Aero Blog

Archive for the ‘Aviation’ Category

As early man watched birds in flight, he probably dreamed of taking to the air himself. The notion of harnessing hot air to achieve buoyancy may have been the first realization by aviation pioneers that flight could actually work.  Hot air balloons have a lengthy history extending back to China, where they were used as hot air lanterns for military communication. The first untethered hot air balloon ride is recorded as having taken place in 1783 in Paris, France.  King Louis XIV decided that the best people to pilot the trial balloons would be condemned criminals. However, two men persuaded the King to let them go instead.  They were Marquis Francois d’Arlandes and scientist Jean-Francois de Rozier. The first casualty of aviation occurred in a hot air balloon that crashed in June 1785, when de Rozier and a companion died while trying to cross the English Channel. The hot air balloons of today are a spectacular site to see. They come in many shapes other than just the typical balloon. Hot air balloon competitions are called races, but the main focus is on accuracy rather than speed. Enthusiasts love to display and race their balloons at annual balloon festivals. These hot air balloon events are extremely popular with people all over the world. Of course, we attribute the very first controlled and sustained heavier-than-air powered flight to the Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur. However, it is important to remember that people had been attracted to the notion of flight centuries before the two brothers finally made their dreams a reality. We have some brave pioneers to thank for the tremendous strides that have been made in aviation. Through often dangerous experimentation, they led the way to the accomplishments we see today. Over the last century there have been continuous advancements in aviation. We give thanks to the early aviation pioneers who, with their thought and vision, brought us such advancements as hot air balloons, airplanes, and spacecraft.  We eagerly await the future progress of aviation.

You know you have to work harder than ever to find customers and reassure them that your aviation company is healthy and that investments in aviation are good business. But your marketing budget is not what it was a year ago, and you may have reduced, eliminated or put off hiring marketing and information technology staff.  How do you find new customers and emerge from the current economic storm healthier than ever?

1) Embrace The Controversy!

2) Use Low-Cost, High Credibility Social Media

3) Use Expert Consultants

Embracing the Controversy

Chief executives from General Motors Corp, Ford Motor Co, and Chrysler LLC traveled from Detroit to Washington D.C. in order to appear before a U.S. House Financial Services Committee to plead for $25 billion in federal assistance.

Lawmakers (and the press) blasted the auto execs for flying in separate private jets to Washington.

“Couldn’t you have downgraded to first class or something, or jet-pooled or something to get here?” asked Rep. Gary Ackerman, a Democrat from New York.

The press and the public may have equated corporate jet service with excess and waste, but Cessna and Hawker Beechcraft are using the publicity to highlight the business case for their products.

Cessna launched a campaign to take on the controversy directly.  From the Cessna Rise website (www.cessnarise.com)

Shame on those who suggest that business aviation is little more than a corporate frivolity. Focusing on facts over hyperbole, it’s glaringly apparent why you fly. Study after study shows companies operating business aircraft outperform competitors that don’t. It’s simply about availing yourself of the tools to do your job.

Hawker Beechcraft is cutting costs in other areas, but is also taking the critics head-on.   The ad for the new Beechcraft King Air 350 is headlined –  ’Sensible enough to impress any Congressional Committee.’

Engaging the controversy is apparently working for them.  At least it’s getting more publicity than they could have paid for.  Radio personality Rush Limbaugh featured the ad on his popular (and controversial) show. Charles Mayer, Hawker Beechcraft’s V.P. of Marketing, says people are surprisingly receptive to the ad.

The National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) and the General Aviation Manufacturer’s Association have also teamed up to create the No Plane No Gain campaign, which includes studies, videos, advertisements and advocacy tools for aviation companies.

Use Low-Cost, High Credibility Social Media

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Social media is the modern, high-tech version of word-of-mouth.

Social media campaigns can include blog entries, articles and press releases.  These types of content are often seen as more credible than the content that’s always on your company’s “traditional” web site for two reasons – first, these blog entries, articles and press releases are current, which is absolutely vital in today’s constantly changing information climate, and 2) the writer is usually identified, and associated with other known entities.

Search engines like Google, Yahoo, and MSN send more traffic to sites that rank higher based on the criteria they use.  Those criteria generally websites higher when they include a lot of content, use keywords that are relevant to current events and the industry they’re involved in, and have lots of links from other sites.   These links can come from other websites, (like references from your suppliers, customers and other industry partners) from articles published on other websites, from blog entries, from profiles of employees posted on social networking sites like LinkedIn or Facebook, or from social bookmarking sites like Delicious or Reddit.

You can inform more people about your product or service, establish your expertise in your field, and bring more traffic to your website by intelligently using social media like articles and blogs.

