.

Orbital Sciences has the Taurus II rocket and isworking on its Cygnus crew vehicle.

more as a morale booster, and to givethe agency a new sense of purpose anddirection. It succeeded—and in the pro-cess, the strategy stimulated the U.S.civil space industry and funded some bill-ions of dollars of R&D work. However,as a vision for attaining a specific goal,it was a dead-end strategy.The good news about the VSE and

Constellation is that they highlighted areality fast becoming apparent under thetenure of NASA Administrator MichaelGriffin, from April 2005 through Janu-ary 2009: that the U.S. civil space pro-

(Continued on page 25)



PROBABLY THE BIGGEST BUZZWORD IN DE-fense electronics today is ISR (intelligence,surveillance and reconnaissance). At theend of 2009, senior commanders fromthe U.S., European, Northern, Southernand Special Operations commands alllisted increased air and space ISR assetsas their organizations’ top needs, citedas an “unquenchable ISR thirst.”

A USAF source claimed, “There’s aninsatiable demand for ground movingtarget indicator [data] right now.” TheAir Force has been considering establish-ing an independent ISR command,which would not only rationalize cross-discipline planning, but also promote anumber of intelligence officers to seniorlevels, where they would have more in-fluence in war planning. And, of course,Secretary of Defense Robert Gates con-tinues to be a staunch supporter of im-proved ISR.

Clearly ISR is the media and mili-tary’s darling of the moment, but in thiscase it is likely to have some stayingpower. ISR growth is everywhere; it isthe common thread to nearly all elec-tronics markets, air, ground and naval.Even if ISR programs are not the biggestin terms of total funding (it is hard tobeat Joint Strike Fighter or even F-22),they are often the fastest growing, andby far comprise the bulk of new programstarts.

Two distinct new ISR flavors of thepast year will become an important partof the market in years to come—a returnto manned ISR, and a return to the wide-field-of-view surveillance that was centralto the Cold War period and is now com-ing back after a decade of “soda straw”sensors developed for UAVs.

Big future for small planes?In January 2009, the Air Force publiclyconfirmed that it had launched ProjectLiberty, an urgent effort to deploy 37manned ISR aircraft to Iraq and Af-ghanistan—beginning in April 2009—toaid high-value targeting and other tacti-

cal intelligence missions. The $950-mil-lion program began in April 2008 withthe service asking used aircraft dealers tosell them as many good Hawker Beech-craft King Air 350 twin-turboprops aswere available. They even bought pri-vate-owner craft, to allow immediate fit-ting with ISR sensors and systems.

The resulting MC-12W Project Lib-erty craft are equipped with off-the-shelfsensors to facilitate accurate weapon tar-geting and identification of improvisedexplosive devices (IEDs). “We alwaysneed to know about the environment,especially in the counterinsurgencyfight,” says Brig. Gen. Blair Hansen, di-rector of the Air Force’s ISR capabilities.

By July 2009, delays had slowed theprogram, blamed on the unexpectedcomplexity of converting used aircraftinto a common military configuration.But L-3 Communications had convertedall seven used King Air 350s ordered bythe Air Force as part of Project LibertyPhase 1. In September 2009, the ser-vice was considering contracting withNorthrop Grumman and Boeing to addfull-motion video and SIGINT payloadsto the 37 planned MC-12W aircraft, in-dicating that this project might be fol-lowed quickly by continuing upgrades.

But how much staying power willthese makeshift ISR aircraft have? Manyin the services have already criticized theshift of funding away from longer en-durance UAVs. Are these aircraft a stop-gap measure, or a return to the recon-naissance lessons learned throughout

the 20th century, when more than oneman in the cockpit was considered vitalfor good, rather than just plentiful, intel-ligence? We should keep in mind thateven midsized manned aircraft have apayload capacity equal to Global Hawk(one argument for keeping U-2s in ser-vice), and in-the-air operator consolesmitigate the problem of processing (orwasting) voluminous UAV sensor data onthe ground: Greater endurance canmean more useless data.

Teal Group does see the U.S. return-ing to a more solid manned ISR capabil-ity—sort of a post-Cold-War return tofighter tactical reconnaissance, but at atime when total air superiority makesputting sensors on business jets morepractical than putting them on RF-4Phantoms. We see the next few years es-tablishing a number of moderate newprograms of record for manned ISR—forsynthetic aperture radar (SAR), electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) and SIGINTsensors. But not huge programs: Eventhe Army is considering descoping itsgold-plated Aerial Common Sensor pro-gram to something more like Project Lib-erty, a quicker way to get new sensors inthe air on platforms with payloads biggerthan Predator/Warrior UAVs.

International demandIn a related development, L-3 Communi-cations and Hawker Beechcraft are nowoffering the same aircraft used for Proj-ect Liberty and several other U.S. ISRprograms—the King Air 350ER—for in-

Geography drives ISR technology

An MC-12W takesoff from Bagram Airfield,Afghanistan, on the first missionof the newly activated 4th ExpeditionaryReconnaissance Squadron, December 29, 2009.(USAF photo by Tech. Sgt. Jeromy K. Cross.)

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ternational sales with a standard or cus-tomized ISR payload: $8 million for the8-hr endurance aircraft, plus $5 million-$10 million for a basic EO/IR turretsetup with satellite communications andtwo operator stations.The recent surge of new manned ISR

aircraft has Hawker and L-3 predicting amarket for 225 aircraft, worth $3.8 bil-lion, over the next decade. The 350 hasa payload of 2,000-2,800 lb, comparedto a Global Hawk Block 30/40 (thebiggest UAV) with 3,000 lb. Teal Groupbelieves a much smaller market may ex-ist, but there should be a number of mi-nor sales. Over 6,000 King Airs havebeen built already, mainly in civil service,currently operating in 94 countries.In 2009, Lockheed Martin was also

offering to lease various custom or re-configured manned ISR aircraft, fromGulfstream G550s and BombardierQ400s (with a 20,000-lb payload) downto King Airs. Lockheed used an acquiredGulfstream III business jet, which it haddeveloped as an “airborne multiintelli-gence laboratory,” to show its wares ona “road show” through Europe on theway to the Dubai Air Show in November2009. Initial sensor offerings includedFLIR systems, EO/IR and SIGINT sen-

sors and Lockheed’s ownPhoenix Eye.These offerings may

see limited internationalacquisitions, on the orderof a couple of platformsfor a few countries each,but the U.S. is still theonly nation that can af-ford to buy 37 (plus morefor the Army and USMC)new multimillion-dollar ISR aircraft, al-most on a whim. We do not see this as abroad-based return to manned ISR out-side the U.S., when most countries arejust beginning to get their first few (long-awaited) endurance UAVs. Most of thehundreds of dedicated European tacticalreconnaissance fighters from the ColdWar will stay dead.

Sensors go wideIn terms of sensors, because of theirsmall payload and lack of on-board crew(who can scan wide areas for points ofinterest with sensors called “eyes”), therampant UAV growth of last decade re-sulted in a drastic shift from the ISR sen-sors of the last century. UAV EO/IRsensors are almost universally narrowfield-of-view (FOV) telephoto systems,

which can zoom in on vehicles, roads,buildings and people, but do a relativelypoor job of scanning countryside andlarge areas. The sensors must be cued(often today by a laser designator forweapon targeting) to find their target.Since the first gulf war, in 1990-

1991, the U.S. military has always beenthe dominant military power in theater,and has been primarily concerned withrelatively known targets, especially inpopulation centers such as cities. Therehas not been the Cold War need to spotthreatening military forces moving any-where across a broad landscape, or di-verse forces that might be hiding behindnational borders. In Iraq, most impor-tant military targets have been either incities or in places where there arethreats to localized groups of U.S. or al-lied troops. Thus, wide field-of-view(WFOV) surveillance has had less impor-tance. But in the past few years, withnew missions, several new WFOV ISRprograms have begun.The Army’s Constant Hawk is a per-

sistent surveillance WFOV airborne ISRsystem for conducting counter-IED sur-veillance and forensic force protectionmissions in Iraq and Afghanistan, withdevelopment reportedly begun in 2006.Constant Hawk mounts high-resolutionEO cameras on Shorts 360 and King Air350 aircraft, loitering over areas of inter-est for 5-6 hr collecting and storing im-agery data. These data are processed onthe ground, with resulting intelligencepushed out to commanders within hoursof the mission’s completion.Several near-term upgrades are being

planned for Constant Hawk, includingthe addition of a real-time data link, im-proved processing tools, better EO sen-sors, and an infrared sensor to allow for

RDT&E+procurement available to the U.S.

AIRBORNE ISR MARKET FORECAST

$8.0

6.0

4.0

2.0

0.0FY09 FY10 FY11 FY12 FY13 FY14 FY15 FY16 FY17 FY18

$BillionsTOTAL$61,800

4,4534,763

5,0575,617

6,1606,680

6,9887,382 7,295 7,405

Manned EO UAV EO Manned SAR

UAV SAR Manned SIGINT UAV SIGINT

The Shorts 360 Constant Hawk carries a a persistentsurveillance WFOV airborne ISR system for the Army.(Photo copyright Ian Howat.)


day and night operations (today’s Con-stant Hawk is pretty crude—day only andnot real-time). The new sensor systemwill be BAE Systems’ airborne wide areapersistent surveillance system.

