The shipment did not go smoothly, though. As soon as the Yakutia jet reached cruise altitude, the bees began to creep out of the two cardboard boxes that served as their hives, the airline said by e-mail.

The flight attendants managed to seal the bees inside the plane‘s wardrobe in the business-class section — where the boxes were held — by taping shut the wardrobe’s doors.

It was not immediately clear whether the bees had actually stung anyone during the 10 hour, 40 minute flight, but several passengers panicked, the airline said.

The incident took place on May 28 but was first reported Thursday by Rossiiskaya Gazeta.

The jet arrived at Moscow’s Vnukovo Airport on schedule, but passengers had to wait two hours to collect their luggage because the flight engineer and airline officials had to kill the bees with an anti-bug spray, Dichlorvos, after police either failed to call sanitary and emergency officials on the pilot’s request or failed to respond to it.

Consequently, the next leg of the plane’s flight, to Barcelona, was delayed. When the plane arrived in Barcelona, the next crew discovered five bees that managed to survive the insecticide in the cabin.

The beehive smuggler, whose name was not released, said the airport’s deputy director, Anatoly Smirnov, had asked him to hand the bees over to an unidentified person in Moscow, the airline said.

Another passenger said the man with the bees was “slightly drunk” upon boarding, documents provided by the airline said.

Blagoveshchensk is a city in the far eastern Amur region and located on the border with China.

After the incident, the airline requested that Blagoveshchensk prosecutors check the airport’s observance of safety rules. The subsequent check found unspecified violations that the airport’s management was ordered to eliminate, the airline said.

The violation of flight safety rules carries a fine of 2,500 rubles ($86) for officials and up to 5,000 rubles for legal entities. It was unclear whether anyone had been fined over the beehive incident.

Source: www.themoscowtimes.com

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Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation, manufacturer and designer of helicopters, announced on Monday the first delivery of MH-60 Seahawk helicopters to an international customer.

The company stated that two MH-60 helicopters flew into the Port of Baltimore for the Royal Thai Navy. The aircraft were acquired under the US Government’s Foreign Military Sales programme. The new Sierra aircraft are reportedly an integral part of the Royal Thai Navy’s fleet modernisation programme to augment the capabilities of six Sikorsky S-70B SEAHAWK and six marinised S-76B helicopters acquired through US Foreign Military Sales in the late 1990s. Also, the Thai Navy has expressed interest in additional MH-60S purchases. MH-60S and MH-60R Seahawk multi-mission helicopters are designed and manufactured by Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation. Lockheed Martin (NYSE:LMT) provides the digital cockpit for both MH-60 helicopter types and is the systems integrator for the MH-60R platform. Sikorsky Aircraft is a subsidiary of United Technologies Corp (NYSE:UTX). Lockheed Martin is a global security company.

Source: http://www.militaryaerospace.com

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June 1: The space shuttle Endeavour rolls out on runway 15 after landing on her final flight at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Space shuttle Endeavour is back on Earth.

Space shuttle Endeavour and its crew of six landed for the final time at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center after 248 orbits around Earth and a journey of 6,510,221 miles on STS-134 early Wednesday . The touchdown closed out a 16-day mission that was the next-to-last for the shuttle program.

Endeavour’s crew put the finishing touches on the International Space Station.

Commander Mark Kelly will have to wait another day before reuniting with his wife. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords remained at her Houston rehab center. She was shot in the head in January.

The last shuttle to fly, Atlantis spacecraft, was almost at the launch pad when Endeavour returned. Atlantis emerged from the hangar late Tuesday as thousands of space center workers and their families lined the route to the pad. Space shuttle Atlantis just completed its 3.4 mile trek from the Vehicle Assembly Building to Launch Pad 39A and was secured to the launch pad at 3:29 a.m. The move began last night at 8:42 p.m. and took approximately 7 hours. Atlantis launches in July.

Source: FoxNews.com

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Lockheed Martin has received an Undefinitized Contract Action from the U.S. Government for the Foreign Military Sale of an additional C130J Super Hercules to Israel, with funding for advanced procurement items for a third aircraft.

