Flight Safety Information September 19, 2012 - No. 190 In This Issue Air India takes second 787 amid engine concerns Pilot escapes from helicopter crash with no injuries NASA's Wallops Flight Facility to use High Altitude NASA Aircraft Japan, U.S. Agree on Osprey Deployment Taiwan boosts airport amid China tourism boom. PRISM Certification Support Shuttle Endeavour prepped for valedictory tour, museum duty Gogo quietly hikes up its in-flight Wi-Fi prices GRADUATE RESEARCH SURVEY Air India takes second 787 amid engine concerns Air India flew away its second Boeing 787 Dreamliner from Charleston International Airport on Tuesday afternoon, despite continuing concerns about the General Electric engine that powers such airplanes. The red, gold and white jet, one of two assembled in Everett, Wash., and flown to North Charleston in early July, was officially delivered to the Indian national carrier earlier in the day, a Boeing spokesman confirmed. According to the flight-tracking website FlightAware, the plane was expected to land in Frankfurt, Germany, late Tuesday. Like the first 787 delivered from Boeing South Carolina this month, it will continue on to India from there. Aside from confirming the delivery, Boeing did not publicize or celebrate it, and neither did Air India. The Chicago-based airframer and the troubled government-owned airline had negotiated for months over what compensation Air India was owed for Boeing's years of delays. Air India ordered 27 787s almost seven years ago but only took delivery of its first Dreamliner on Sept. 6. There are now three 787s on the Boeing South Carolina flight line, all assembled locally; the lone painted jet would be next in line for delivery. Tuesday's fly-away was somewhat unexpected given that history, but also because of the ongoing probe into the GEnx engines that power many 787s, including all made so far by Boeing South Carolina, and 747-8s. The engine trouble began July 28 when one of the GEnx-1B power plants on the second S.C.-built 787 failed during a pre-flight taxi test, igniting a small fire by the runway and briefly closing Charleston International Airport. After a preliminary investigation, the National Transportation Safety Board determined the engine's fan midshaft had fractured, causing it to shift backward and break both turbine blades and the stator vanes they hit. Then, on Sept. 11, a Boeing 747-8 freighter operated by Air Bridge Cargo experienced a similar engine failure while preparing to take off from Shanghai, China. The larger 747-8s are powered by four GEnx-2B engines, which are similar to each 787's pair of GEnx-1B engines. The NTSB did not weigh in until Friday when it issued a four-page report that revealed it had found cracks in a third engine's drive shaft and included two urgent safety recommendations. The agency called on the Federal Aviation Administration to check all in-service GEnx engines not already inspected before further flight and to require repetitive inspections of the fan midshafts of all GEnx engines. In the meantime, GE said it had "introduced changes in the production process that address environmentally assisted cracking, including changes to the dry-film coating applied to the mid-shaft, as well as changes to the coating lubricant used when the retaining nut is clamped to the mid-shaft." The FAA said in a statement Friday it would "soon issue an emergency airworthiness directive and ... take appropriate action." But as of Tuesday evening, the agency had taken no action. The series of events has puzzled analysts, such as Carter Leake, who covers the aerospace and defense industries for BB&T Capital Markets. On Thursday, Leake had written a note advising investors to "brace for the possibility of an FAA directive that significantly impairs -- or even grounds -- the 787 and 747-8 fleets in the next few days." The same note went on to say, "given Air India's past behavior, we would not be surprised if Air India opted not to close on aircraft due for immediate delivery this month." But on Tuesday, a day which brought another Dreamliner delivery but no word from the FAA, Leake wondered whether GE is negotiating terms with the FAA and whether the engine manufacturer's coating fix would be sufficient. "What I struggle with is ... do you get to just apply the new coating and that's fine?" he asked. "But what about all the in-service engines? I've got to believe that you've got to swap out the whole turbine shaft with a correctly coated one." "If the FAA thought this was a safety-of-flight issue, they would act," Leake continued. "But if they really had the root cause, and everything was fine, you would've had something by now." As for Air India, Leake said the government-owned airline must be comfortable that Boeing and General Electric have their arms around the problem and will pay to fix it expeditiously -- or is simply showing good faith. "You can't hold up a $200 million asset over a hypothetical problem," he said. http://india.nydailynews.com/business/8884be80eb825d9a81621e79ef5048c9/air-india-takes-second-787-amid-engine-concerns Back to Top Pilot escapes from helicopter crash with no injuries A Slaton pilot got out of a helicopter crash Tuesday afternoon with no injuries, officials said. The crash occurred about 3:45 p.m. at Slaton Municipal Airport, according to Senior Cpl. John Gonzalez of the Texas Department of Public Safety. Glen "David" Guetersloh, 59, was attempting to land the aircraft when he lost control and the helicopter wound up on its side. The propellers