The Marine Corps’ wide field-of-viewpersistent surveillance (WFVPS) program(also called Angel Fire) also offers persis-tent ISR, IED mitigation, and actionableintelligence in urban and other opera-tions (disaster relief, security). It deliversbroad-area, near-real-time georegisteredimagery down to the tactical level. De-velopment reportedly began in 2007.

The airborne payload consists of animager sensor (currently daytime-onlyEO, believed to be Goodrich ISR’s CA-247 camera), on-board processors and

an air-to-ground communication link.The ground distribution network consistsof the ground receive station, servers,storage and viewer client stations. TheAngel Fire system is hosted on mannedplatforms, currently the Hawker Beech-craft King Air A-90; pilots fly the planewhile the sensors can be controlled fromthe ground through autonomous soft-ware. The USMC ultimately plans toshift the WFVPS mission to a UAV.

The Air Force’s wide area airbornesurveillance (WAAS) program, now some-what bizarrely renamed Gorgon Stare(and also sometimes called the wide areapersistent surveillance sensor), will de-velop a multiple aperture EO/IR pod forthe Reaper or another UAV (it is toolarge for the Predator). It will provide asimilar wide-angle view as the new AngelFire and Constant Hawk manned ISRaircraft, both in great demand in combatareas. Advantages of this program willbe the IR sensor, as well as a real-timedata link, downloading images throughthe Rover system. The aim is to field 10systems, beginning in 2010.

Another WAAS version is to be spe-cifically optimized for operation in urban

for reliable forecasts.Immediate procure-ments will all be overfairly soon, and whatwill come after is un-certain. What we cansay is that since UAVsbegan to take overfrom manned fightertactical reconnaissanceand other ISR aircraftwith WFOV sensorssuch as the U-2 Drag-onlady, WFOV recon-naissance has beenlargely ignored. Nearlyall UAV EO/IR sen-sors today providenarrow FOV soda-

straw views that are great for watchingthe highways of Iraq, but do not work aswell trying to locate soldiers hidingacross hundreds of miles of Afghanmountains; in this regard, at least, ourmilitary is realizing that not every oppo-nent will be urban, and WFOVs areagain sometimes necessary.

On the other hand, the Army hasalso been actively considering needs forfuture conflicts: Demographic and mi-gration trends point to an increasing em-phasis on urban and littoral locations,with almost three-fourths of the world’spopulation living in those areas, whichwill require yet again different equipmentand training—and even more new ISRsystems.

But when the U.S. services acquirean ability, they generally want to do itbetter, and so far this century the de-fense budget has not declined. Today’srudimentary WFOV EO sensors (mostare not even night-vision capable) clearlypresent great opportunities for future de-velopment. Our speculative forecast as-sumes that each service (except, per-haps, the USMC) will soon begin aformal program of record for WFOVISR. We will have to wait to see exactlywhat these future development pro-grams are, and exactly what will becomeof today’s essentially prototype systems,but our forecast funding continues to-day’s programs with at least similar fund-ing levels through the decade.

David L. RockwellTeal Group

[email protected]


RDT&E+procurement available to the U.S.MANNED/UAV ISR MARKET SHARES

100%

80

60

4.0

2.0

0.0FY09 FY10 FY11 FY12 FY13 FY14 FY15 FY16 FY17 FY18

The Gorgon Stare is beingcarried by the Reaper.

areas, where the “urban canyon” effectmakes tracking personnel on the grounddifficult. An airship is being considered,to provide even more persistent surveil-lance and steeper view angles from highabove a city, but this would be evenmore vulnerable to ground fire and mis-siles than UAVs are.

International programs also exist,though these are more difficult to locate.In April 2009, photos showed one offour new King Air 350 aircraft procuredby the U.K. under a classified programnamed Shadow R.1 by the RAF.

A broad future for WFOV?All of the new WFOV EO sensor aircraftin or entering service today are urgentprocurements, mostly developed to com-bat IEDs in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mostof these aircraft, based on the mannedKing Air, have moderate endurance andvery little survivability in contested air-space. They can fly above man-portablesurface-to-air missiles, but other thanthat are essentially defenseless commer-cial aircraft. Thus future applications willbe limited.

The WAAS/Gorgon Stare will becarried by the Reaper, providing greaterendurance and, if not greater survivabil-ity, at least less concern about losses. Ithas been suggested that an aerostatwould provide even better performancewith even greater endurance, but theseapplications would be mostly limited tofixed sites, not aiding mobile forces.

Since all these programs are recentdevelopments, there is very little basis


century. Russia will unquestionably bethe premier country in this arena, fol-lowed by China, which is now spending$2 billion annually on its human space-flight program.

China has already launched taiko-nauts to LEO aboard its Long March CZ-2F/Shenzhou system. It is also aiming tolaunch space stations to LEO by 2015and a manned mission to the Moonsometime between 2020 and 2022.

India could soon have a national hu-man spaceflight capability as well. Fol-lowing the successful Chandrayaan-1 un-manned lunar orbiter mission in No-vember 2008, India is now conducting aserious effort to send a manned missionto the Moon by 2015. Earlier this year,the Indian government announced that itplans to spend $2.7 billion on this pro-gram, with the ultimate goal of landingan Indian astronaut on the lunar surfaceby 2020.

It is an extremely ambitious under-taking, particularly since India has neverhad a human-rated space vehicle. None-theless, it is becoming apparent that thesecond race to the Moon will be betweenChina and India.

The Russian government has ex-pressed an interest in sending a mannedmission to the Moon by 2025, but its fo-cus seems to be less on winning the sec-ond lunar race than on eventually build-ing a permanent lunar base. The Russianspace agency has speculated that it couldbegin assembling a manned station onthe Moon as early as 2027.

There is no doubt that this next raceto the Moon will receive considerable in-ternational publicity and help advance

NASA’s evolution from being thedominant player in human spaceflight tobeing a facilitator for the expansion ofthis commercial industry will take time,and it will not happen without the usualsetbacks and delays that occur with anynew industry. Neither will it occur with-out considerable pain to some of theagency’s traditional contractors, whostood to secure lucrative long-term busi-ness by building hardware and creatingsoftware for the follow-on to the shuttle.

The good news is that you can al-ready begin to envision the potentialbenefits that this sudden paradigm shiftcould bring to the U.S. NASA an-nounced in February a total of $50 mil-lion in contracts for work on “spacetaxis” to several aerospace companies,including Paragon Space Development,Blue Origin, Sierra Nevada, and UnitedLaunch Alliance. There also are othercompanies besides these—SpaceX andOSC are working on cargo and humantransportation space vehicles. All theyneed is a consistent series of incentivesand R&D investments from NASA, inmuch the same way that the U.S. gov-ernment provided the railroad and air-craft industries in their early years.

While China and India are busy rac-ing to the Moon to plant their respectivenational flags, the U.S. will be fueling thegrowth of a commercial industry, onethat may well lead to innovations thatspark the creation of countless other in-dustries—in much the same way that theinvention of the Internet permanentlychanged the technological landscape.

Marco CáceresTeal Group

[email protected]

the human spaceflight capabilities of In-dia and China. The technological statureof both countries will be enhanced dur-ing the coming decade, and when eachcountry successfully completes a mannedlunar landing. So is the U.S. making amistake by giving up on the VSE?

The answer depends on whether ornot you assume that repeating theApollo program’s achievements of fourdecades ago is a worthwhile goal. Obvi-ously, it is worthwhile for countries thathave never come close to attaining whatNASA did by the end of the 1960s. It isdifferent for the U.S. The VSE never sat-isfactorily answered the question, “Whyare we going to the Moon again?” And itdefinitely did not address the question,“How does it justify the necessary finan-cial investment?”

Getting out of the wayThe cancellation of the VSE is a prag-matic decision by the Obama administra-tion. There is just not enough money inthe U.S. budget to pay for a space trans-portation and exploration initiative inwhich the tangible benefits to the nationare not clear. It is important to note,though, that the decision is pragmaticnot only because of what it eliminates,but also because of what it will allow tooccur as a result.

Without its own human spaceflightcapability, NASA will now no longer beboth the main customer for and themain provider of human spaceflight ser-vices in the U.S., as it has always beenbefore. The agency will quickly becomenoncompetitive as a provider of suchservices and thus will gradually becomeless dominant as a customer.

By looking to the still-nascent U.S.commercial spaceflight industry to com-pete with the Russians for ISS cargotransportation services, NASA will helpfund efforts by companies like SpaceXand OSC to develop human-rated spacevehicles that will eventually be able totransport astronauts. These vehicles can,in turn, be adapted and offered to spurthe development of new commercialmarkets such as space tourism. This willstimulate private capital investment inthese types of space transportation pro-grams, and before you know it you willhave a growing and vibrant commercialhuman spaceflight industry.

The United Launch Alliance may offera human-rated Atlas V (left) or Delta IVfor future astronaut launches.

China has already launched taikonauts to LEOand may be aiming for the Moon next.