Israel ordered its first C-130J in April 2010 and will receive that aircraft in spring 2013. The next two aircraft will be delivered in late 2013 and late 2014 respectively. The contract also covers a number of items to meet Israel’s unique operational requirements. The Israeli Air Force’s new Super Hercules are the longer fuselage or “stretched” variant of the Lockheed Martin C-130J.

“We are providing Israel with the most flexible and capable airlifter in the world as that country continues to expand its advanced airlift fleet. The proven multi-role and multi-mission capability and performance of the C-130J are ideally suited to the unique requirements of the Israeli Air Force,” said Jim Grant, Lockheed Martin vice president of Business Development for Air Mobility.

Israel’s aircraft are being modified during production with non-developmental items, which include an Enhanced Service Life center wing, two embedded Global Positioning Systems and a Universal Aerial Refueling Receptacle Slipway Installation aerial refueling system.

Headquartered in Bethesda, Md., Lockheed Martin is a global security company that employs about 126,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services. The Corporation’s 2010 sales from continuing operations were $45.8 billion.

Source: DefenseTalk.com

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The Southwest Airlines reported that one of its planes slid off a runway during heavy rain at Chicago Midway International Airport yesterday, April 26. The Southwest Flight 1919 had just landed en route from Denver when the Boeing 737-700 ran off the runway. Fortunately, there were no immediate reports of injuries.

The report is the latest in a series of embarrassing incidents for Southwest Airlines, which came under scrutiny earlier this month when a ruptured fuselage ripped a hole in one of its B-737s at 34,000 feet and then again when reports surfaced that one of its planes came within 176 yards of a small aircraft.

The National Transportation Safety Board said in a statement it was investigating Tuesday’s incident and there were 134 passengers and 5 crew members on board at the time of the incident.

“The passengers have been safely deplaned from the aircraft using air stairs and have been bused to the terminal,” the airline statement said.

The Dallas-based airline grounded 79 of its 737s for inspection this month after a fuselage rupture punched a hole in Southwest Flight 812 while it was en route to Phoenix, causing a rapid depressurization of the plane. The flight crew conducted an emergency descent, landing at Yuma International Airport. No one was seriously hurt, officials said.

That was followed by a report that a Southwest pilot, responding to a request by an air traffic controller, pulled a plane within 176 yards of a small aircraft to check on the occupants after they failed to acknowledge radio traffic. The controller and the pilot have been suspended while federal investigators determine if the two violated the Federal Aviation Administration’s minimums for separation of aircraft.

Southwest Airlines did get some good news Tuesday from the Department of Justice, which approved its acquisition of AirTran Airways. Southwest has offered to buy the airline for $1.4 billion.

The Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division said it closed its investigation Tuesday into Southwest’s proposed purchase of AirTran, saying it determined that the merger “is not likely to lessen competition.”

Southwest Airlines, which reported revenues of $12.1 billion in revenue in 2010, serves 72 cities in the United States. Orlando-based AirTran reported revenues of $2.6 billion. It flies to 69 cities in the United States, Mexico and the Caribbean.

Source: CNN.com

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Col. Matt Molloy, the 1st Fighter Wing’s commander, and Col. Kevin Mastin, the 1st FW’s vice commander, escorted the aircraft to here to bolster F-22 Raptor training using cost-effective training exercises and supplementing flight training for future pilots.

Following the completion of an environmental survey in the fall, the planes will be reassigned permanently to the 1st FW. Wing officials expect to receive the remaining six Northrop T-38s gradually over the coming months.

According to Lt. Col. Derek Wyler, the 1st OG Adversary Air Program lead, the program provides adversary support for training scenarios. The T-38s will serve in a “red air,” or enemy capacity, while F-22s will fly as “blue air,” or friendly forces. Each T-38 can be flown as often as three times daily to provide adversary support at a fraction of the cost of launching a Raptor.

The reduction of flying time on the Raptor combined with the lower operating cost of the T-38s will save the wing considerable money, officials said.

“The reduction in the Air Force’s inventory of fourth-generation fighters (F-15s) placed an increased emphasis on finding a suitable, yet cost-effective platform to keep F-22 Raptor pilots current with combat readiness training,” Colonel Wyler explained. “This T-38 Talon program is a very economical solution to a difficult problem.”