Many companies establish a corporate blog as a new version of the corporate newsletter.  They write an editorial calendar, just like they do for a newsletter, to broadcast industry news, announce new products, explain concepts, and communicate successes.   Customers can subscribe to the blog or visit as is convenient for them. Having high-quality, consistently current information is less expensive than producing and mailing a printed newsletter and has a greater potential reach and impact. (And articles can be linked to and from other sites, as we mentioned before.)  Once the blog is set up, it is fairly simple to post text, photos and even video.

Many companies have several representatives that post regularly to the company blog, or start their own blogs on related topics and interlink articles.  They can also link these to their profiles on LinkedIn or Facebook for additional visibility.

Use Freelance Specialists

In uncertain economic times, the last thing you may want to do is add to your existing staff. You may even be functioning with fewer people than before and need to get things done more efficiently.

Using freelance specialists is a cost effective way to get tasks accomplished quickly, by experts that you don’t need on your staff all the time.

You may hire a consultant to design, set up or tweak your web site or blog. You may want an expert to plan a marketing campaign that you can execute with your existing staff.   You may hire someone to write regular articles or content for your blog so that you know that your company will be continually represented  in a professional “voice.”  You may hire a consultant to set up a pay-per-click campaign that targets specific customers and provides instant metrics.   Or you may hire someone to perform search engine optimization (SEO) on your web site so that you get more traffic from the search engines.

It probably doesn’t make sense to have these specialists on your staff permanently, but it may make perfect sense to hire them for particular projects or have them on retainer for ongoing efforts.

Getting an expert will cost more per hour than having someone on your staff perform these tasks, but if you hire the consultant, it will be more cost-effective in the long run. A specialist will take less time to accomplish your objective, won’t divert your task from your critical daily operations, and will generally guarantee satisfaction with the results.

Rising to the Challenge

May You Live In Interesting Times – Kai Lung

An ancient Chinese curse is intended to sound like a blessing.  We certainly do live in interesting times, and probably would prefer that they be not quite so interesting, in quite the same way.  There is no doubt that the aviation industry faces challenges. The economic climate we live in has caused some banks and auto manufacturers to fail and others to go begging.

Aviation has the additional burden of having been painted as luxurious, excessive and unnecessary in popular press.  It will take every bit of innovation, creativity and good, cost effective practices that people responsible for marketing can muster.  But companies that are willing to embrace controversy and technology will find ways to weather the storms that keep the competition in the hangar. As Han Solo said to the crew of the Millennium Falcon when flying into a asteroid field –

“We should be safe – they’d be crazy to follow us here!”

Companies that embrace the challenge and make resourceful use of new technology and outside consultants will emerge even stronger than before.

Typically, the primary focus is the chartered flights sector of the business aviation industry wherein chartered and commercial flight services are offered to clients for a fee that is realistically higher in cost than traveling on standard airlines. The service is definitely more personal in that there are generally fewer passengers to deal with. Occasionally, the larger corporations have their own business jets as well as the aircraft’s pilots being on the company payroll as regular employees.

Generally, the use of company jets is only afforded to the “higher-ups” such as CEO’s and upper management personnel. The benefit is that a person has the ability to schedule a flight on their time frame rather than those mandated by the typical passenger airlines.

Normally, business aviation charter companies will offer a variety of amenities to their clients, both onboard and on the ground. These would include in-flight personal services such as a catered meal and beverages, the availability of conference capabilities, satellite telephone, and fax services. It is not unusual for these flight charters to be available on a 24/7/365 basis either so as to accommodate their clients with destinations globally and in different time zones.

While on the ground, the charter companies have their own airport lobbies where the business traveler can relax and prepare for the mission ahead of them. Beverages and snacks are usually provided, and the better companies also offer internet connectivity and satellite TV to their clients as well. Safe and reliable ground transportation between the client’s hotel and the airport is also offered, as well as on-site rental vehicles, buses, and shuttles for the client’s convenience.

A significant amount of business aviation charter services have working relationships with the major airlines which enables the companies to offer clients a variety of air transportation services. The use of chartered private aircraft in business aviation circles has become a major component of the corporate world where extensive business travel is concerned.

In addition, the benefits of chartered private aircraft for business travel is that it saves the client time by providing an easier, less tiresome way to travel. The absence of time consuming registration procedures and shortened security check procedures while traveling through control zones saves the client countless hours and lots of frustration in the process.

In years gone by, business aviation was synonymous with flying on a “business class” type of aircraft. Characteristically, this was associated with traveling on luxury airliners that were not cost-effective and usually inconvenient where scheduling was concerned. Today, business aviation has become a necessity for those clients who are both budget and time conscious. For these reasons, the use of chartered private aircraft is now a key component in the business aviation industry.

Recent History

During the 1920s and 1930s, there was a huge leap forward in the field of aviation. Noteworthy milestones included Charles Lindbergh’s transatlantic flight in 1927, and Charles Kingsford Smith’s transpacific flight the following year.