(Continued from page 21)




MOST ASTRONOMERS WOULD NOT DREAM

of opening their observatory’s doorsin 100-mph winds. Yet NASA’s newSOFIA telescope recently flew in an air-plane at 250 mph with doors wide open.On December 18, the Stratospheric Ob-servatory for Infrared Astronomy flew ina modified Boeing 747SP at 15,000 ftfor 1 hour and 19 minutes. For two min-utes of that time, the door by the tele-scope was wide open.

sition to capture especially interesting as-tronomical events such as stellar occulta-tions (when celestial objects cross infront of background stars), while ground-based telescopes fastened to a “wrong”geographic location on Earth’s surfacemiss the show. SOFIA will fly above theveil of water vapor that surrounds Earthto take a wide-eyed look at the cosmos.

This veil of vapor acts like an invisi-ble brick wall to the infrared energy fromcosmic objects that SOFIA wants to see.SOFIA solves this problem by viewingthe heavens from “above the veil”—something ground-based scopes cannotdo. Like space-based telescopes, SOFIAwill collect infrared energy before itreaches Earth.

Seeing the birth of planetsAlthough our galaxy teems with plane-tary systems, astronomers do not knowexactly how they form. That is becauseordinary telescopes cannot see throughthe giant, dense clouds of gas and dustthat spawn planets. Using infrared wave-lengths, SOFIA can pierce the haze andwatch the birthing process—showing sci-entists how molecules come together toconstruct worlds.

“SOFIA will be able to locate the‘planetary snowline,’ where water vaporturns to ice in the disk of dust and gasaround young stars,” says Marcum.“That’s important, because we think thatis where gas giants are born. The mostmassive planetary cores are fashioned[around the snowline] because conditionsare best for rock and ice to build up.”(Sticky ice particles help form planets.)

“Once a large enough core forms, itsgravity becomes strong enough to holdon to gas so more hydrogen and heliummolecules can ‘stick.’ Then these largecores can grow into gas giants likeJupiter and Saturn. Otherwise, they re-main as smaller rock-ice planets.

“SOFIA will also be able to pinpointwhere basic building blocks like oxygen,methane and carbon dioxide are located

SOFIA passed with flying colors.“Everything went well. No adjustmentsor corrections were needed. Nothingshook loose or got damaged.”

The 98-in. German-built infraredtelescope weighs 20 tons and is ulti-mately destined to fly above 40,000 ftand study a range of astronomical ob-jects over its expected 20-year lifetime.Those objects include other galaxies andthe center of our own Milky Way; the in-

SOFIA’s smooth ride shakes upastronomy

“This was the first time the door wasfully opened in flight,” says Bob Meyer,SOFIA program manager at Dryden.“We wanted to find out whether openingthe door affected flying and handling theaircraft, caused acoustic resonance inthe cavity or made anything come loosein the cavity because of wind.

“When you blow air over a soda popbottle and hear a hum, that’s acousticresonance. If that happened in theplane, it could vibrate the structure of theplane and the telescope and cause prob-lems,” he explains.

terstellar medium, especially the buildingblocks of life it contains; the formation ofstars and planets; and comets and aster-oids in our solar system.

“SOFIA is set to achieve some spec-tacular science,” says project scientistPamela Marcum. “For instance, this tele-scope will help us figure out how planetsform and how our own solar systemcame to be.”

Above the veilAs a mobile observatory, SOFIA can flyanywhere, anytime. It can move into po-

A close-up shows the telescope in flight.

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within the protoplanetary disk,” Marcumsays. Knowing where various substancesare located in the disk will cast light onhow they come together, from the“ground” up, to form planets.

Time to spareOne of the telescope’s key strengths isits ability to complement other infraredobservatories. With a 20-year lifetime, itcan do follow-up studies on objects thatshorter lived infrared scopes do not havetime to home in on. If, for example, anorbiting observatory such as WISE spotssomething deserving of more attention,SOFIA can move in for a long, slow lookwhile WISE continues gazing at the restof the sky.

“WISE is designed to scan the entiresky at infrared wavelengths, gatheringsurvey data for multitudes of objectsrather than studying targeted objects ingreat depth,” says Marcum. “But SOFIAhas time to spare for deeper studies.”

SOFIA can also do follow-up scienceto reap the full benefits of discoveriesfrom Herschel’s deep spatial surveys,and later, the James Webb Space Tele-scope’s near- to mid-infrared investiga-tions. Herschel is the European SpaceAgency’s space observatory (formerlycalled Far Infrared and SubmillimeterTelescope, or FIRST).

“Once Herschel runs out of its three-year supply of coolant, SOFIA will be theonly observatory routinely providing cov-erage within the far-infrared to submil-limeter wavelength range. This part ofthe spectrum is largely unexplored terri-tory,” Marcum says.

“And although SOFIA covers thesame part of the spectrum James Webbcovers, SOFIA is optimized for wave-lengths just beyond JWST to comple-ment its observations. SOFIA will do abang-up job observing between theJWST and Herschel wavelength gap.”

Unlike these space-based scopes,SOFIA can “head back to the barn” pe-riodically for instruments to be repaired,adjusted or even swapped out for newand improved science devices—keepingpace with cutting-edge science from a“mere” airplane.

It will do so while looking through

vibrations or movement of the aircraft.The secondary mirror can even be oscil-lated to take out the shaking of the im-age itself.

“SOFIA is really a marvelous piece ofengineering,” Meyer concludes. The re-cent flight test “represents a huge suc-cess and significant milestone for all thepeople who have worked hard for adecade on this mission.”

Future plansOperations costs and observing time willbe shared by the U.S. (80%) and Ger-many (20%). SOFIA will offer interna-tional science teams approximately1,000 cloud-free high-altitude scienceobserving hours a year during its two-decade design lifetime. More than 50science proposals will be selected eachyear through a rigorous peer reviewprocess.

Although the primary impact ofSOFIA will be its science return, it is ex-pected to yield other benefits as well.Discoveries will follow the developmentof new technology—technology that canbe demonstrated readily on SOFIA.

Young scientists-in-training, educa-tors and journalists will also fly onSOFIA, making it a valuable trainingplatform and public ambassador.

Nine first-generation science instru-ments are under development by institu-tions in the U.S. and Germany, includingimaging cameras and spectrographs.SOFIA will observe at wavelengths from0.3 μm to 1.6 mm. With its first-genera-

the open door of its air-craft. As in the test, thetelescope, with its pri-mary, secondary andtertiary mirrors, will sitin a cavity in the rear ofthe plane. The tele-scope’s controls, com-puters, spectrometersand other instrumentswill ride in the pressur-ized cabin. The scien-tists, also in the cabin,can look through aphysical window in thecabin wall to view theactual image the tele-scope takes. The image is transmittedthrough a conduit called a Nasmyth tubeattached to the window on one end andto the telescope on the other.

Test runsMore testing is planned for this springbefore SOFIA can begin science opera-tions in the fall. “We will test at all thespeeds the plane can fly and all the alti-tudes planned for the mission,” Meyersays. “We will also test different pointingelevations of the telescope itself.

“Our first light test, where we actu-ally look at an image and characterizethe telescope, is set for April. In that testwe will unlock and uncage the telescopeso it will move as though it is really ob-serving. The wind will be buffeting andshaking SOFIA, so that will be the firsttrue test of its ability to obtain stable im-ages,” he explains.

Keeping a telescope still enough topoint accurately and stay “on point” in amoving airplane with the door open re-quires good engineering.

“The telescope rests on big shockmounts that isolate the mechanical vibra-tions of the plane from it. And on theback edge of the cavity there is a rampthat catches the airflow entering the cav-ity and redirects it back over the rampand out of the cavity.”

SOFIA will also have weights at-tached to it that can be sized and tunedto dampen any shaking. And the drivesystem can move the scope back andforth to compensate for lower frequency

NASA’s SOFIA 747SP aircraft begins its December 18, 2009, test flight.


tion instruments, it will be capable ofhigh-resolution (greater than 104) spec-troscopy at wavelengths between 5 and600 μm. SOFIA’s diffraction-limited im-aging longward of 25 μm will producethe sharpest images of any current orplanned IR telescope operating in the30-60-μm region.

Key benefitsThe SOFIA Observatory concept em-bodies a number of key advantages thatmake it a unique tool for astronomy inthe coming decades.

One is that SOFIA comes home afterevery flight. Its scientific instruments canbe exchanged regularly for repairs, to ac-commodate changing science require-ments and incorporate new technolo-gies. These instruments do not need tobe space qualified.

Another plus is that SOFIA can studytransient events and operate on shortnotice from air bases worldwide to re-spond to new scientific opportunities.

In addition, SOFIA’s diverse range ofinstrumentation will facilitate a coordi-nated effort to analyze specific targetsand science questions. Its 20-year designlifetime will enable long-term studies andfollow-up of work initiated by SOFIA it-self and by other observatories, as wellas future facilities.

Moreover, because of its accessibilityand ability to carry passengers, SOFIAwill include an education and public out-reach program designed to exploit theunique attributes of airborne astronomy.With its large suite of science instru-ments and broad wavelength coverage, itwill be capable of undertaking a hugebreadth of different investigations.