burst into flames after impact, burning most of the 2004 Robertson R44, according to Gonzalez. Guetersloh was the only person on board and did not seek medical treatment. He told the Avalanche-Journal he has been flying since he was 18 years old. He has logged close to 7,000 hours piloting helicopters and fixed- wing planes, he said. He owns the helicopter and had just returned from Plains, where he was checking on his farm. Guetersloh, an aerial firefighter, declined comment on the crash because of the ongoing Federal Aviation Administration investigation. FAA officers were on site Tuesday afternoon. "It is what it is," Guetersloh said. "You never think this will happen." Mike DeLano, assistant administrator with the airport, said the helicopter crash was the second one in the facility's history. DeLano has worked at the airport for 12 years. In 2004, a Highway Patrol helicopter doing emergency landing practice crashed at the airport, DeLano said. The pilot and co-pilot walked away. A third crash at the airport involved an airplane and resulted in one fatality, he added. Weather was clear with no obstruction and very little wind at the time of the crash Tuesday, DeLano said. He witnessed the crash from inside the airport office. Although he is accustomed to hearing the sounds of planes and helicopters, the noise Tuesday was not normal. "About the time it started tipping, it made a certain noise," he said. " ... You don't pay much attention until it's something different." DeLano estimated the whole helicopter was on fire about 10 seconds after the crash. "The door may have been popped open on impact," he said. "He had to get his seat belt off and jump out. David's an experienced ag pilot, and that's a very fast reaction time for anybody." The first step after the crash was to make sure Guetersloh and the construction workers were out of the way of any danger, DeLano said. The area of the airport is undergoing construction to redo the ramp. Airport officials called for emergency responders and temporarily shut down the airport. It reopened about 5:10 p.m. after the FAA approved it, DeLano said. Air pumps were secured to avoid fire damage, and the area was kept clear. After the crash, the FAA interviewed Guetersloh. DeLano said the officers also would interview witnesses and then file a procedure report and haul off the remains of the helicopter. "Normally, no, (a pilot who is involved in a crash is not fined), unless they're doing something blatantly dangerous," DeLano said, "which he wasn't." http://lubbockonline.com/local-news/2012-09-18/pilot-escapes-helicopter-crash-no-injuries#.UFmrLLJlTnQ Back to Top NASA's Wallops Flight Facility to use High Altitude NASA Aircraft to develop new Satellite Instruments Over the next few weeks, an ER-2 high altitude research aircraft operating out of NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, VA, will take part in the development of two future satellite instruments. The aircraft will fly test models of these instruments at altitudes greater than 60,000 feet to gather information researchers can use to develop ways to handle data future spaceborne versions will collect. NASA Wallops will be the temporary home of one of NASA's ER-2 research aircraft. The ER-2 from NASA's Dryden Aircraft Operations Facility in Palmdale, CA, will carry two instruments, the Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS) and the Multiple Altimeter Beam Experimental Lidar (MABEL). CATS and MABEL are test beds for instruments to be carried by future satellite missions, and because they are both high-altitude laser instruments they will share space on the ER-2 in part as a way to lower costs for both teams. The ER-2s deployment began on September 7th and will end no later than September 27th. CATS is a high spectral resolution lidar that uses a laser to gather data about clouds and aerosols. Aerosols are tiny particles in the atmosphere such as dust, smoke or pollution. Similar instruments on existing satellites, such as CALIPSO, can detect aerosol plumes, but cannot determine what they are made of. "You have to make some assumptions," said atmospheric scientist Matt McGill at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD. CATS can better detect aerosol particle properties, allowing researchers to better determine what kind of aerosols the plumes are made of and improve studies of aerosol transport and cloud motion. CATS was designed as a test instrument for the future Aerosol-Cloud Ecosystems (ACE) satellite mission, which is still in its planning stages, and a version of CATS will be installed on the International Space Station in mid-2013. MABEL is a laser altimeter built to simulate the primary instrument on ICESat-2, scheduled for launch in 2016. ICESat-2 will study land and sea ice and vegetation. In April, a NASA ER-2 carrying MABEL flew surveys of land and sea ice out of Keflavik, Iceland, which yielded large amounts of data that researchers are using to develop algorithms for ICESat-2. This time around, MABEL will measure vegetation along the U.S. East Coast, which will provide data useful for developing methods for determining the amount and thickness of vegetation coverage. This involves measuring both the tops of tree canopies and ground level at the same time, which Kelly Brunt, a cryospheric scientist at NASA Goddard, said is a challenging task. The ICESat-2 team's need to measure deciduous forest canopies is in part of why these flights will operate out of Wallops. "We can't get the type of vegetation canopy