Without doubt, the most successful design of this period was the Douglas DC3, which became the first airliner to carry passengers profitably, and ushered in a new era in passenger airline service.

By the beginning of the Second World War, many towns and cities had built airports, and there were many eager and qualified pilots available. There were many new innovations in aviation, including the first jet aircraft and the first liquid-fueled rockets, which were the result of research generated during WW2.

There was a boom in aviation, in both the private and commercial sectors, after the war, in particular in North America. This was due, in no small part, to the thousands of pilots who became available from the military, and the plethora of inexpensive war-surplus transport and training aircraft which became available. Manufacturers such as Cessna, Piper, and Beechcraft rapidly expanded production in order to provide a ready supply of light aircraft for the new middle class market.

As the 1950s dawned, the development of civil jets had expanded at a pace, starting with the de Havilland Comet. The Boeing 707 was the first commercially successful passenger jet, since it was much more economical than its competitors of the period. By now, turboprop propulsion was coming into its own on smaller commuter planes, with the result that low-volume routes could now be served in a much wider range of weather conditions. 

In 1961, Yuri Gagarin was the first human to travel to space whilst, in 1969, Neil Armstrong was the first to set foot on the moon. Since the 1960s, composite airframes, which are engineered materials made from two or more constituent materials, and quieter more efficient engines had become available, and Concorde was the first supersonic passenger airliner.

However, the most important, and lasting innovations took place in the field of instrumentation and control. This was exemplified by the arrival of solid state electronics, GPS, or Global Positioning Satellite, satellite communications, and increasingly small and powerful computers and LED displays, which is a semiconductor diode that emits light when an electric current is applied in the forward direction of the device, have dramatically changed the cockpits of airliners and, increasingly, of smaller aircraft as well.

Pilots can navigate much more accurately and view terrain, obstructions, and other nearby aircraft on a map or through synthetic vision, which is a technology that provides pilots with a clear and precise method of understanding the environment in which they are flying, even at night or in low visibility.

In 2004, SpaceShipOne became the first privately funded aircraft to make a spaceflight which presented the spectre of an aviation market outside the earth’s atmosphere.  Aircraft powered by alternative fuels, such as ethanol, electricity, and even solar power, are becoming more common and may soon become a reality, at least for light aircraft.

Aviation – How To Succeed

Peter Radford writes Articles with Websites on a wide range of subjects. Aviation Articles cover History, Aircraft Types, Air Traffic Control.

His Website contains a total of 75 Aviation Articles, written by others and carefully selected



View his Website at: aviation-how-to-succeed.com

View his Blog at: aviation-how-to-succeed.blogspot.com

 

 

Working in the airport must be fascinating and glamorous as you meet people from around the world everyday; did you ever wish that you were the lucky one working in the aviation industry in these fancy places where you would meet people from around the world everyday. Well, many of us feel that aviation industry offers jobs only as pilots, first officers, flight attendants and specialized engineers but the truth lays in the fact that the aviation industry offers a much larger variety of jobs in aviation support services, which involves mainly ground personal.

How do you find your dream job in the aviation industry? It is very simple; just get in touch with a recruiter and let them guide you to what is available and suitable for your qualifications. The best recruiters have been in the recruiting market for decades during which time they have developed close ties with aviation corporations around the world that today entrust them with the difficult job of finding and providing the right personal for any particular position they require.

Aviation support services offer all types of opportunities such as; ticketing and customer care agents, cleaners, catering, luggage handling, airport safety, technical maintenance and repairs. Each of these fields have tens if not hundreds of types of jobs varieties for both qualified and non-qualified personal in UK, Europe and around the world. All aviation jobs have one thing in common and that is that they have become more adventurous and stressful but also more rewarding and exciting in the process.

In UK it has become very competitive to find the job of choice even in fields of high demand such as aviation and that is because of the sudden invasion from the Eastern European countries. International recruiters ensure a sure way to access the job you desire as soon as it is posted and thus, everyone has a fair chance to obtain the same. Many times we miss an opportunity because you are minutes late but online you don’t have to take that chance as, companies will be able to browse through curriculum vitae posted and thus, decided who is the best qualified for the job.

Top notch aviation recruiters often provide a newsletter with the latest news in the industry and also the latest jobs postings that match your qualifications and requirements, which can be sent directly to the email address you provide when you register. Empower yourself with recruiting professionals that work for you and find the job of your dreams sooner then you think.