Focus areasSOFIA has unique capabilities in threeinvestigative areas: massive stars, proto-planetary disks and astrochemistryprocesses.

The process of massive star forma-tion remains largely unknown despite re-cent progress in the observation and the-ory of low-mass star formation. SOFIAwill collect comprehensive data on hun-dreds of massive stars. These data willhelp astronomers understand how mas-sive stars form in different environmentsby distinguishing physical, chemical anddynamical differences between high- and


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AIAA has created a newtask force to assist in theformulation of a nationalroad map for the U.S. toaddress investments in theEarth-observing industryto adequately inform futureclimate change debatesand decisions. Composedof leading experts on policyand climate-monitoringtechnology from withinAIAA and in collaborationwith other organizations,the task force is developinga strategy to come up withrecommendations to helpreach this goal.

For more information,contact Craig Dayat 703.264.3849

or [email protected].

low-mass star formation regions.SOFIA measurements of the broad

spectral energy distribution of nascentmassive stars, which are dark in thenear- and sometimes mid-infrared, willhelp scientists develop models of collaps-ing cores. SOFIA’s high spatial resolu-tion over a broad spectral range (25-300μm) that encompasses the luminous out-put of massive stars will reveal structuraldetails not seen by previous missions.

To understand the origin of the solarsystem, scientists must investigate theprotoplanetary environment in whichplanets form: the circumstellar disksaround young stars. Over the last twodecades, the study of circumstellar diskshas focused on the shape of their spec-tral energy distributions and direct mil-limeter interferometric imaging. SOFIAdata will be used to refine accretion andcooling models of these disks, and tostudy the kinematics, composition andevolution of disks around low-massyoung stellar objects.

The study of exoplanetary systemsand the astrochemistry involved in theirformation is one of the fastest growingtopics in astronomy, with far-reachingimplications for understanding our placein the universe. Intimately related to thistopic is the study of the chemical com-position of the gaseous and solid-statematerial out of which new planets formand how it is modified in the dense pro-tostellar and protoplanetary environ-ments. With the ability to track theformation of complex hydrocarbons,SOFIA—in concert with the AtacamaLarge Millimeter/submillimeter Array,Herschel, and the JWST—has an impor-tant role in tracing our chemical origins.

��SOFIA is a joint effort between NASAand the German space agency, Deut-sches Zentrum fur Luft- und Raumfahrt,in Bonn, Germany. The program ismanaged by NASA Dryden. The aircraftis based at the Dryden Aircraft Opera-tions Facility, Palmdale, California.NASA Ames manages the science andmission operations in cooperation withthe Universities Space Research Associ-ation in Columbia, Maryland, and theDeutsches SOFIA Institute in Stuttgart,Germany. Edward D.Flinn

[email protected]


REFLECTIONS ON THE UNIVERSE


Since its launch in 1990, the remarkableHubble Space Telescope has becomean icon of astronomical exploration—

seeing more, seeing farther, seeing deeper.But arriving at that lofty position and attainingsuch capability has not come easily.

Hubble’s scrutiny of the surrounding uni-verse far surpasses that of ground-based tele-scopes. The orbiting observatory has won thecosmic staring contest hands down, showcas-ing its ability to help resolve the age of theuniverse, identify quasars and scope out theexistence of dark energy.

As one of NASA’s most successful andlong-lasting science missions Hubble is also,quite literally, a tangible symbol of humandexterity, staying power and resolve. On-orbitservice calls by a succession of shuttle crews tochange out instruments and replace life-limit-ing items have ensured Hubble’s endurance asa 21st-century machine of breakthroughs andbreathtaking discoveries.

Its successor, the James Webb Space Tel-escope now in development, has a plannedlaunch in 2014. As a large infrared telescopewith a 6.5-m primary mirror, it will be the pre-mier observatory of the next decade—buildingupon the Hubble’s lasting legacy.

Liberation from Earth’s atmosphereThe idea of parking a telescope in space hasbeen credited to an early founder of rocketry,German scientist Hermann Oberth, whowrote of the possibility in the 1920s. Some

basic concepts of space and time.”Spitzer shouldered decades of work to

make the space telescope a reality. In 1965,the Princeton University astronomer headed aNational Academy of Sciences committee todefine the scientific objectives for a proposedlarge space telescope. The idea did not finduniversal support among astronomers, who

by Leonard DavidContributing writer

HUBBLE AT 20

Copyright© 2010 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

20 years later U.S. astrophysicist LymanSpitzer Jr. authored a seminal report for Proj-ect RAND, titled The Astronomical Advan-tages of an Extraterrestrial Observatory. Inthat September 1946 paper, the scientist sug-gested that a space-based telescope—liberatedfrom the blurring of Earth’s atmosphere andits distortion of light streaming in from stars—could “uncover new phenomena not yet imag-ined,” and perhaps “modify profoundly our

HUBBLElayout4-10X.qxd:AAFEATURE-layout.Template 3/15/10 1:33 PM Page 2

In the mid-1970s, NASA and ESA tookup the idea and outlined a 3-m space tele-scope—a facility that was “descoped,” in bothsize and the number of instruments, becauseof budget considerations. Funding began toflow for the project in 1978; a few years laterthe telescope was named after U.S. astron-omer Edwin Powell Hubble. It was Hubble

…AND OURSELVES


feared that its high price tag would lessen sup-port for ground-based efforts.

Undaunted, Spitzer began an aggressivecampaign to persuade both the scientific com-munity and Congress of the great value ofplacing a large telescope into space. His dili-gent advocacy helped spur NASA to approvethe Large Space Telescope project in 1969.

FROMTHEPEAKSOF

EXCITEMENTDURING

ITS1990LAUNCHTO

DESPAIRAFTER

DISCOVERYOFWHAT

SEEMEDAFATALFLAW,

THEHUBBLESPACE

TELESCOPEHAS

EMERGEDTRIUMPHANT,

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PROVIDEDAZZLING

IMAGESANDHISTORIC

BREAKTHROUGHS IN

OURUNDERSTANDING

OFTHEUNIVERSE.

On the first servicing mission,STS-61 astronaut Story Musgrave,anchored to the end of the remotemanipulator arm, prepares to beelevated to the top of the toweringHST to install protective covers onmagnetometers. Astronaut JeffreyHoffman assisted Musgrave withthe final servicing tasks.



Institute in Baltimore, Md., heard the words“spherical aberration” used in connection withHubble. He was told by a colleague: “There’sa fundamental flaw with the mirror. It can’t befixed. You can’t focus it out.”

The blurry imagery was the result of Hub-ble’s primary mirror having been preciselyground to the wrong shape. Later investiga-tion found that a main null corrector—a deviceused to verify the exact shape of the mirror—had been incorrectly assembled. During pol-ishing, Perkin-Elmer specialists had scruti-nized the large mirror’s surface with two othernull correctors, both of which correctly found

who confirmed an “expanding” universe andwas first to understand the true nature ofgalaxies. Indeed, it is Hubble’s Law that pro-vides the foundation for the Big Bang theoryof the beginning of the universe.

Work began on the Hubble Space Tele-scope (HST), an observatory carrying a 2.4-mmirror and interchangeable instruments toperform its visible, infrared and ultravioletlight astronomical duties. It would be placed inorbit by NASA’s space shuttle, which was stillunfinished, and either be returned to Earth forrepairs and replacement instruments, or beserviced in space.

The HST began to take physical shape ascontractors, universities and NASA centersplunged into the effort. Marshall would handledesign, development and construction of thetelescope and its support systems. Goddard

would see to the design, development andconstruction of the science instruments, andwould also perform ground control.

Perkin-Elmer was given the task of fabri-cating the HST assembly, including the mir-rors and fine guidance sensors required topoint and direct the telescope. Lockheed Mis-siles—now Lockheed Martin—was contractedto build the structure and supporting systems,and to assemble and test the telescope.

By 1979, astronauts were fully immersedin training on a telescope mock-up, conduct-ing underwater tank work to simulate theworking conditions induced by microgravity.

Hubble’s shuttle sendoff had been slatedfor October 1986, but the tragic Challengeraccident earlier that year had led to a two-yearstoppage of shuttle missions. On April 24,1990, on its STS-31 mission, space shuttleDiscovery roared skyward, later to deployHST into a circular orbit 600 km above theEarth, inclined at 28.5 deg to the equator.

Some 70 years had passed since an orbit-ing observatory had first been proposed. Butas Hubble’s aperture door swung open tosoak in its first views, the telescope’s history-making potential became more a focal pointof disappointment.

Baltimore…we have a problem!Shortly after the HST began functioning in or-bit, James Crocker, then head of the pro-grams office at the Space Telescope Science

Soon after its launch, scientistsrealized that the HST’s largeprimary mirror was flawed.Shuttle crews installed thiscorrective optics package, calledCOSTAR, in 1993. The hardwarewas later returned to Earthand is now on display at theNational Air and Space Museum.Photo by Eric Long, courtesy ofthe Smithsonian Institution.



Bruce McCandless, a crewmember onSTS-31, was also a member of that brain-storming group. “There were weird ideas,” hesays, a number of which ground control offi-cials would never support, for safety reasons.