we need flying out of Dryden," Brunt said. The ER-2 will be surveying forests and grasslands from Maine to the Florida Everglades. In addition to CATS and MABEL, the ER-2 will carry a Cloud Physics Lidar (CPL) instrument that will be used to detect clouds and aerosols that could hinder MABEL's performance. "We need to know what's between MABEL and the surface," said McGill. These flights will coincide with NASA's Hurricane and Severe Storms Sentinel, or HS3, campaign. HS3 is an airborne mission where a NASA Global Hawk unpiloted aircraft will overfly hurricanes and severe storms to measure properties such as wind, temperature, precipitation, humidity and aerosol profiles. One of the instruments it carries is a CPL identical in design to the one on board the ER-2. The Global Hawk is capable of flying at altitudes greater than 60,000 feet for more than 28 hours at a time and will be operated by pilots back on the ground. The flights are sponsored by the Earth Science Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. http://www.clarksvilleonline.com/2012/09/19/nasas-wallops-flight-facility-to-use-high-altitude-nasa-aircraft-to-develop-new-satellite- instruments/ Back to Top Japan, U.S. Agree on Osprey Deployment Japan and the U.S. reached agreement on deploying U.S. Osprey military aircraft in Japan, settling an issue that had been an irritant in their relations as both countries grapple with China. "We have confirmed the safety of the Osprey aircraft," Defense Minister Satoshi Morimoto said Wednesday. "Having rigorously confirmed its flight safety, which was a precondition for flights to take place, we have given the U.S. permission to start test flights." The V-22 Osprey is a hybrid, with tilting rotors that allow it to take off and land vertically like a helicopter but fly like a plane. The agreement, which follows a visit to Japan by U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, comes as Japan is embroiled in an increasingly heated territorial dispute with China over a set of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea. The U.S. is eager to deploy the Osprey to improve its ability to move troops and equipment by air, and project power in the region. "Secretary Panetta has placed a high priority on reaching this agreement, directed numerous senior officials at the Department of Defense to work on this issue over the past several months and raised the issue in multiple discussions with Foreign Minister (Koichiro) Gemba and Defense Minister Morimoto, including earlier this week," Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said in a statement from Beijing, where he is accompanying Mr. Panetta on his Asian trip. The deployment in Japan has become controversial due to safety concerns. An Osprey crash in Florida injured five people, while an accident in April in Morocco killed two. U.S. officials say the perception of safety problems isn't supported by the actual accident rate, which is lower than for other aircraft. The U.S. Marines, who will be operating the Osprey, are expected soon to begin test flights at an air base in Iwakuni, Yamaguchi Prefecture, where 12 of the aircraft have been grounded since their delivery from the U.S. in July. But the agreement between Tokyo and Washington is not expected to end opposition in the southern prefecture of Okinawa. Concerns over the aircraft have been exacerbated by their planned deployment at Okinawa's Futenma Air Statione-the center of a 15-year stalemate over the realignment of U.S. forces. Tokyo has long tried to relocate the base within Okinawa, but local governments want the forces out of the prefecture completely. "As seen in past protests and demonstrations, the popular consensus against the Osprey deployment is firm," said a spokesman involved in U.S. base relations for the Okinawa prefectural government. Though supported by the government of Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, the Osprey deployment has encountered strong resistance from senior members of his ruling Democratic Party of Japan. Officials in a minority party allied with the DPJ and in opposition parties also have expressed doubts about Tokyo's acceptance of Washington's deployment timetable. The aircraft have been battle-tested in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the U.S. says that they can fly nearly twice as fast as the CH-46 helicopter they will replace, with much larger payloads and flying distances between fuelings. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444165804578005663806994352.html Back to Top Taiwan boosts airport amid China tourism boom Taiwan, which is seeing a boom in tourism from China, will spend Tw$463 billion ($15.4 billion) on a new terminal and other facilities at its main airport, the government said Wednesday. In addition to a third terminal at the Taoyuan international airport in the island's north, the surrounding area will get an aerospace industrial park and special zones for cargo and logistics, said the transportation ministry. Taiwan, which relaxed controls on travel from China in 2008, received 1.78 million Chinese tourists last year, and calls have been mounting for better facilities to accommodate the growing inflow. The new terminal, the centrepiece of the "Taoyuan Aerotropolis" project with a budget of Tw$50 billion, is set to begin in 2014 and is expected to start operating in 2018, the ministry said. The project is expected to generate Tw$2.3 trillion in "economic benefits" and 260,000 new jobs as well as Tw$84 billion in business