AEROAGE En route on the mach 4.7 supersonic jet, I flipped open my iTV , which connected me to the most advanced space network, spacecast. The usual news was being broadcast; “NASCOM, the space people have started mining a new mineral on the moon which is almost identical to Uranium; the Americans have come out with yet another version of the unmanned X-67 which maneuvers itself at mach 25 (courtesy nuclear fusion engines!); the international space station at Mars has discovered a revolutionary microorganism that can be used to fight multiple cancer, a predominant disease on Earth”. Yes, this is the age I’m living in, and when I look back in time at the history of aviation, it leaves me flabbergasted. The history of AVIATION commenced in the 20th century, and a few lucky people who were witness to the first tentative flight of the Wright Brothers, managed to live through these 150 years (through medical advancement of course!) to witness the hypersonic X-67s as well. As Robert Wall once rightly said (towards the end of the 20th century), “So rapid has been the development of aeronautical science that no one can say with safety that an end has been reached or that there is any limit to the ability of man to develop flight at the same pace in the next century.”1 Today, in 2057, man has traveled a long way in the field of civil and space aviation. Advancements that were merely probable 5 decades ago are possible and practical today. All these developments are a consequence of decades of stupendous achievements in space exploration. Half a century ago, landing human astronauts on Mars was within the bounds of possibility. However, today, successful implementation of hypersonic space travel and use of geodesic domes have not only enabled man to experience the surface of Mars, but have also helped him estabilish cyborg colonies there. In addition to the Moon, even Mars is available now, for scientific exploration! The international space station on Mars, in addition to helping scientists in their research work, has facilitated in mitigating the power crisis, which at present is history! After the establishment of The International Lunar Base Station in 2037, man has passed several milestones in setting up a long term colony on the moon. Today, the hotels on the moon go full with increasing number of world, or rather space, citizens going on lunar holidays! A fleet of spaceships taking space tourists high above the atmosphere is now a routine affair. These spaceships are improved versions of Spaceshiptwo, which took Santosh George of India along with other space tourists to as high as 55000 feet, enabling them to experience the excitement of weightlessness and the thunderous deceleration of aerodynamic drag on reentry, in 20072. In addition, disputes between industries, over the acquisition of lunar land for mining have become fairly common. At the start of the 21st century, the failure of NASA’s Mars lander caused despondency over the failure of its apparently reliable technology and put a question mark over other similar systems3. However, perennial human effort and incessant advancement in hypersonic space travel have led to the innovation of extraordinarily efficient probes which are now meeting the challenge of unearthing secrets about the solar system’s remotest planets. For example: a recent probe that has been sent to Pluto weighs only 570 pounds and stands almost 10 feet tall and 27 feet wide. It is composed of 19 solar panels, an extremely light nano-fission engine, and is controlled by an onboard computer. The probe functions by harnessing the light energy of the Sun. At present the fission engines are taking it close to the Sun. Once it is sufficiently close, the fission engines would shut down and light energy from the Sun would push the probe towards Pluto with a tremendous amount of force. The probe would then constantly accelerate and reach hypersonic speeds enabling scientists to have a glimpse of the details of Pluto within their lifetimes! The innovation of the controlled nuclear fusion engine, after the ion and fission engines, in 2031, was by far the most significant advancement in space travel. It enabled spacecraft to reach astonishing speeds. Many decades ago, scientists deciphered that scarce and expensive raw materials exist in abundance on asteroids in our solar system. Today, aeronautical geeks have succeeded in designing manned aircraft, run by fusion engines that travel at supersonic speeds to these asteroids. They are slowed down, when close to the asteroid’s surface and then are made to land by making use of the asteroid’s relatively low gravity. During this rendezvous, with a suitable asteroid, the spacecraft uses abundant solar energy to extract and refine metals like gold and platinum and then the fusion engines power them back to Earth.4 In order to aid space travel and further exploit the hypersonic travel technology, a set of 5 astronomical telescopes, linked by laser, 100 times more powerful than the antiquated Hubble Space Telescope of the 20th century, was deployed in space in 20255 with the aid of space stations and hypersonic jets. Through these telescopes, we have been able to probe deeper into the universe and directly study details of planets in the Milky Way, without having to study the wobbling of stars. This was just a glimpse of the hypersonic space travel in my age! Now, let’s delve into the advancement of supersonic and hypersonic travel in civil aviation. Civil aviation is governed by practicality and affordability. And when supersonic travel is looked at with these factors in mind, its picture seems somewhat blurred. Although, supersonic and hypersonic travel is easily available for civil aviation, its use is restricted only to the elite class. Four decades ago, hypersonic travel could take you anywhere on the planet in 4 hours6. Today, it can take you in just 2 hours! If the world population is transported from one corner of the globe to the other, then, oh my! The gas guzzling machines and sonic booms, created close to the earth’s surface, would simply attract the ire of environmentalists! Although this is the era of supersonic air travel, there also exists an alternative economic means of transport. No economy can ignore such basic realities. Even today we need economically viable means for mass transportation. So, where speed is not essential, the principles of freight transportation have been applied to mass travel. Non-inflammable gases are used to lift huge airships propelled by turbines7. This technology has made air travel extremely cheap, resulting