“Could an astronaut be sent down insidethe telescope to spray something on the mir-ror to change its curvature? There wasthought about thickening the outer edges ofthe mirror, then resilver it in place. There wasno lack of imagination,” says McCandless,now a Colorado-based aerospace consultant.

A first-order nonstarter was bringingHubble back to Earth. “There was a belief,which I subscribed to as well, that if we everbrought it down, the likelihood of getting it re-launched was fairly remote,” McCandlesssays. “So the decision was to do everythingpossible to fix it in place and in the meantime

that, indeed, the mirror suffered from spheri-cal aberration. However, those test resultswere considered less accurate than the pri-mary device, which was reporting that themirror was perfectly configured.

The mirror’s slightly wrong shape causedthe light that bounced off the center to focusin a different place than the light bouncing offthe edge. The tiny flaw—about 1/50th thethickness of a sheet of paper—was enough todistort the view.

Edward Weiler, NASA’s associate admin-istrator for the Science Mission Directorate,recalls that Hubble’s spherical aberration “waslike death by a thousand duck bites.” In hisrole at the time, Weiler was the HST chief sci-entist, serving as prime scientific spokesper-son for the program from 1979 until 1998.Given the telescope’s eyesight woes, he says,“It was hopeless at that point. To describe itas a roller-coaster ride is an underestimate.”

Then-director Charles Pellerin of NASA’sAstrophysics Division writes in his book, HowNASA Builds Teams, that after 15 years and$1.7 billion spent, Hubble became a nationaldisaster, permeating popular culture and seenas a technological dud analogous to the Hin-denburg on fire or the Titanic sinking.

A leadership failure had caused the flaw,a review board later reported. The board,notes Pellerin, found that NASA’s hostilemanagement of its Perkin-Elmer contractorcaused the company to become wary of re-porting technical problems if they could ra-tionalize them. Managerial failings and qualitycontrol shortcomings on both sides, coupledwith schedule slips and cost overruns, hadconspired to produce the imperfect mirror.

The fix is inFor James Crocker, now vice president andgeneral manager of Sensing and ExplorationSystems at Lockheed Martin Space Systems,a slice of good news was that the tool used,the null corrector, was found in bonded stor-age at Perkin-Elmer. He tells Aerospace Amer-ica: “While we didn’t have Hubble’s eyes…wehad the tool that was used to make the Hub-ble wrong. We had the prescription. We knewwhat the error was. And if I can measure youreyes, I can make glasses for you.”

Financially backed by Pellerin’s Astro-physics Division, a crack team of specialistsfrom NASA, ESA, industry and academiawere brought together to brainstorm a fix forHubble—an expert team that includedCrocker. “No idea was too stupid…but somewere pretty wacky,” he recalls.

HOUSE CALLS TO HUBBLEFollowing its deployment in 1990, the HSThas been shuttle serviced on five separateoccasions.

The repairs that have been done onHubble “are really leading edge for humanspaceflight,” says Mark LaPole, the Hubblemission program manager for Ball Aero-space in Boulder, Colo. “When you talk tothe astronaut crew that gets assigned toHubble, the energy that comes out of theirpores is just phenomenal,” he says.

Ball Aerospace has been involved inbuilding Hubble instruments since June1978, having built seven so far. Followingthe May 2009 servicing mission, all theinstruments aboard the observatory areBall-built. Probably more than 50% of thecompany has touched Hubble, LaPole adds.

“There’s not much left to replace,because everything has been replaced,”he says. “Every piece of electronics…batteries, solar arrays. Everything isnew…and it could be new again.”

Servicing Mission 1, December 1993•Installation of two new devices, the widefield and planetary camera 2 and thecorrective optics space telescope axialreplacement, both designed to compensatefor the primary mirror’s incorrect shape.•New solar arrays attached to reduce“jitter” caused by excessive flexing of thesolar panels during the telescope’s transitfrom cold darkness into warm daylight.•New gyroscopes that help point and trackthe telescope, along with fuse plugs andelectronic units.

Servicing Mission 2, February 1997•Installation of the near-infrared camera

and multiobject spectrometer and thespace telescope imaging spectrograph.•A refurbished fine guidance sensor, asolid state recorder and a renovated,spare reaction wheel assembly.

Servicing Mission 3A, December 1999•Replacement of six gyroscopes, onefine guidance sensor and a transmitter.•Installation of an advanced central com-puter, a digital data recorder, an electronicsenhancement kit, battery improvement kitsand new outer layers of thermal protection.

Servicing Mission 3B, March 2002•A new science instrument called theadvanced camera for surveys.•A solar array panel swap-out with smaller,more powerful units and replacement ofan outdated power control unit.•Installation of a new cooling systemfor the near-infrared camera and multi-object spectrometer.•Replacement of one of the four reactionwheel assemblies.

Servicing Mission 4, May 2009•Considered Hubble’s most challengingservicing mission, featuring installationof a new wide field camera 3 and thecosmic origins spectrograph, as well asextraction of COSTAR.•Installation of the spare science instru-ment command and data handling unit.•On-site repairs of nonworking advancedcamera for surveys and the space telescopeimaging spectrograph. Requirement forspacewalkers to access the interior of theinstruments, switch out components andreroute power.



(WF/PC 2) that contained small mirrors tocorrect for the aberration. This was the first ofHubble’s instruments to have built-in correc-tive optics.

Bolstered by nearly a year of training, thecrew of Endeavour headed for Hubble on De-cember 2, 1993. Following five days of space-walks and repairs, the telescope received itsfirst makeover, revitalized and reshaped intothe powerful observatory that had been origi-nally promised.

Beyond the grandeur of the universe re-vealed by the rejuvenated telescope, Crockerconcludes, Hubble’s story is a classic Ameri-can saga of snatching victory from the jaws ofdefeat, “with brave astronauts launching intospace to save the day—damn the torpedoes,full speed ahead—and overcoming adversity.”

On seeing the first image from the trans-formed Hubble on the night of December 18,1993, Weiler recollects: “All I can describe isvindication. That was the emotion. We hadbeen dumped on; we had been ridiculed forthree years. That was the true birth of Hubble.That’s the anniversary that counts.”

Hubble’s vision was successfully repaired.In the first test of the telescope’s advertisedcapability to be serviced and repaired in orbit,it passed in a full spectrum of flying colors.

The human factorSince its 1990 launch into Earth orbit, fiveshuttle servicing missions have flown to Hub-ble. There has been a steady progression from

get as much data as we could with the unit asit existed.”

Still, even with the best image enhance-ment software available, Hubble’s myopiccondition—as well as its embarrassing techno-turkey status in the public eye—was intolera-ble. Furthermore, beyond the needed optical

fix, the telescope wasalso experiencing solararray twang, amongother teething issues.

Crocker is noted forconceiving the idea ofthe corrective opticsspace telescope axial re-placement (COSTAR)and leading the BallAerospace team that de-veloped it. This was aeureka solution, he re-lates, one that came tohim while he was takinga shower, as he stared ata sliding shower head.

COSTAR was a se-ries of small mirrors used to intercept the lightreflecting off Hubble’s mirror, correct for theflaw, and bounce the light to the telescope’sarray of science instruments. The device couldbe installed in place of one of the telescope’sother instruments; Hubble’s high-speed pho-tometer was sacrificed.

Astronauts could also replace the widefield and planetary camera with a new version

Captured by the IMAX 3D cargobay camera, Astronaut AndrewFeustel transfers the COSTARunit from the telescope to itstemporary stowage positionin the Atlantis cargo bay.

These eerie, dark pillar-likestructures are columns of coolinterstellar hydrogen gas and dustthat are also incubators for newstars. They are part of the EagleNebula, a nearby star-formingregion 7,000 light-years awayin the constellation Serpens.The picture was taken on April 1,1995, with the WF/PC 2.



tute, has often been called the chief HST re-pairman—an unabashed “Hubble hugger.” Asa NASA astronaut he participated in threeflights to service the telescope: STS-103 inDecember 1999, STS-109 in March 2002,and most recently, STS-125 in May 2009.He also served on two other shuttle flights.

There have been many twists and turnsthat make Hubble an incredible story, far be-yond what an engineer could ever devise,Grunsfeld suggests. “It would take the likes ofan Ernest Hemingway to really create a storywith this much intrigue, politics…probablylove stories buried in there somewhere. Cer-tainly we have love for the telescope. It’s astory about humans struggling and striving todo great things. And the best part of it…wedon’t know how it ends.”

If Hubble had not been serviced by astro-nauts, Grunsfeld wonders, would it have re-mained in the public eye as much as it has?

routine work to a reboosting of the facility toextend its useful lifetime.

The disastrous loss of the shuttle Colum-bia and its crew on February 1, 2003, nixed ascheduled HST visit that following year, spark-ing heated debate over the safety risk to hu-mans, even spurring a major look into roboticservicing of the observatory.

That intense debate eventually subsidedand led to the spectacular May 2009 “final”servicing mission to enhance Hubble’s healthand augment its observational skills at leastinto 2014 and perhaps beyond. During thatlast human stopover, Hubble was outfittedwith a soft capture and rendezvous system toenable the telescope’s safe disposal by either afuture crew or robotic system.