In addition, the T-38s serve as proficiency trainers for F-22 pilots as the aircraft is difficult to detect when airborne.

“This will sharpen the talons of the Raptor pilots,” Colonel Molloy said. “The T-38 is small, nimble and difficult to find in the air. Combine that with a low radar cross-section and low electromagnetic emissions, and this plane will punish a Raptor pilot’s mistakes if they make them.”

These processes will take time to build and perfect, but the arrival of the T-38 is the first step in bringing the project to fruition.

“This is the culmination of a long road,” Colonel Wyler said. “It took a lot of work by a whole lot of people to bring these planes here. Finally getting an airplane on the ramp at Langley is a big event.”

Source: Defensetalk.com

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Police spokeswoman Monika Peters said, “The A-10 Thunderbolt II went down near the village of Laufeld, between the former West German capital of Bonn and Trier.”

The pilot has been hospitalized and is in “good condition,” according to a military statement.

The A-10 jet crashed in a field just about 330 yards (300 meters) from Laufeld’s residential area, Peters said. The town’s mayor, Karl-Josef Junk, told the German news agency DAPD that a catastrophe was “narrowly avoided.”

The debris of a crashed US military plane lies in a field near Laufeld, western Germany Friday, April 1, 2011.

The twin-engine A-10 is used to provide close air support for ground forces by attacking tanks and other targets.

Firefighters quickly extinguished the blaze following the crash, Peters said.

The aircraft, also known as the “Warthog”, was part of the 81st Fighter Squadron at the Spangdahlem Air Base, in Rhineland Palatinate, said Senior Airman Nathanael Callon, a spokesman for the 52nd Fighter Wing at Spangdahlem.

The 52nd Fighter Wing said in a statement the A-10 was “was on a routine local training mission” when it crashed Friday afternoon.

The pilot’s identity is withheld pending the notification of his family members. A board of officers will investigate the accident, the statement said.

Spangdahlem Air Base, founded in May 1948, is one of 16 major operating locations for the U.S. Air Force in Europe, and about 5,500 military personnel are currently assigned to the base, according to its website.

Source: seattlepi.com

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Airmen from Altus Air Force Base, Okla., offload a firefighting crash truck March 11, 2011, at Fort Sill. (Photo/James Brabenec)

Members in Fort Sill are transforming the fort into an airfield busy with frequent evening arrivals and departures as C-17 Globemaster III aircrews from Altus Air Force Base, Okla., are training here.

Altus AFB pilots are honing their skills in assault landing zone procedures that require them to land in a 500-foot area on the runway and stop in less than 3,500 feet.

Maj. Michele Lobianco, the 97th Operations Support Squadron assistant director of operations, said the runway at Altus AFB is undergoing construction and will be unavailable for training.

“We are very appreciative of Fort Sill’s leaders working with our leaders to allow us to come over and continue training,” she said. ”It’s very realistic, because when we’re out doing real-world support, whether in Iraq, Afghanistan or other areas throughout the world, the Army is our user; we go out to support them. To fly in and out of an Army field is very realistic to what we’re doing these days.”

Moving the training here required some adjustments; the first of which arrived March 11 when a C-17 delivered an airport crash truck.

Clint Langford, the Fort Sill assistant fire chief, said the 3,000-gallon crash truck triples the water-carrying capacity of the post’s largest firetruck. This truck, manned by three Airmen from Altus AFB and an additional crash truck from the fire department here, will provide fire support services in the event of an in-flight emergency.

Langford is also working to get some training time on the C-17s practicing egress procedures, shutting the aircraft down and removing the pilots.

As for the pilots flying into Fort Sill, Lobianco said they range from seasoned instructor pilots to those student pilots in training for instructor or commander pilot positions with at least 800 to 1,000 hours flight time. Pilots will bring the big cargo jets to a stop in 2,000 to 3,000 feet. On average, this is about one-quarter the braking distance required for a C-5 Galaxy.