in a five fold increase in air traffic compared to that of 2007. Although technology is reaching new heights every day, socialism continues to be a speed breaker! In addition to supersonic and hypersonic aircraft being used in civil aviation, air taxis with tilt rotors have also come into daily use. Not needing a runway, these taxis can easily maneuver around the city. They help me land right in the center of a supermarket! In addition to the tilt rotors, which give them the vertical lift, they also make use of the ground effect that reduces the drag experienced by aircrafts8. This, thus, reduces the fuel consumption of the taxis. Bad news for environmentalists; they have one less topic to debate upon! As far as the armed forces go, there is no stopping them! Billions were and are being spent to develop aircraft that are capable of traveling at such hypersonic speeds that they escape even the most efficient of all radars owned by their enemies. With the introduction of hypersonic travel, came the highly sensitive infrared radars that were capable of detecting the infrared radiation produced by the engines of these aircraft9. Technology has constantly moved towards super automation. Way back in 2003, Arlen Rens’, a Lockheed Martin test pilot, describing automation in aviation, said humorously: “Airplanes are now built to carry a pilot and a dog in the cockpit. The pilot’s job is to feed the dog, and the dog’s job is to bite the pilot if he touches anything!”10 Now, the question arises; how did we reach this pinnacle? How did we overcome all the inevitable challenges? The main challenges were: a) Financial: the sums invested to develop this technology dwarfed those involved in making possible the Apollo missions to the Moon! b) Biological: traversing long distances in space meant spending years in space in zero gravity conditions. The human body cannot adapt to stresses greater than 9g and react to situations as fast as machines. The human mind is incapable of making 1 million inferences per second unlike machines! c) Technological: reaching high levels of automation required integrating man and machine, and the functioning of diverse systems in perfect synchronization over longer distances and timescales with a minimum of maintenance.11 d) Environmental and Ecological: sonic booms produced by supersonic and hypersonic aircrafts were a great threat to mankind, and wildlife12. Even if man could somehow artificially adapt his hearing sensibilities to sonic booms, he could possibly not dissuade animal activists from protesting against hypersonic travel. Apart from this, supersonic airlines of that age utilized gas guzzling engines, dependant upon dwindling petroleum supplies. It has truly been a daunting task for man to find an answer to everything through technology. It is spellbinding to know how he prevented technology from reaching a standstill, without betting on speed at the cost of mankind. It was observed rightly by Thomas Friedman, in 2006, that “the world is getting flat”. Outsourcing and around sourcing were the key to mutual cooperation, advancement, and ameliorating financial crises13 that would have otherwise brought about a pause in aviation technology. The cornerstones of cooperation, laid in the beginning of the 21st century, led to countries coming together to develop hypersonic and supersonic air travel. This has led us all to live in a more cooperative, rather than a competitive world. It was international cooperation that brought about the success of all the space projects since then and led to the establishment of international space stations. The limiting reagent, in moving further down into space at hypersonic speeds, is the homo sapien! Although such speeds make one experience the tumbling alchemy of Earth and sky, the audacity, and miracle of flight, flying at stresses above 9g, in the Earth’s atmosphere, causes human blood to drain down from the brain, thus, extinguishing vision or even consciousness. In the old gravity suit, pilots would strain against their glottis. This would shut breathing. In the new suits, the pilots are able to flex their body muscles with less force, thus, reducing fatigue. This has been made possible by using “fluid muscles”, as they are called, which are independent of hoses and pressurized air on board, and reacts immediately to high g’s. Besides this, suits have designed in such a way, that pilots can communicate with each other even while traveling at such hypersonic speeds14. As far as space travel is concerned, man’s shortcomings, both mental and physical, have been overcome by integrating him with machines. As Alwin Toffler predicted about 8 decades ago, the astronaut has become “an integral part of an ongoing micro-ecological process whirling through the vastnesses of space”15. What Theodore Gordon once said has come true. We have found that it would indeed be simpler “to provide life support in the form of machines that plug into the astronaut”. In accordance with his vision, an astronaut is “fed intravenously using a liquid food compactly stored in remote pressurized tank”. And “direct processing of body liquid wastes and conversion to water (is) accomplished by a new type of artificial kidney built in as part of the spaceship”16. Five decades ago, Professor Kevin Warwick, was able to connect his nervous system to his wife’s nervous system through a computer. Looking at that development, it is not hard to believe that today the human brain is directly connected to the computer, controlling his spacecraft. Thus, his mind is able to run as fast as a computer and in turn the computer gets a brain to think. Thus, what can be seen is that, the astronaut is no longer a separate entity monitoring the aircraft; he is in fact a part of the whole process. If one divides human existence into three phases, then I would say that the first phase extends from the birth of humans till the year 1920. The second phase covers the time from 1921 to 2000 and we are at present in the third phase. This can be clearly explained by seeing the advancements that took place during these three phases. During the third phase mankind has moved so fast that from Earthlings we have started becoming Marslings! The technology that made all this probability a possibility would make a 20th century dweller dumbstruck! What humans did was that they teraformed Mars and tailored it to their requirements. The first thing that was required was to heat up the exceedingly cold atmosphere. The toxic pollution on Earth served as a medicine for Mars. Pollution creating machines were dropped on