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The new consortium will be headquartered in Toulouse but ATR, Avro and Jetstream will each maintain appropriate industrial and financial capabilities to support their respective programmes. The joint venture operation will be open to other European manufacturers at a later date and it is hoped that eventually an Airbus-type operation will be established for regional airliners involving many European interests. The new arrangement has already been dubbed ‘Minibus’ by some! Partners will also eventually be sought in the Asia-Pacific region, raising the possibility that the previous failed talks between BAe and Taiwan Aerospace over coproduction of the 146/RJ regional jet could be reopened.

Jets To Race At Skyrace

The organisers of Skyrace Tasmania have introduced a world first category — jets. Pending full CAA approval (at press time only approval in principle had been granted), three jet trainers, a Strikemaster, a Jet Provost and an Iskra, will participate in the world’s first low level jet air racing. Part owner of the Jet Provost, Rod Edington, noted that “unlike the older piston engine aircraft, jets respond well to being flown at full power. We have never raced them at low level, but that should add to the fun of the day.” Skyrace Tasmania runs from February 16 to 19.

Parts Ground Black Hawks

More than half of the Army’s Sikorsky Black Hawk helicopter fleet has been taken out of action because of problems with spare parts, cracking and corrosion. Twenty four of 27 Townsville based aircraft, out of a total fleet of 38, were effectively grounded, pending the arrival of replacement parts from Sikorsky in the USA. Problems have included cracked panels and corrosion, and worn cuffs and gearbox supports, similar to problems being experienced by the US Army.

They have been attributed to the higher than expected utilisation rates, while corrosion has been aided by Townsville’s coastal/tropical location. Further, the Army’s extensive use of long range fuel tanks has been attributed to the unexpected wear, something that Sikorsky did not predict because its calculations were based on flying without the tanks. Consequently the Army has curtailed flying with long range fuel tanks unless operationally essential.

The fatigue and corrosion problems have resulted in a $20m repair and spare parts bill. The Army has ordered the necessary spare parts from Sikorsky and the 24 aircraft will be progressively returned to service over a period of several months. Payment will be broken down into $8m this financial year and $12m the next, and will comprise a special allocation from the government so as not to take funding away from other defence programmes. In other Army Aviation news, the Army’s Nomad fleet looks set to remain grounded until after the release of a full technical evaluation of the type due to be released this June.

Ad For R22 & R44

The US Federal Aviation Administration has placed a restrictive Airworthiness Directive on the Robinson R22 and R44 light helicopters, but has stopped short of grounding them as recommended by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recently. The AD is aimed to prevent mast bumping and fuselage/rotor strike, an area that the NTSB has heavily scrutinised. The FAA did not ground the two types as recommended by the NTSB as it says that “the majority of the helicopters are flying safely” and that if there was a design flaw in the helicopters it would have grounded them before now.

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The AD requires operators to limit forward airspeed to the minimum possible, with 80kt (150kmh) the maximum allowed in turbulence; restrict flight operations to the lowest safe density altitude; avoid turbulence; maintain balanced flight; face into the wind when hovering out of ground effect; and stay grounded where surface winds exceed 25kt (47kmh), gusts exceed 15kt (29kmh) or windshear or turbulence is forecast. The FAA is developing new pilot training requirements for the aircraft and will test Robinson developed component modifications this April.

Caa To Restructure In July

The Civil Aviation Authority will split into two organisations on July 1 this year — the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) and the Airways Corporation of Australia (ACA). Basically, the CASA will incorporate the existing Directorate of Aviation Safety Regulation (DASR) while the ACA will look after the administrative and operational side of things. The CAA’s corporate support functions will be divided between the two organizations.

The CASA replaces the originally proposed Aviation Safety Agency (ASA) which was to come into effect on January 1 this year in the wake of recent air safety problems. This has been held over until the middle of the year and replaced by the CASA in the interests of making better use of resources for an efficient operation. It is anticipated that manning levels will increase from the present 530 (approx) to between 750 and 800 by year end.

Airworld Threatened

One of Australia’s best known aviation museums, Airworld at Wangaratta, will be forced to close unless its debt problem can be solved. The museum costs ratepayers in Victoria’s Milawa Shire about $500,000 a year and the shire has called for expressions of interest to purchase it. According to accounting firm Coopers and Lybrand, the museum has lost an average $110,000 per annum over the years and a $117,000 loss has been budgeted for this year.

Ansett Has More Undercarriage Problems

Ansett Australia has suffered more undercarriage woes when one of its A320s was recently found to have a structural problem in one of its main gear bogey units. The aircraft was stranded at Canberra airport for several days in late January with an unserviceable oleo while a new main undercarriage unit was fitted. At press time the cause of the oleo failure was unknown and the entire A320 fleet has been checked to ensure the problem does not reoccur.

Record Setting Rv-4

Adelaide man Jon Johanson has recently set new fixed wing under 1000kg class flying records in his homebuilt RV-4 with two marathon long distance flights, the pinnacle of which was a nonstop trans Tasman crossing from Adelaide to Auckland. The first flight saw him fly from Adelaide to Hobart, Melbourne and return to Adelaide nonstop, establishing three Australian class records. He departed Parafield at 10am on January 20 before arriving over Hobart at 3pm and Melbourne at 6pm, returning to Adelaide at about 8pm. Mr Johanson did not land at Hobart or Melbourne, but instead circled each cities’ airport tower.

Then at 2:30am on January 29 Mr Johanson departed Adelaide for Auckland, arriving at the New Zealand city 3350km and 13 hours and 57 minutes later. In completing the flight the RV-4 became the smallest aircraft to make the trans Tasman crossing. Mr Johanson intended to return home to Australia by flying from Wellington to Melbourne. In preparation for the marathon flights Mr Johanson fitted the RV-4 with an auxiliary fuel tank in the cockpit, increasing the aircraft’s fuel capacity to 300 litres. Congratulations to Jon from all at AA on his remarkable achievements.

Hornet Engine Maintenance To Nz

Hawker de Havilland Victoria has lost its contract for maintenance work on the RAAF’s F/A-18 Hornet GE F404 engines to Air New Zealand. The awarding of the contract — worth about $2.5m annually — to an offshore company has come in for strong union criticism, the Automotive, Food, Metals and Engineering Union saying the decision is “wrong and stupid” and that Air New Zealand has no experience in maintaining high performance military jet engines and appears to have won the contract on the basis of New Zealand’s favourable exchange rate.

AA Comment: The implications of this decision are serious and long term. The decision is indeed “wrong and stupid” because it will almost certainly lead to the closure of HDHV’s engine facility for good, and negotiations between the union and the company over redundancy packages are already underway. HDHV’s engine facility is the best in Australia and has a very high level of expertise. It was established in 1937 as part of the original Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation and has since been responsible for the manufacture, maintenance and modification of a wide range of aero engines for Australia’s military needs. These range from Pratt & Whitney piston engines through to the Rolls-Royce Merlin and jets such as the Nene, Avon, Atar, Viper and F404.

The level of employee expertise at HDHV’s engine facility is second to none in the region. It will now probably be lost forever (along with its associated engine test cell), providing yet another example of what our Government regards as proof that Australia is “the clever country”. It also calls into question the policy of investing a considerable premium (as much as $1bn in current values) in assembling the Hornets locally rather than simply buying them direct from MDC when the very purpose of AIP (Australian Industry Participation) is to build, foster and develop in-house support and expertise to ensure the aircraft can be supported locally.