“Anything we practice or train with on the C-17, such as going into an austere field or landing on short runways, is perfect training for responding to natural disasters,” she said. “If a city had only half a runway available and couldn’t get other cargo aircraft in, the tactics we are practicing at Fort Sill would allow C-17s to land and deliver pallets of water, relief aid or other high-need items.”

Source: AF.mil

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Despite the airplane crash, 45 years old Burick did not file a flight plan, he was fortunate in a few ways. First, he was uninjured by the crash and was prepared to survive several days in the Alaska wilderness in March, where the nighttime temperature still dips well below freezing.

Searchers also located him swiftly. After about 10 hours of searching, the 11th Rescue Coordination Center received a call over the radio at 12:55 p.m. Wednesday from the 211th Rescue Squadron notifying it that the 210th Rescue Squadron HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopter had found Burick. Pararescuemen were on the ground talking to him.

Burick, who had worked in Southeast before moving to Anchorage, is an avid outdoorsman. Two years ago, he finished the rugged, 24-mile Crow Pass Crossing in 5 hours, 31 minutes.

On Wednesday afternoon, He was flown to Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson.

Alaska State Troopers information officer Megan Peters said Burick was well- prepared and noted that rescuers never know how long a search will take.

“They can last five minutes, or they can last days,” Peters said.

Forest Service spokesman Ray Massey said Burick’s co-workers did not become concerned until Tuesday, because he often works independently outside the Anchorage office.

The search was initiated about 1 p.m. Tuesday by the 11th Rescue Coordination Center. At first, the Anchorage Civil Air Patrol sent two search aircraft. Later, the 211th and 212th Rescue Squadrons of the Alaska Air National Guard joined in.

“He took off out of Lake Hood, but he didn’t file a flight plan, so we don’t know his destination,” Tech. Sgt. Kenneth Bellamy, the 11th RCC rescue controller, said in a news release.

Discussions with family members and friends gave the RCC a sense of where Burick might have gone. The FAA provided a radar track that matched the description of the overdue aircraft, Bellamy said. That corresponded roughly to the time the missing pilot was thought to have taken off.

“It tracks when the craft took off and follows it from A to B, tracking in the tower,” said Maj. Guy Hayes, chief of public affairs for the Alaska National Guard. “They just weren’t sure it was him.”

“It’s ready to go fly right now,” said Capt Mark Feuerstein at a press conference at Boeing Field immediately following the aircraft’s landing. Feuerstein is Boeing’s 747 chief project pilot and captained the 747-8I for its first flight. He was accompanied on the flight by Capt Paul Stemer, another B747 project pilot, as first officer.

Watch a video of the Boeing 747-8I pulls in after its first landing:

He said the crew flew several “simple approaches to stalls”, performed functional checks of the aircraft’s systems and tested its directional stability during the flight. The maximum airspeed the 747-8I reached during the flight was 250 knots and the minimum was as low as 105 knots, as the crew performed approaches to stalls. Boeing has already sold 33 of the planes.

One major highlight is its new wing design. Created using what Boeing calls “the latest in computational fluid dynamics validated in the world’s most sophisticated wind tunnels,” the all-new wings are said to offer better aerodynamics and improved fuel capacity, while also allowing the plane to be as fast as, or faster than, any other passenger aircraft in the world.The new wing design sports “fly-by-wire spoilers and ailerons that make it possible to incorporate a flight control feature known as a maneuver load-alleviation system,” Boeing said.

While most of the plane is made from new aluminum alloys, it also incorporates graphite composites in the rudder, spoilers, flaps, and other areas.As designed, the 747-8 Intercontinental will carry 467 passengers in a three-class configuration and has a range of 8,000 nautical miles. The freighter version of the 747-8 can fly up to 4,390 nautical miles. The Intercontinental has a wing span of 224 feet, 7 inches, and is 250 feet, 2 inches long. Its tail towers to 63 feet, 6 inches high. And its four GEnx-2B67 engines produce 66,500 pounds of thrust. The passenger plane’s top cruising speed is Mach 0.86, while the freighter can fly at Mach 0.845.

Sources: Airlinesanddestinations.com
cbsnews.com

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