and land tax revenues for the government from 2011 to 2030, a transportation official said. The "economic benefits" include growing revenues for construction companies, raw material suppliers, airlines, transportation service providers as well as spending from more visitors, he said. The airport, which was inaugurated 30 years ago, has been a frequent target of criticism, with complaints ranging from leaking toilets and roofs to a lack of trolleys. International visitors to the island reached a record 6.08 million in 2011, compared with the previous high of 5.5 million in 2010, according to the tourism bureau. http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hn5SlvImkl901MAOPrb12tCQ3bTQ?docId=CNG.a135488fc7fc21d5ca0e8f7a41f4fa38.31 Back to Top Back to Top Shuttle Endeavour prepped for valedictory tour, museum duty The space shuttle Endeavour, veteran of 25 trips to orbit since its maiden launch two decades ago, was prepped today for takeoff on its final flight tomorrow, a cross-country tour atop a NASA 747 transport jet that will give the public one last chance to see the iconic spaceplane in flight before landing in Los Angeles Friday for work to ready the ship for museum duty. Running two days late because of stormy weather along the Gulf Coast, Endeavour and its carrier jet are scheduled for takeoff from the Kennedy Space Center's 3-mile-long shuttle runway around 7 a.m. ET tomorrow. If all goes well, the transport jet and its 155,462-pound payload will land at Los Angeles International Airport around 2 p.m. Friday ET (11 a.m. PT). The shuttle will be housed in a United Airlines hanger until mid-October, when it will be hauled along city streets to its new home at the California Science Center near downtown Los Angeles. The long-awaited move is the last time a space shuttle will take to the air, following similar museum runs for the prototype shuttle Enterprise, now on display at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York City, and the veteran shuttle Discovery, on display at the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C. NASA's third surviving orbiter, the Atlantis, will remain at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. In November, the spaceplane will be hauled 10 miles to a new $100 million display facility under construction at the spaceport's privately operated Visitor Complex. The new facility is scheduled to open next summer. For Endeavour's final flight, the Federal Aviation Administration has approved 1,500-foot flyovers of multiple NASA centers, towns, and cities along the way, including the Florida "space coast," NASA's Stennis Space Center in Bay St. Louis, Miss., and Lockheed Martin's Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans where the shuttle's external tanks were manufactured. If all goes well, Endeavour will end the first day of its cross-country flight with a low-level fly-over of Houston before landing at Ellington Field just outside the Johnson Space Center around 11:45 a.m. ET (10:45 a.m. CT). Parked near NASA Hangar 990, the spacecraft will remain on public display for the rest of the day. At sunrise Thursday, Endeavour and its transport jet will take off and fly west, refueling at Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso, Texas, and then flying over the White Sands Test Facility near Las Cruces, N.M., on the way to NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base in the Mojave Desert north of Los Angeles. The tour will continue Friday morning with low-level flyovers of San Francisco, NASA's Ames Research Center, Sacramento and other communities before heading back to southern California for another series of low-altitude passes. A NASA team will use a pair of cranes to carefully remove Endeavour from its transport jet. It will be housed temporarily in a United Airlines hangar before the trip to the California Science Center around October 13. Starting October 30, the space shuttle will be on display at the Samuel Oschin Space Shuttle Endeavour Display Pavilion at the science center. Named after Capt. James Cook's famed sailing ship, the HMS Endeavour, NASA's youngest shuttle, was approved in 1987 to replace the shuttle Challenger, destroyed in a launch mishap January 28, 1986. Rockwell International completed the $2.2 billion orbiter in 1991 and it blasted off on its first mission May 7, 1992, a dramatic flight to repair a stranded communications satellite. Endeavour went on to fly 24 more missions, including multiple flights to help assemble the International Space Station. Its final space mission, STS-134, ended in May 2011. At that point, the ship had spent 299 days off planet, logging 122,883,151 miles over 4,671 orbits. On April 12, 2011, NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden announced the museums that NASA had selected to host the orbiters, settling on New York, Washington, Los Angeles and the Kennedy Space Center. Ownership of Atlantis was transferred to the California Science Center on October 11, 2011. Getting Discovery to the Smithsonian Institution's display hangar at Dulles International Airport was relatively straightforward. The Enterprise was flown to John F. Kennedy International Airport and then moved by barge to the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum. Getting Endeavour to the California Science Center is a much more complex affair, requiring city planners, engineers and museum officials to map out a course through 12 miles of Inglewood and Los Angeles city streets, moving hundreds of trees and