Originally blueprinted for a 15-year serv-ice life, the telescope’s performance contin-ues, without question, to be truly stellar. ButHubble also represents a bridge-building be-tween two communities: space science andhuman spaceflight.

“Hubble is the shining star in the mergerof science and the human space program.Hubble was designed from day one to be ser-viced…with astronauts in mind,” Weiler tellsAerospace America. Indeed, if it were not forthe human space program, he continues, “itwould already have made one hell of a lightshow reentering.”

John Grunsfeld, newly appointed deputydirector of the Space Telescope Science Insti-

Side-by-side images of the coreof the galaxy M100 show thedramatic improvement in theHST’s view of the universe afterthe first servicing mission. Thenew image, taken withWF/PC-2,demonstrates that the camera’scorrective optics compensatefully for the optical aberrationin the primary mirror. Credit:NASA/STScI.

90˚ 180˚ 270˚

The most detailed and dramaticimages ever taken of the distantdwarf planet Pluto, released inFebruary 2010, show an icy,mottled, dark molasses-coloredworld undergoing seasonalsurface color and brightnesschanges. Credit: NASA, ESA,and M. Buie/SRI.


REFLECT ON THIS! HUBBLE’S MAJOR SCIENTIFIC FINDINGSOver the last two decades, the Hubble Space Telescope has been an astronomical anchor for scientificstudy of the surrounding universe. The observatory’s workhorse findings have had a major impact inevery area of astronomy, with thousands of technical publications reporting on the facility’s sharp-shooting productivity. Herewith, a “Top 10” summary of some of Hubble’s major scientific results:

The accelerating universe and dark energy.Hubble’s ability to detect faint supernovaecontributed to the discovery that the expansionrate of the universe is accelerating, indicatingthe existence of mysterious “dark energy”in space. �

The distance scale and age of the universe.Observations of Cepheid variable stars in nearbygalaxies were used to establish the expansionrate of the universe to better than 10% accuracy.

The evolution of galaxies. The Hubble DeepField provided a deep view into the distant pastof the universe, allowing scientists to reconstructhow galaxies evolve and grow by swallowingother galaxies. �

The birth of stars and planets.Peering into nearby regions of starbirth in the Milky Way galaxy,Hubble has revealed flattened disksof gas and dust that are the likelybirthplaces of new planets.

Stellar death.When Sun-likestars end their lives, they ejectspectacular nebulae. Hubble hasrevealed the enigmatic details ofthis process.�

�

�


On the other hand, it has provided a flood ofimages that time and time again elicit expres-sions of awe and fascination.

“It has been a long-term love affair, if youwill, with the public. The visibility of the im-ages, the Eagle Nebula, the Hubble DeepField…they show the public that the universeis much more interesting than ever imagined,not just a bunch of stars and points of light.”

Spirit of discoveryThe public hungers for human space explo-ration. Moreover, people want to see an ef-fective use of the nation’s investment in suchactivity, says Frank Cepollina, the manager ofNASA’s Hubble Space Telescope Develop-ment Project at Goddard.

“The fact that we put these great scien-tific machines up…that’s significant for a fewdays,” Cepollina says. “It’s even more signifi-cant when you see humans for a few weeks

working on those machines in space…andthen they see the result of that work.”

Cepollina is widely regarded as the “fa-ther” of repairing and upgrading satellites, de-signing the tools and technologies that enableastronauts to perform intricate tasks difficultto do even on the ground. He has been re-sponsible for carrying out the on-orbit servic-ing that has maintained Hubble in peak condi-tion, leading the charge on hardware that hasallowed the observatory to stay on the cuttingedge of technology throughout its long life.

Scientists making use of Hubble are directbeneficiaries of the near-term application of anew Moore’s Law in orbit, an evolution of ca-pability, says Cepollina. (Moore’s Law refersto the observation—in computer parlance—

that the number of transistors that can beplaced on a computer chip roughly doublesevery two years.)

“The new equipment has much better sig-



human and hardware assets already financedby U.S. taxpayers.

In saluting Hubble and what it has taught,Cepollina advises that scientific discovery be-comes a direct function of our ability to pro-vide Moore’s Law every four or five years toorbit. When you do that, he adds, the prod-ucts are tremendous leaps in information flowand discovery potential.

Barring a life-ending Hubble event, havewe seen the last servicing mission to the es-teemed orbiting facility?

Cepollina is quick to respond. “No, be-cause I think the value of a machine like Hub-ble—as long as it demonstrates that it cankeep making scientific advancements—wehave not seen the end of it. Hubble representsa spirit of discovery. And as long as discover-ies keep coming, we should do everything inour power to keep it upgraded and innovatedwith new technology.”

nal-to-noise ratios, far fewer disturbances.There are these immediately observable im-provements. They are getting much better im-agery. It is not a new telescope, but it hasbrand-new scientific instruments,” Cepollinasays. “And that’s what satellite servicing doesin the big picture…progressively change outthe scientific instrumentation so that you cancontinuously improve your return.”

Over the years there has also been a pro-gressive evolution of astronaut capability in or-bit. Much, but not all, of that, Cepollina says,is due to more intelligent tools that can takeon the brunt of a spacewalker’s workload.“Let the batteries and self-powered devices dothe work for them. Use their intelligence morekeenly than in the past, where we relied ontheir brute force, skill and endurance.”

What Hubble represents, he believes, isthe human spirit of fostering discovery usingthe least costly approach possible, given the

Stellar populations in nearbygalaxies. Deep imagesby Hubble that resolve individ-ual stars in other galaxies haverevealed the history of starformation.

Planets around other stars.Hubble made detailed measure-ments of a Jupiter-sized planetorbiting a nearby star, includingthe first detection of the atmo-sphere of an extrasolar planet. �

The impact of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 on Jupiter.The explosive collision of the comet with Jupiter in 1994 wasobserved by Hubble, providing Earthlings with a cautionarytale of the danger posed by cometary impacts.

Black holes in galaxies. Hubble observations have shown thatmonster black holes, with masses millions to billions of timesthe mass of our Sun, inhabit the centers of most galaxies. �

Gamma-ray bursts. Hubble has played a key role in determining the distances andenergies of gamma-ray bursts, showing that they are the most powerful explosions in theuniverse other than the Big Bang itself.

With special thanks to the Space Telescope Science Institute.

�

�

�



by Edward GoldsteinContributing writer

Copyright© 2010 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

Fewer aircraft programs in recent years have meant declining use

of the nation’s wind tunnels. Yet these venerable facilities still

offer vital insights that cannot be matched by computer technology.

From left, Charlie

Powell, R. Pierson

Smith and Bob Bo

mar stand on turn

ing vanes

inside AEDC’s 16-f

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Tunnel test facility

(1960 photo by Ph

il Tarver).

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investigate aerodynamics,” notes Edward M.Kraft, chief technologist at Arnold Engineer-ing Development Center (AEDC). “We don’treally do that any more. We use wind tunnelsnow as production tools for getting data.That’s a shift in mentality over two or threedecades. Wind tunnels are looked at as beingrelatively expensive, so you try to get in, get alot of data and get out. Whitcomb had the lux-ury of being able to stay in a wind tunnel formonths and years. If you read any of his bios,he would literally go in and file wing shapes byhand trimming them down for minor im-provements in drag and really came up withsome breakthrough phenomena.”

Ironically, a month before Whitcomb’sdeath, another piece of Langley’s proud her-itage, its Full-Scale 30x60-Ft Wind Tunnel—which tested everything from biplanes to X-

Aviation pioneer Richard Whitcomb, whodied last October at the age of 88, was

definitely an old-school engineer. Described bySmithsonian Institution aviation historian TomCrouch as “the most important aerodynamiccontributor in the second half of the centuryof flight,” Whitcomb studied at WorcesterPolytechnic Institute. During his engineeringcareer at the National Advisory Committeefor Aeronautics’ Langley Memorial Aeronau-tical Laboratory (after 1958, NASA LangleyResearch Center), wind tunnels were criticalto proving his three revolutionary aircraft de-sign innovations: the Whitcomb area rule con-cept, the supercritical wing and winglets.

In describing how his area rule conceptevolved from a flash of inspiration into a tan-gible innovation, Whitcomb recalled, “Webuilt airplane models with Coke-bottle-shapedfuselages, and lo and behold the drag of thewing just disappeared. The [transonic] windtunnel showed it worked perfectly.”

THE VALUE OF TIMEOne cannot overestimate the value of thewind tunnel time Whitcomb had for testing hisideas. “He was basically given license to takea wind tunnel and use it as his personal tool to

Windtunnels

DON’TCOUNTTHEMOUT



those we have now? I don’t think there’s a de-finitive answer for that.”

Currently, NASA centers with remainingwind tunnel facilities include Langley, Glennand the adjacent Plum Brook Station in San-dusky, and Ames. The Defense Dept. main-tains AEDC wind tunnels at three locations—at Arnold AFB, White Oak Federal ResearchCenter in Maryland (which AEDC took overfrom the Navy during base closures), andAEDC Moffett Field in Mountain View, Cali-fornia (where it took over operations of aNASA facility). DOD also maintains wind tun-nels at the Air Force Research Laboratory inDayton, Ohio, and at the Naval Surface War-fare Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

A number of major aerospace corpora-tions, including Boeing and Lockheed, main-tain their own wind tunnel facilities, as do sev-eral universities. Boeing’s development of the787 Dreamliner benefited from 15,000 hr ofwind tunnel testing at its Transonic Wind Tun-nel facility in Seattle, the state-of-the-art Qine-tiQ 5-m low-speed tunnel in Farnborough,England, NASA Ames and the University ofWashington’s low-speed tunnel in Seattle.

