1) The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the U.S. Department of Transport, the European Union and the International Air Transport Association (IATA) have signed an agreement in Montreal today aimed at sharing more aviation safety and security information. The new multilateral initiative has been name the Global Safety Information Exchange.

2) Meanwhile, as expected in recent years, European Union member states are about to apply standard procedures and requirements, under the aegis of the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), for the prevention of civil aviation incidents/accidents, and for  aviation incident/accident reporting and investigation.

News items 1) and 2) result from joint streamlining efforts by public authorities and the private industry to make commercial air transport safer yet and able to respond quickly and effectively to future potential security threats to civil aviation.

3) The jury is still out on what exactly caused the failure this month of a Boeing 787 engine being tested on a rig. The damage to the RR Trent engine and its test rig is substantial. One company official even suggested that testing procedures were at fault, not the newly designed engine for Boeing’s Dreamliner. Either way, there is renewed concern that the belated Dreamliner, already years behind in the production and delivery of the first units, might cause another commercial set-back to Boeing and its hopeful first customers. Whether or not Boeing will manage to deliver its first production B-787 to All Nippon Airways, as rescheduled for early 2011, remains to be seen.

4) Back in December 2009, I mentioned the high hopes of achieving suborbital space flight at a… shall we say ‘reasonable’ cost with a push and financial participation by Virgin Galactic and its major partners. Since that post, it has come to our attention that another similar venture is pursued in the U.K. under the Skylon Project name.  This is not to say the two projects are competing head on; in fact, they perhaps supplement each other in their own niches. Virgin Galactic might, in the not too distant future, fill the void left by the demise of Concorde by offering continent-hopping suborbital flights to the travelling public, while the Skylon project, on the other hand, could fill another void now that NASA has retired its fleet of space shuttles from service.

   Let’s start with the Boeing Dreamliner which is already a test pilot’s dream come true, as the first video shows. Needless to say: an airliner’s capability to sustain high crosswinds on landing is a feature airlines look for in their decision to purchase or lease a fleet of new aircraft. In fact, any airliner having to divert to an alternate airport due to excessive crosswind on the destination runway is a major annoyance for both the airline and its passengers.

   Keflavik Airport in Iceland has the dubious distinction of having some of the strongest crosswinds. No wonder Airbus and Boeing, to name but two aircraft manufacturers, call Keflavik Airport a testbed for exploring a new aircraft’s landing and take-off limits in demanding wind conditions.

   YouTube has dozens of genuine videos, other than the ‘Flight-Sim’ kind,  showing the crosswind landing capabilities of new aircraft. The crab angle of sky giants such as the Airbus A-380 on final approach and touch-down seems almost unreal. At times, the Airbus looks as if it were flying sideways. Later on, at the 2009 “EAA AirVenture Oshkosh” event, a visiting A-380 on a public relations tour created a sensation when landing at Oshkosh in a hefty crosswind. There was no shortage of knowledgeable commentators on location to describe the sort of heavy footwork going on in the cockpit and other corrective input by the flying pilot in order to maintain the A-380 lined up with the runway’s centre-line on approach, right after after touch-down and during initial roll-out.

   Such sights have onlookers wondering whether the aircraft is on auto-land or hand flown. Which of the two produces the smoothest results? Unfortunately I do not have the answer for now. Suffice it to say that one of the many difficult crosswind landing of Boeings 747 aircraft engaged in actual commercial flight can be viewed on YouTube. One can appreciate the severe lateral stress on the landing gear upon touch-down. In such landing conditions, the aircraft jerks on touch-down with the main landing gear billowing heavy smoke from its tires. Less frequently, aircraft display an unusual wing-low attitude on approach before levelling the wings, and a very noticeable crab angle above the runway, followed at times by an immediate go-around. Go-arounds in stiff cross-winds are presumably more frequent in the case of jetliners having a tall landing gear, such the defunct Concorde.

   Speaking of using a wing-low technique in the final stage of a cross-wind landing, several twin jets, including the Boeing Dreamliner, powered by turbofans engines with a wide diameter and slung below the wings, would be nearly impossible. Not only are the turbofan engines much larger in terms of  cross-section, but their landing gear is also short for the overall size of the aircraft. This is where, IMO, the Airbus A-380 shines with its gull-wing design that helps keep the engines well above the runway upon touch-down, despite the short undercarriage and the impressive wing flexing on touch-down. Notice for example, in the video linked above, showing the Airbus A-380 landing at Oshkosh in 2009, the busy foot-work by the FP (flying pilot), as displayed externally by the rudder movements. These control inputs are naturally necessary, even after touch-down, in order for the heavy aircraft to remain on the runway centreline during initial roll-out, in cross-wind gusts reported to be 23 kts. These are only part of the challenging conditions the A-380 and the Boeing Dreamliner have been designed and tested for prior to production.

   Despite the benefit of allowing large turbofans a higher clearance above the runway on landing, both the Dreamliner and the Airbus A-380 are designed to take severe punishment in a cross-wind landing without the landing gear collapsing due to lateral drift, or any engine and wing tip scraping the runway.  Heavy airliners have their own constraints in stiff cross-wind landings, for touching down safely on a runway, wings level, compared to good old propeller-driven tail-draggers which are capable of touching down, in cross-wind conditions, on their upwind main gear alone until bleeding enough airspeed for a full three-point contact with the runway.