Mars whose work was to suck up a mixture of dust and atmosphere and process them into greenhouse chemicals. These chemicals trapped the heat radiated by the Sun and heated the surface and atmosphere of Mars. Once Mars was warm enough, plants and trees were grown in geodesic domes, which in turn increased the oxygen content of the atmosphere, making human existence possible17. This led to the establishment of an Earth colony on Mars which in turn gave birth to the Mars space station. The future now, is thus, to further the use of this technology and make the whole of Mars a human colony. The technology developed for scramjets to attain hypersonic speeds, brought out a solution to the fossil fuel crises. Decades ago, rocket engines used hydrogen as well as liquid oxygen. The weight marred their performance and efficiency. A scramjet carries only hydrogen and uses oxygen from the atmosphere instead. Thus, it turns out to be lighter and more efficient18. Moreover, it also proves to be environment friendly. Mark Lewis of the University of Maryland had once said, “Flying an air-breathing rocket system above Mach5; that’s sort of the gleam in everyone’s eye”19. And yes, today we are all witness to the result of that vision. Scramjets have made hypersonic travel in the civil sector possible and to an extent, environment friendly as well. They fly at hypersonic speeds only high above the Earth and thus avoid the ill-effects of a sonic boom, protecting animals as well as mankind. In addition to the scramjets, the ion, nuclear fission, and nuclear fusion engines are also an answer to the dwindling fossil fuel resources, since they efficiently use materials that are available in abundance on the Earth, Moon, and Mars. Besides this, scientists, with the aid of nanotechnology, are trying to devise methods to manipulate abundantly available elements at the atomic level and give them fossil fuel properties. The problem of inventing a lightweight material that can endure the prolonged high temperatures of the flight engines, plus the heat of the air friction against the wings20, was taken care of by nanotechnology. By manipulating materials at the nanoscale, scientists were able to develop in 2020 a nano-aerogel from carbon which has excellent thermal properties. This material is used to insulate hypersonic aircrafts, which in turn are made up of sheets of carbon nanotubes and nanofibres that are 60 times tougher than steel and much lighter than graphite. For all the above advancements to take place a perennial desire to achieve something better was required. In the words of a Pelican program manager, Blaine Rawdon: “From our perspective, anything that’s already flying is history.”21 From the very beginning of space exploration, most people have always thought it to be an extravagant luxury, affordable only by the superpowers, and only justifiable by them at times when questions of global prestige, between the competing systems of capitalism and communalism, were involved22. However, it has been practically shown that on an average, every dollar spent on the space program and/or aviation industry, results in 7 dollars paid back to the economy23. A list of spin-offs from space technology can be as varied as it is long. The most significant of all spin offs was the result of the need for smaller and more powerful computers, which provided an incentive for the development of microchips. Development of rescue blankets, CCD chip technology, virtual reality systems, advanced keyboards, etc. are all a consequence of space technology. If these things seem vague to some people, they would be astonished to know how space technology has extended its wings to everyday articles like wheelchairs, school buses, batteries, television screens, home security systems, medicines, etc24. Besides this, the modern designs of hypersonic aircraft are the result of research carried out for spacecraft designs over the years. Thus, in some way or the other, we all owe our modern comforts to space technology. Our forefather’s of the 1960s knew that they were witnessing some of space exploration’s “game changing events”25! With our present and near future focussed on Mars, our children may experience the same extraordinary odysseys. Today, we are on Mars and the Moon; tomorrow we might be on one of Jupiter’s moons or even farther. The speed of sound has long been surpassed, and now man’s mission is to approach the speed of light! This may seem like an impossible dream but we must remember that powered flight were seemed impossible when the Wright Brothers set out with their bamboo and canvas contraption to the sand dunes of Kitty Hawk almost one and a half century ago! Read more at http://www.nanojini.com Notes 1 Robert Wall, A History of Airliners (Burlington Books: London 1980, rpt 1989) p 238. 2 Hindustan Times, New Delhi, March 15, 2007, p 1. “the Richard-Branson owned Virgin Galactic company that hopes to begin a new era in tourism in less than two years. Apart from George, two US-based Indian Americans have also signed up for the two-hour flight, Louela Faria-Jones of Virgin Galactic told Hindustan Times from London. SpaceShipOne, a prototype of the space vehicle, flew to space three times in 2004, she said. George will fly on board the SpaceShipTwo, which has large windows, reclining seats, cabins the size of a Falcon 900 executive jet and wings approximately the size of a Boeing 757. It will carry six passengers and two pilots, Faria Jones said. 3 David Owen, Into Outer Space (Burlington Books: London 2000) p 135 4 Ibid, p138 5 Space: Episodes 3 and 4, VCD, B.B.C., 2001 6 Michael Klesius, “Wings of Change”, National Geographic (National Geographic Society: Washington DC, December 2003), p 32 7 Wall, A History of Airliners, p 251 8 Klesius, “Wings of Change”, National Geographic December 2003, p 25, 29 9 My own assessment 10 Klesius, “Wings of Change”, National Geographic December 2003, p 13 11 Owen, Into Outer Space, p 137 12 Wall, A History of Airliners, p 238 13 Thomas L. Friedman, The World is Flat (Penguin Books: London, 2005) 14 Klesius, “Wings of Change”, National Geographic December 2003, p 20,21 15 Alvin Toffler, Future Shock (Pan Books: London, 1971) p 196 16 Ibid, p 196 17 Space: Episodes 5 and 6, VCD, B.B.C., 2001 18 Klesius, “Wings of Change”, National Geographic December 2003, p 32 19 Ibid, p 32 20 Ibid, p 32 21 Ibid, p 29 22 Owen, Into Outer Space, p 128 23 Ibid, p 128 24 Ibid, p 129 25 Jeffrey Kluger, “Nasa’s Plan for a Lunar Comeback Gets a Big Boost”, Time (Time Asia: Hong Kong, March 19, 2007), p 36. http://www.nanojini.com