repositioning power lines and traffic signals to accommodate the shuttle's 78-foot wingspan and its iconic vertical tail fin, which will tower nearly six stories above street level. "This will mark the first and only time a space shuttle will travel through 12 miles of public urban streets. It's also one of the biggest objects ever transported down an urban corridor," the California Science Center says on its web site. "A large team -- the California Science Center, the cities of LA and Inglewood, logistics, tree and utility and engineering experts -- have spent hundreds of hours preparing for Endeavour's complex journey. "To make way for the Endeavour, we picked routes through the cities that would have the least impact on surroundings and we'll be using a state-of-the art Endeavour Transportation System that will allow us to maneuver precisely around trees, light poles and utility poles wherever possible. Pruning is also another tool being utilized in this effort. Thousands of trees along the route are being preserved and protected as a result of this careful planning." In Inglewood, 128 trees are being removed and replaced with 256 new trees at a cost of more than $500,000, money donated by the Science Center Foundation. Another 256 trees in Los Angeles are expected to be removed and replaced with 530 new trees, the science center says on its web page. The Science Center Foundation is donating more than $1 million to cover the costs in Los Angeles. "The vast majority of trees being removed in Los Angeles are small trees less than 15 feet tall or have a trunk diameter at breast height less than 12 inches," according to the Web site. "Fifty-four of the trees to be removed are large trees, five of which will be transplanted. Many of these large trees to be removed are invasive trees that are causing street damage or posing safety hazards to the public. After we remove them to make way for the Endeavour, our team will replace them, two to one, where indicated by civic agencies, at no cost to the cities, with urban-friendly trees." The Los Angeles Times reported final approval to remove 265 trees -- pushing the total to nearly 400 -- was granted Monday. "To garner residents' support, the center sweetened the deal at the last minute and agreed to replant four times as many trees, repair additional sidewalks and offer scholarships and job training," the paper reported. The shuttle Endeavour completed 25 space missions since its maiden launch in 1992, logging 299 days off planet covering 122,883,151 miles over 4,671 orbits. http://news.cnet.com/8301-11386_3-57515318-76/shuttle-endeavour-prepped-for-valedictory-tour-museum-duty/ Back to Top Gogo quietly hikes up its in-flight Wi-Fi prices It's kind of strange timing for Gogo to quietly raise its in-flight Internet prices -- with airplane Wi-Fi usually being frustrating rather than helpful and JetBlue just announcing it's offering it for free -- but according to PandoDaily, the wireless service has upped their costs. In what used to be $17.95 for Wi-Fi on a long flight on Virgin America now costs at least $30. Because rather than offering a one-time flight pass, Gogo is now charging by the hour. One hour of in-flight wireless costs $10, so a cross-country flight could be about $60. That's quite a price hike. According to PandoDaily, the change in cost was apparently Gogo's decision since the price hike was seen in both Virgin America and Delta flights. It's not yet clear if it will apply to all flights and carriers on these airlines. "We are experimenting with different pricing on various flights," a Gogo representative told VentureBeat. "We want pricing to reflect demand on any given route." Even though Gogo is no longer offering the one-time flight passes, it is still offering monthly subscription packages, like the Gogo Unlimited and the Traveler Pass. These cost the same as before, which is between $34.95 and $39.95. The service is also allowing customers to pre-purchase a one-time Gogo pass for $17.95. This news comes as JetBlue announced yesterday that it will be offering in-flight Wi-Fi service that is apparently several times faster than Gogo's and will also be free for an extended trial period. http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57515522-93/gogo-quietly-hikes-up-its-in-flight-wi-fi-prices/ Back to Top GRADUATE RESEARCH SURVEY Hello, My name is Christopher Hubacek and I am a Master's student in Aviation Human Factors at Florida Institute of Technology. For my thesis, I am developing a low-level prototype for a data communication interface that will be incorporated into GA glass cockpits, to follow with design and implementation goals for FAA's NextGen system. However, before I develop the display, I need input from intended users about display preferences and when they would plan on using it the most. Transport category aircraft already have the ability to send and receive data communication from the cockpit with ATC, commonly through a system called ACARS. My concept is taking that technology and incorporating it with GA. Also, going beyond simple display design, receiving input on the intended use can be helpful for creating procedures revolving around when is best to use data or voice communications. The survey can be accessed through the following link: http://GADatacommfinal.questionpro.com. It is primarily multiple-choice with a few questions that involve typing comments, and takes approximately 10 minutes to complete. Thank you for your participation. Christopher Hubacek Curt Lewis