   No lateral drift of the Boeing Dreamliner appears during video-recorded test flights in heavy crosswinds approach and landing at at Keflavik Airport. Is this a reflection of a test pilot’s superior flying skill? I can’t say for sure. The video of the Dreamliner’s crosswind landings linked below indicates that some of the landings in heavy crosswind are carried out in auto-land mode. Presumably, they must be able to do so in order to meet current certification requirements.

   Here is  a video of the Dreamliner’s crosswind testing , complete with a running commentary by a Boeing official and test pilot.

   I thougt it would be useful to include a similar video below, showing the Airbus 380 undergoing the same rigorous testing in strong cross-winds and on a wet runway. If only one could better see the rudder and aileron deflections that keep the large A-380 in line with the runway on approach. No aircraft is a master of the sky, and yet both the Boeing Dreamliner and Airbus A-380 seem very stable and undaunted, from a distance, during strong crosswind approach, touch-down and initial roll-out.

   Our second topic below is an update of the Virgin Galactic project mentioned in a previous post in this blog, concerning the demise of the Concorde supersonic airliner. The main question raised in the earlier post was what sort of supersonic vehicle would likely fill the void left by Concorde in supersonic air transport. It was mentioned at the time that Virgin’s Galactic suborbital flight project was an attractive proposal. The video below indicates that suborbital public transport is years away. For now, suborbital flights to be conducted jointly by Virgin Galactic and its main partners will cater to space tourists only. The space tourism concept implies that any suborbital spacecraft launched from the mother ship will return for landing at the spaceport of departure.

   Sir Richard Branson and his partners plan  1) to make suborbital flights more affordable over time, for the benefit of space tourists without deep pockets, and  2) ultimately, to develop the global infrastructure - a major challenge to take on, as existing airports are not suited for such flights – and to redesign suborbital spacecraft necessary to achieve intercontinental public transport. Whether suborbital flight will in fact meet the need for affordable supersonic transport remains to be seen, of course, despite the enthusiasm displayed presently by its proponents. Yet, more conventional SST technology should not be discounted since improved and safer versions of Concorde might see the light of day before suborbital flight has sufficiently matured to meet the need for affordable intercontinental supersonic public transport.

   The following BBC report highlights Branson’s plans for suborbital flight:

   More information on the alternate application of SST technology, such as an improved variant of Concorde for instance, will follow as relevant material is found.

   The European consortium EADS is still ahead of the game on that level, by most accounts. For example, EADS has allowed China years ago to assemble Airbus 320 on site, knowing that outsourcing often results in a transfer of technology most likely beyond the limit stipulated by contract. Boeing, on the other hand, chose safe subcontractors in its outsourcing policy, from within the USA or with predictable economic partners such as the U.K., perhaps under pressure from the controversial Buy American Policy.            

   Boeing’s claim to put into service a new transport jet, the B-787 Dreamliner, that will emit 20% less pollution and burn less fuel* is not all that impressive inasmuch as the claim can very well be perceived as being too little too late. Also, such welcoming figures are not wholly in response to pressure from environmentalist organizations. On the positive side, the claim does signal a new trend that might accelerate in the next couple of decades, still behind previous promises made in Copenhagen and Davos. Moreover, who should really be credited for that reduction in pollution levels: Rolls Royce, General Electric or both?            

Boeing 787 Dreamliner

   Isn’t it unsettling that news media consider the Boeing 787 and the Airbus 380 as totally different aircraft, and yet track them both as bed-fellows in the sky in terms of the race for the highest number of firm purchase orders? More reliable sales figures will emerge after the Farnborough show is over. Even then, the figures will not be finalized because one has to differentiate firm orders from other variations of formal interest in the purchase of new passenger jets, namely options to buy either aircraft. After all, Boeing’s sell/purchase contracts might not worded in the same way as those normally used by EADS, for instance in matters regarding penalties for cancellation, not to mention the airlines’ own brand of stipulations. Grouping sale figures under one concept of sale and purchase agreement is risky for aviation reporters and analysts.            

   The Airbus A-380 and the Boeing Dreamliner yield different cost figures on a seat-per-mile basis. It would be most interesting to find out which one is the uncontested winner on that score. In the case of the Airbus A-380 in particular, the difficulty will be to focus on a seating configuration that will carry the day in terms of profitability. Seating arrangements can vary between 550 to 850 passenger seats, depending on the scheduled routes flown and type of airline. It is obvious Ryanair will not choose the same cabin configuration as Emirates Airlines.            

Airbus A-380

   Would you know that the Douglas DC-7 would not have seen the light of day in the early 50s, had the Douglas Aircraft Company not managed to secure 40 million dollars worth of firm contracts while the most advanced  and last piston-engine transport aircraft was still on the drawing board? However, trading in new advanced passenger jets nowadays offers aircraft development financing solutions as creative as those used for the purchase of new transport aircraft types rolling off assembly plants, within WTO safeguards, of course.            

PS: Aircraft fuel-efficiency is a relative concept resulting mainly from the economic circumstances of the day for airlines, knowing that fuel costs alone amount to around 30% of operating costs. At present, one would be hard pressed to find general standards of fuel efficiency set out by aeronautical regulatory agencies.