 

If you are looking for any information about aviation, commercial or fighter aircrafts, and other information on pilots and crew, Internet is the best source. You will get all the information on aviation at a single place.

Aviation is one of the major industry not only in India but worldwide. A number of new aircrafts are being manufacturers by the global manufacturers. Aviation in India has come a long way and still our military is heavily dependant on the fighter and military aircrafts produced by other countries.

Further we don’t bother to learn and know more about the aircrafts even commercial aircrafts and therefore we should increase our interest in all the terms related to aviation industry. The technical aspects and advantages of commercial and military aircrafts are different. Military and fighter aircrafts are indeed the requirement of every country today and the military of every country would like to induct latest fighter aircraft equipped with all modern techniques.

If you have interest in aviation industry or would like to know more about the fighter aircraft, you need to understand some of the technical terms so that you can easily understand the difference between various commercial or fighter aircrafts. There are over a dozen of aircraft manufacturers worldwide. Some of these have a very good reputation in the aviation industry.

The next thing is to understand the aircraft from a pilot’s viewpoint. You should understand the techniques used by manufacturer especially the design parameters and computerization of the cockpit. Safety is one of the important parameter and manufacturers of commercial or military aircrafts spend billions of dollars for improving safety in all these aircrafts.

So, if you are looking for some information on aviation industry, you will get information from anything to everything at the Internet. Even the top people from military and civil aviation will find the information much more relevant and they can even use the information for deciding the next fighter aircraft for Indian Army.

History

Aviation refers to the activities involving aircraft, including the people, various support, operational and manufacturing organisations, and regulatory bodies associated with them.

Many individuals and societies have built devices with the aim of being able to travel through the air. Such manifestations range from the earliest projectiles, such as stones and spears, to more sophisticated, buoyant or aerodynamic structures, such as the mechanical pigeon of Archytas in Ancient Greece, the boomerang in Australia, the hot air Kongming lantern, and kites.

There are ancient tales of human flight, such as the fanciful story of Icarus, to the more credible claims of short-distance human flights, such as a kite flight by Yuan Haungtou in China, and the parachute flight and controlled glider flight of Armen Firman.

The true age of aviation began in 1783. Up to then, attempts had involved machines linked to the ground by ropes. However, this represented the first untethered manned flight, in a hot air balloon, designed by the Montgolfier brothers.

Since balloons had the limitation of being only able to travel downwind, then it was quickly realised that a steerable, or dirigible, balloon was required. The challenge was taken up by Jean Pierre Blanchard who, in 1784, flew the first human-powered steerable balloon. Then, in 1785, he went one step further by crossing the English Channel in one.

These machines were subsequently developed further, with such innovations as machine-powered propulsion, in 1852, the addition of rigid frames in 1896, and improved speed and maneuverability by 1901.

Whilst there are many conflicting claims with regards the earliest powered flight, the consensus is the 1903 flight by the Wright brothers. However, this aircraft was impractical to fly for more than a short distance due to severe control problems.

The introduction of ailerons made aircraft much easier to handle, and only a decade later, World War 1 powered aircraft had become practical solutions for reconnaissance, artillery spotting, and even attacks against ground positions.