MANAGING RESOURCESIn 2007, NASA and DOD entered into a for-mal agreement, the National Partnership forAeronautical Testing, to help manage federalgovernment wind tunnel resources. “The part-nership looks at how we decide what facilitiesgo forward, how we decide where to invest—not from a NASA point of view or a DODpoint of view, but really from a joint NASAand DOD point of view,” says George.

From a larger national policy standpoint,the Aeronautics Science and Technology Sub-committee of the National Science and Tech-nology Council is looking at wind tunnelneeds as it updates the National Plan forAeronautics, Research, Development, Testingand Evaluation and Related Infrastructure. Aspart of this report, the subcommittee will ad-dress national R&D needs as related to theNational Aeronautics R&D Policy in wind tun-nel capabilities and will assess where we standtoday relative to those needs. The report willbe presented to the White House Office ofScience and Technology by midyear.

Two years ago, supported by the work ofits Ground Test Technical Committee, theAIAA developed a white paper expressing itsalarm “at the continuing deterioration of ourwind tunnel test infrastructure in the UnitedStates.” The paper observed, “DOD, NASAand private industry currently use wind tunnels

planes—was put out to pasture after 78 yearsof operation. This was not an aberration; theU.S. is faced with an aging and in some casesdeclining wind tunnel infrastructure, a result ofthe apparent drag on agency budgets—fewervehicle programs mean decreasing tunnel use.NASA, for example, has reduced its wind tun-nel facilities by roughly one-third; as budgetconstraints continue, the agency may see ad-ditional mothballing or outright decommis-sioning of these classic structures.

“The environment has changed,” saysMike George, director of the Aeronautics TestProgram at NASA Ames. “What we need inthe future is going to be different from whatwe’ve had in the past…and probably a littledifferent from what we have today. If you goback to about 1990, about the time the BerlinWall fell, a big change came in the aerospaceindustry; you can see that by the downsizingin the number of companies, the number ofnew starts and the number of programs. To-day we have fewer programs [to test], and the

role of computational physics [CFD] has alsoplayed a part in changing the role of the windtunnel in the aircraft design and aircraft R&Denvironment.”

ASSESSING CAPABILITIESPhilip S. Antón, lead author of the 2004RAND National Defense Research InstitutereportWind Tunnel and Propulsion Test Facil-ities: An Assessment of NASA’s Capabilities toServe National Needs, says he hears a lot ofconcern from people who say, “These facili-ties are 40-50 years old, and we’re not certainhow long they will last. The question is: Willwe need to make serious investments in newcapabilities, or work to maintain and improve

A 5% scale model of the Orionlaunch abort vehicle was installedin Langley’s Unitary Plan WindTunnel for supersonic jet effectstesting. The model was paintedwith pressure-sensitive paintand illuminated to produce surfacestatic pressure maps in thelocations of the attitude controlmotor nozzles and the aft-bodyinteraction regions.



sonic bomber, X-15, Saturn booster, Apollospacecraft, space shuttle and B1-bomber—wasclosed by its last owner, the University of Cal-ifornia at Los Angeles, for environmental rea-sons. Its loss “will force compromises inmodel scaling and test capacity supportingmissiles systems development,” noted thewhite paper.

While the Air Force has not downsized itswind tunnel capacity as much as NASA, Kraftobserves, “I think we’ve probably reached a

as required on a project-by-project basis. Fluc-tuations in government budgets and industrialconsolidations have led to cyclical use of thesefacilities. The resulting business model forwind tunnels does not compare favorably withother uses of the real estate involved. As a re-sult, many wind tunnels have closed and somecapabilities have been permanently lost.”

LOST CAPABILITIESThe white paper concluded that this decline“decreases our national ability to develop andfield complex aeronautics systems, conse-quently forcing the use of non-U.S. interna-tional facilities that may not be available whenneeded, may not provide adequate capabili-ties, and may not afford protection from unau-thorized access to technologies under test.”

As an example of losing a key capability,the white paper pointed to the shutdown in2008 of the North American Trisonic WindTunnel in El Segundo. This tunnel—whichsupported development of the XB-70 super-

The Trisonic Wind Tunnel wasthe testing ground for a broadarray of aerospace vehicles.Copyright 2009 Damon J. Duran.

Frank Quinto, facility managerfor the 14x22-ft Subsonic Tunnelat NASA Langley, inspects the fanblade area of the tunnel. Photocourtesy NASA/Sean Smith.



Surface Warfare Center’s Carderock Division,gives a nautical example for why wind tunneltesting is still vital: “Right now, if you test anaircraft carrier [to see how it reacts to forcessuch as the airflow over its deck], you canbuild a model with detail down to a few thou-sandths of an inch and test on an 8-ft-longmodel, and you’ll have quite a bit of detail onthat aircraft carrier. To have a comparableamount of detail in a CFD model, it has somany grid points that [computer] storage andprocessing are really limiting factors. I thinkCFD is going to advance farther and faster asthings continue to grow….But if you are look-ing right now for the effect of a tiny little detailon a giant problem, that becomes a challengefor some of the CFD tools.”

In addition, wind tunnels are required tovalidate CFD models, so in many cases onesimply cannot simulate everything based oncurrent knowledge of the physics involved.

The 8x10-Ft Subsonic Wind Tunnel thatWalker and her colleague Kevin Kimmel showvisitors at Carderock is an example of a fine,gracefully aging wine. The tunnel still operateswith its original 1940s-era propeller blades (itis much easier to spot cracks in these than ina composite material propeller, notes Walker).Its six-component Toledo force in momentsystem, which measures a model’s lift, drag

steady state on capacity unless the federalbudget keeps pushing on budgets….Peoplewill argue, ‘Wait a minute, wind tunnels aren’tfull all the time.’ But they don’t understand theessence of capacity. When I want to do an F-35 [wind tunnel testing campaign], I needthree or four wind tunnels simultaneously. If Iwere to start taking other wind tunnels offline, and let’s say a next-generation long-range bomber were put on the table for a newdevelopment, and I only had one wind tunnel,it would take six or seven years to develop thedatabase for that, not three.”

Antón adds that it is also a matter of whattypes of capabilities a facility offers. No singlewind tunnel can economically or technicallyoffer all that is needed, so different facilitieswere built that together cover the envelope ofoperational parameters and specialized tests.

LINK FROM A PIONEERING ERAAlthough there are concerns about the cost ofoperating less than fully scheduled wind tun-nel facilities, many experts ironically point outthat it is a drop in the bucket compared to thecost of major new aviation or space develop-ment programs. Wind tunnel advocates arguewith passion for the practicality of this tech-nological link to aviation’s pioneering days.

Monica Walker, test director at the Naval

An X-48C is mounted in therecently dismantled Full-Scale30x60-ft Wind Tunnel. USAFphoto by Staff Sgt. Barry Loo.



uable for helping to ensure that programsmeet performance target guarantees, whichcan have significant cost penalties if missed.”

PROSPECTS FOR THE FUTURETurning to the future, Ed Mickle, manager ofaerodynamics test facility planning at AEDC,Arnold AFB, says, “We are really going tohave to look at how we are going to use testfacilities in the future. I think this is where youwill see more merging of large-scale computa-tions with testing. Not in spite of, or in re-placement of, but the two will meld more toeach other.”

Mickle adds that there might be a processchange in the duration of time a customer willneed a wind tunnel. “We sometimes bring amodel into a wind tunnel during early develop-ment and it will have multiple test entries, eachentry requiring several weeks or more, over aperiod of months up to several years [for largesystems], to refine and define a concept,” henotes. “I think with the advances in the designof experiments and with advanced computa-tions you’ll look for getting in [a tunnel] for areduced time per test, but also a reduction inthe number of test entries per flight vehicleprogram, and potentially only for a few hoursfor getting answers to specific design questionssupporting concept development and earlytrade studies.

“Now, you could retrofit the tunnels wehave, or we as a nation could say, ‘Let’s puttogether the facility we need in the future.’ Anew facility could also bring in energy efficien-cies and bring in better access for diagnostictools so that you could optimize the aerody-namic design process.”

The bottom line when we consider the fu-ture of wind tunnels, says Kraft, is that while“you can do fundamental designs with knownphysics on computers, they can’t give you thekind of insights that Dick Whitcomb gained.You have to do that experimentally.”

and side forces as well as rolling, pitching andyawing moment, is of similar vintage. But thetunnel works like a charm, testing everythingfrom aircraft carriers, submarines, unmannedaerial vehicles, Navy buoys and parachutes tobobsleds for the U.S. Olympic team.

While it would be nice to have the newestwind tunnel technology, says Walker, what isreally “make or break” is the “knowledge ofthe people that use them, and what they usethem for.”