Soon, as they developed into larger and more reliable machines, aircraft had begun to transport people and cargo. In contrast to small non-rigid blimps, which are airships without an internal supporting framework or keel, giant rigid airships became the first aircraft to transport passengers and cargo over great distances.

The best known aircraft of this type were manufactured by the German Zeppelin company. Probably the best known and most successful Zeppelin airship was the Graf Zeppelin which flew over a million miles, including an around-the-world flight in 1929. However, as airplane design advanced, the dominant position of the Zeppelins over the aircraft of the period, even though they had a range of only a few hundred miles, was steadily being eroded.

The “Golden Age” of the airships finally ended, on June 6, 1937, when the Hindenburg caught fire, killing 36 people, whilst it was in the process of landing. Even today, there is no clear evidence to suggest the cause of the conflagration

Although periodic attempts have been made to revive their use, the efforts have mostly been in vain, and limited to niche applications. Could the fate of the Hindenburg be a contributing factor?

Aviation – How To Succeed

Peter Radford writes Articles with Websites on a wide range of subjects. Aviation Articles cover History, Aircraft Types, Air Traffic Control.

His Website contains a total of 75 Aviation Articles, written by others and carefully selected

View his Website at: aviation-how-to-succeed.com

View his Blog at: aviation-how-to-succeed.blogspot.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Despite a recent report in one of the nation’s top news papers detailing the surprising string of accident free years in commercial aviation, aviation lawyers have been kept busy by any number of legal and liability issues. It has been found in a recent study that commercial fights in the United States have gone two consecutive years without a related accidental death. This is the first time that in the history of United States aviation that this feat has occurred. However, the average aviation lawyer still must battle over certain safety and liability issues that have kept the need for such specialized lawyers in demand. These lawyers, while obviously not having to concern themselves with personal injury claims due to accidents in the previous years of relative safety, have still had their hands full with defining regulatory bodies and creating new and protective laws for consumers, bystanders, and workers.
While assigning liability in an accident and insuring that a claimant receives due process of law and proper compensation where deemed necessary is the primary task of an aviation lawyer, it is not the only task. These specialized lawyers must deal with a complicated set of government institutions at the state and local level, and may even have to deal with international regulatory bodies for large, commercial flights. These agencies, committees, and other regulatory bodies are largely created from case files brought through and prosecuted by lawyers. Just like criminal law, aviation law has been created by these vast networks of case files and court decisions. These regulatory bodies have sprung from these decisions. Creating these laws, therefore, dominates much of these attorneys’ time and energy even when there are few commercial accidents to prosecute.
Aviation attorneys are also employed to institute safety standards. Many of these attorneys are involved in, or used to be involved in, commercial or private aviation. Many are current or former pilots and enjoy private joy flights. They are, given their concurrent knowledge of law, uniquely qualified to institute and maintain safety standards. By providing this service, they are insuring that when you buy your ticket for your next flight, you can be guaranteed of certain standards. These include safe airplane design, fully functioning safety systems (such as lighted pathways, available exits, flotation devices, etc.), regular maintenance schedules, and age limits on old aircrafts. Without these basic guarantees commercial flying could be a dangerous practice. Once these safety guidelines are established, attorneys can then use these standards to prosecute those at fault during an accident and more easily assign liability to those at fault.
Even while the United States has had two consecutive years without a death associated with the commercial airline industry, the average aviation lawyer is still busy and in demand. Despite the fact that there have been no accidents to prosecute, these specialized lawyers still must maintain strict industry safety standards, thus insuring that the unprecedented string of safe and successful flights continue, and develop and fine tune the developing field of aviation litigation and law. Therefore, these particular lawyers are still heavily in demand.

There have been different types of sunglass styles getting popular each and every year, but the only category of sunglasses that are popular right from the start of sunglasses production until now, for more then 70 years is the Aviator type. What actually makes this kind of sunglasses get ticked? If you see how it has become popular, or for that matter how most of the sunglasses style get popular, it is definitely through the trend of fashion set by the Hollywood actors or the heroes. The Aviator sunglasses became popular with the TOP GUN Tom Cruise.

But since then it has been in the market popular as ever, and is to remain so for more time to come. The aviator sunglasses were initially made for the use of air force personnel of the US, to protect them from UV rays. Ray-Ban Sunglasses made them this and it came up with public sale of Aviator sunglasses the next year and every one lapped it up.

The Aviator sunglasses has now become a classic style and still popular and fashionable in its own way. The main reason for their persistence is its uniqueness in design that is not met with any other style in the sunglasses range. The aviator sunglasses are the best from the original manufacturers Ray-Ban but there are also designs of aviators floating the market, made from other brands based on the original aviator type.

If you want o be classic in fashion and still be amazing in looks, it’s the aviator sunglasses you are looking for. Reasonably priced and comfortable to be worn, coming with additional advantages of protection, polarized vision, or mirrored style of look, they just make you just great to be looked at!