Mike Worthy, senior staff engineer of theAerodynamics Group at Lockheed Martin’sMissiles and Fire Control group in Dallas, putsit this way: “Wind tunnels are still used in thedevelopment of just about every flight vehiclewe have; we don’t fly a vehicle unless we testit in a tunnel. They’re very important. Wemight use analysis techniques for preliminarywork, but when it comes down to getting thevehicle ready for flight, verifying it, modelingit, we’re going to rely on the wind tunnel togenerate the critical data we need.”

Adds colleague Tim Fennel, senior man-ager for wind tunnel laboratories, “In what wedo with today’s aircraft, with improvements inflight control systems, we’re pushing the air-craft to fly closer and closer to the edge oftheir envelope. So you end up having to do alot more testing out there at the edges, togather the data and characterize how the air-frame flies out there.

“CFD is really good for helping us withthe preliminary design and narrowing down[options], but you still need the wind tunnel togather the data in those areas where you havea lot of turbulent flow and you have complexshapes,” says Fennel.

Moreover, “if you wait until flight testingof a full-scale vehicle to ensure you are notmissing something, the cost of redesigningmajor components late in a development pro-gram are much higher than if you find prob-lems earlier,” says Antón. “Also, testing is val-

The UH-60 rotor is mounted onthe Large Rotor Test Apparatusduring testing of the individualblade control system at AEDC’sNational Full-Scale AerodynamicsComplex’s 40x80-ft wind tunnel.Photo by Philip Lorenz III.


April 13 The Navy’s Transit 1-Bsatellite is successfully orbited by aThor-Able-Star booster rocket fromCape Canaveral, Fla. The 265-lbTransit carries a military navigationpayload experiment. This flight alsodemonstrates the first engine startin space and the use of satellites asnavigational aids. E. Emme, ed.,Astronautics and Aeronautics1915-60, pp. 121, 147.

April 14 The first underwaterlaunch of the all-solid-fuelPolaris 1,500-mi. fleet ballisticsubmarine-launched missiletakes place from a speciallymade underwater tube offSan Clemente Island, Calif.E. Emme, ed., Astronauticsand Aeronautics 1915-60,p. 121.

April 15 The Discoverer XIreconnaissance satellite is launchedfrom Vandenberg AFB, Calif., by aThor-Agena. Code-named Corona,the satellite is used for photographicsurveillance of the USSR, Chinaand other areas. E. Emme, ed., Astro-nautics and Aeronautics 1915-60,pp. 121, 147.

April 18 A testvehicle for theall-solid-fuelScout launchvehicle under-goes its firstfiring with livefirst and third stagesfrom NASA’s Wallops Island, Va.,facility. However, the rocket breaksup following the first-stage burnout.E. Emme, ed., Astronautics andAeronautics 1915-60, p. 121.

April 28 The first full-scale 250-mi.-range Nike-Zeus antiballistic missile islaunched at the White Sands ProvingGrounds, N.M. The missile’s firststage is a 450,000-lb-thrust motor,

April 4 Project Ozma begins at theNational Radio Astronomy Observatoryat Green Bank, W.Va., to detectpossible sig-nal patternsfrom outerspace, whichwould bedifferentfrom “nat-ural” noisesfrom space. This is a pioneeringSETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelli-gence) experiment started by CornellUniversity astronomer Frank Drake.The object is to search for signs of lifein distant solar systems through inter-stellar radio waves; however, no suchsignals are found. E. Emme, ed.,Astronautics and Aeronautics1915-60, p. 121.

April 6 The SovietUnion’s Sputnik 3satellite, launched onMay 15, 1958, reentersEarth’s atmosphere andburns up. Its 7,000-lbweight includes about2,935 lb of instrumentation forexperiments in gathering data onatmospheric pressures, ions, micro-meteorites and Earth’s electrostaticand magnetic fields. Flight, April 22,1960, p. 555; The Aeroplane, Feb. 12,1960, p. 204.

April 13 The rocket-boosterramjet-powered Bomarc Bsurface-to-air missile issuccessfully tested for thefirst time at Eglin AFB, Fla.The 1961 Aerospace YearBook, p. 444.

April 13 Britain’s minister of defenseannounces the cancellation of theBlue Streak long-range ballistic missile.This was the U.K.’s biggest weaponssystem and could also have been usedas a launch vehicle for spacecraft.Flight, April 22, 1960, p. 552.

25 Years Ago, April 1985

April 12-19 Sen. E.J. “Jake”Garn (R.-Utah) serves as amission specialist on theSTS-51D mission of thespace shuttle Discoveryand earns the distinctionof being the first member

of Congress in space. Garn,chair of the Senate subcommittee

overseeing the NASA budget, under-takes research on space sickness duringthe flight. He is wired to record electri-cal signals from his brain and heart. Hedoes exercises to induce nausea, whileother instruments measure his bonegrowth or shrinkage in weightlessness.NASA, Press Release 85-9; New YorkTimes, Jan. 18, 1985, p. A13, andApril 13, 1985, p. A1.


April 1 A Thor-Able rocket launchesTIROS 1, the world’s first weathersatellite, which provides the firstglobal cloud-cover photos from itsnearly circular orbit of 429-467 mi.The primary mission of the 270-lbspacecraft is to test experimental

TV techniques toward thedevelopment of a worldwideweather satellite system. Duringthe 78 days of its operationallife, TIROS 1 transmits 22,952photos from its two TV cameras.E. Emme, ed., Astronauticsand Aeronautics 1915-60,pp. 121, 146; FAA HistoricalChronology, p. 66.

April 1 The fourth inflatable 100-ft-diam Shotput is launched to analtitude of 235 mi. and successfullyinflates. E. Emme, ed., Astronauticsand Aeronautics 1915-60, p. 121.

April 2 The USSR’s Luna, or Lunik 1,space probe completes its first solarorbit. E. Emme, ed., Astronautics andAeronautics 1915-60, p. 121.


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An Aerospace Chronologyby Frank H.Winter, Ret.

and Robert van der Linden

National Air and Space Museum

April 28 England’s Imperial Airwaysbegins trial flights on the London-to-Brindisi, Italy, route in preparation forregular passenger and airmail service.The machines used are the Avro 652Ava and Avalon. The Aeroplane, May15, 1935, p. 574.

And During April 1935

—The Soviet government issues anedict making military and technicalaviation training compulsory for thealmost 5 million young people (ages16-24) belonging to the junior organ-ization of the Communist Party andyoung working people not affiliatedwith the organization. The trainingincludes at least one parachute jumpfrom one of the towers especiallyerected for the purpose, at least 30 hrof aircraft engine studies, training inmarksmanship and, in some cases,aircraft and glider piloting. AeroDigest, May 1935, p. 16.


April 6 Alberto Santos Dumont fliesa distance of 2,000 m from St. Cyr inhis tiny Demoiselle XX. A. van Hoore-beeck, La Conquete de L’Air, p. 76.

the most powerful solid-fuel motorto date. D. Baker, Spaceflight andRocketry: A Chronology, p. 102.

April 29 Skylark, Britain’s two-stagesolid-fuel sounding rocket, is launchedfrom the Woomera rocket range inAustralia and reaches a record altitudeof 136 mi. The previous height attainedby this rocket was 100 mi. Flight,May 13, 1960, p. 649.

April 29 All eight H-1rocket engines for theSaturn launch vehicleare fired simultaneouslyfor the first time, for acombined thrust of 1.3million lb, at the Marshall

Space Flight Center. Flight,May 6, 1960, p. 618.


April 1 Vera Fedorova, a 24-year-oldSoviet parachute jumper, claims anew world’s record for jumping,without oxygen, from an airplaneat 21,160 ft. The Aeroplane, April 10,1935, p. 404.

April 3 Lewin B. Barringer glides156.6 mi. from Ellenville, N.Y., to apoint 10 mi. north of Harrisburg, Pa. Inthe air almost 7 hr, Barringer uses theBowlus-du Pont Albatross II sail-planein which Richard du Pont established

the U.S. gliding record of 158 mi.Aero Digest, May 1935, p. 60.

April 8 Jean Batten, the only womanto have flown solo from Australia toEngland, attempts to beat her recordAustralia-to-England flight of 14 days23 hr 25 min, but does not succeed.She pilots her veteran Gipsy MothG-AARB from Sydney, but when sheis 250 mi. from land over the TimorSea the engine stops at 6,000 ft andrestarts onlyafter a 4,000-ftglide. Herprogress isfurther delayedby a thunder-storm andheadwindsthat reduce hergroundspeedto 60 mph. AtMarseilles, laterin the flight,there is enginetrouble. This is remedied, but duringtakeoff a tire bursts. Flight, May 2,1935, p. 471.

April 11 The de Havilland DH.88Comet used by Cathcart Jones andKenneth Waller in their record round-trip flight between Englandand Australia sets a new recordfor the 220-mi. flight betweenLondon and Paris. Capt. HughBuckingham flies the planeover this route in 53 min. Thissurpasses the record held byAmerican Frank Hawks by 14min. The plane, one of twopurchased by the Frenchgovernment, maintains anaverage speed of 240 mph.Aero Digest, May 1935.


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