Usglobaljetsacc Discussion Threads

[waldron] 01/5/2007 14:26

Bombardier sees 9,950 corporate jet deliveries from 2007-2016 worth 227 bln usd


LONDON (Thomson Financial) - Bombardier Inc said it expects demand for 9,950
corporate jets in the 10 years from now until 2016, worth 227 bln usd in total.
The Canadian business and regional jet maker added that its 20-year
commercial aircraft market forecast calls for 11,200 new deliveries in the
market for 20- to 149-seater jets, worth 393 bln usd.


[e-mail]
paw/lam

[ariane] 24/3/2007 07:45

Rocketman takes to the skies

A Swiss pilot has turned himself into a 'rocketman' by strapping a pair of wings and two jet engines to his back.



Yves Rossy, 45, a former airforce fighter pilot, gave his carbon wings their first test flight in Spain.

He said: "It is absolutely fantastic. Total freedom in three dimensions, so much speed and power, it was better than being a bird.



"I have to jump from a moving plane as I can't really take off from an airfield like a real plane, I couldn't run that fast", he said laughing, and added: "I don't have an undercarriage either."

To land he has to cut the engines and coast to the ground, using a conventional parachute at the last minute.

Mr Rossy spent five years developing his three metre carbon fibre wings for his flying man project, then added two kerosene-powered jet engines to his original wing design.

Handles are fixed onto the wings so that Yves can electronically manipulate the wingtips, giving him the freedom to decide when he wanted to either glide or dive.

He said: "After I jumped my wings opened like a bird taking wing, I then glided down to 2500m, and ignited the kerosene engines.

"There was a short period, 30 seconds, while I waited for them to stabilize and then I began to open the throttle.

"I soon realised I was no longer losing height, and achieved horizontal flight for more than four minutes at 100 knots (115mph)."

[ariane] 22/2/2007 20:16

Private Jets Become Flying Palaces
Mystery Head of State Orders $300 Million Custom Jet
By BOB JAMIESON
Feb. 22, 2007 - - Private jet bragging rights among the ultra rich have just taken a quantum leap to a lavish flying palace that is being created inside the biggest passenger plane ever built.

The plane is the Airbus super jumbo A-380, the double-decker that can carry up to 800 passengers if it is configured with only the cheap seats. There will be just 82 passengers in the private version.

Airbus will not identify the individual who ordered the $300 million plane. That price, incidentally, is only the starting point.

Edése Doret, a jet interior expert who is designing the A-380 for the customer will say only that he is a "Head of state." The New York-based Doret, who has customized jets since 1988, says his work will add another $150 million to the total cost.

The price tag includes the cost of modifying the fuselage for an "Air Force One Stairway" which allows passengers and crew to enter the plane directly from the ground through the cargo bay. That stairway leads to a lower spiral staircase which takes passengers to the entry lounge. Another, wide sweeping staircase leads passengers to the grand lounge on the upper deck.

Doret says the buyer's family and friends will occupy the upper deck, which by itself is 147 feet, five inches long, longer than the length of the Wright Brothers' first flight. In addition to the grand lounge it will have a 600-square-foot master suite and other bedrooms, a Jacuzzi, a family dining room, a game room and offices. All of it says Doret "Will be in a desert-like environment."

That environment says Doret will be created by curtains that resemble Arab tents and a mosaic built with fiber optics that will look like shifting desert sands.

The lower deck has an additional dining room and work space as well as seats for the crew and staff.

This is Doret's biggest job which will take about a year and a half, but he is working on a number of projects that are for the super rich. "There are a lot of billionaires out there," he says. And above and beyond the cost of buying and customizing the A-380, its owner will face operating costs of about $25,000 an hour, including the crew of 16.

Airbus executives say this extravagance makes sense for the very rich. They live in their own world and can use the plane as a traveling office or to entertain even on the ground.

The cost of $450 million is ten times as much as the cost of a Gulfstream G550, which seats about 14 passengers and can fly 5,800 miles, once considered the height of private jet luxury. But the industry trend is to bigger and bigger long haul aircraft. One reason may be the income produced by sharply higher oil prices in recent years for residents of the Middle East and Russia.

Marc Yahr, an executive at L and L International in Miami, a big private jet business, says "a lot of the people buying are the known knowns but also the unknown knowns." By that he means the very wealthy most people know about the very wealthy most people have never heard of and who don't make a public display of their riches.

Yahr has seen the market move upward from planes like the Gulfstream to the Boeing Business Jet, a modified 737 which costs a mere $75 million, fully loaded with all the optional extras.

Yahr says the hot plane now is Boeing's new 787 Dreamliner designed to carry 210 to 330 passengers in commercial use will have 35 to 40 seats as a private jet.

"There's tons of money out there," says Yahr, "especially in Europe." Those people, says Yahr "Have come out of the woodwork since 9/11, creating surge in the private jet market. It's huge." The main reason there are now 10,000 private jets in the United States, he says, is that "people don't want to deal with waiting."

Lufthansa Technik, a wing of the German airline, has long experience converting commercial planes for private use and recently unveiled some interior designs for the 787, the first deliveries of which are not expected until next year. One image showed a movie theatre, in additional to a luxurious master bedroom with a queen sized bed, all designed by Lufthansa.

List price for a 787 is $150 million, plus the cost of designing and building the interior. And Lufthansa is expanding a jumbo jet hangar in Hamburg to cope with the expected business.

Some of that new business may come from the redesigned 747 called the 747-8 which will have a list price of more than $180 million with an empty interior and the exterior unpainted. There are now about 40 of the original 747s operating as private planes. How are they used? L and L International's Yahr says casinos in Macao, for example, use them to bring high rollers from the United States. Super wealthy also want their own world where they feel protected. And of course high flying businessmen can write off part of the cost by using them to do deals in far flung places.

The smaller 757, 767 and 777 are favored by the dealmakers. Google co-fonders Larry Page and Sergey Brin bought a used 767 last year. There's always room to grow.

While the jumbos and super jumbos may separate the men from the boys, there are problems. They can only use airports big enough to handle them. That rules out some of the favorite playgrounds for the rich like Aspen, Colorado and several airports in the south of France and in Europe.

But you can always buy a smaller jet to take you from the bigger jet to your final destination.

[maywillow] 02/1/2007 11:01

Cheers pc

Looking good Lewis

Have a great 2007

[pc4900074200] 02/1/2007 10:26

The Scotsman. 02-01-2007.



Why the skies might soon be filled with Very Light Jets.
HAMISH RUTHERFORD. ([e-mail])



The Eclipse 500, above, is yours for as little as $1.5 million. Orders have been placed for more than 3,000

CORPORATE excess may not be what it used to be, but the skies above the world's major financial districts may soon be buzzing with a new breed of private jets, albeit on a smaller scale than in the 1980s, when a Learjet was a must-have.

Two companies, Cessna and Eclipse, have already been granted full flight and sales certification from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for their offerings in a sector tipped to be the latest revolution in aviation: the Very Light Jet.

And the pair, which have battled to be the first company with a VLJ on the market, are not alone. At least eight companies are attempting to catch a piece of the "entry level jet" action, building planes with room for as few as three passengers, weighing less than 4.5 tonnes, taking off from runways less than a kilometre long, flying without refuelling for 2,000 miles and operating more efficiently than the larger business models made by companies such as Learjet, a subsidiary of Bombardier.

The race has also attracted Japanese car company Honda, which is aiming to have the five-seater HondaJet ready for delivery by 2010. The company's first ever aircraft, and powered by its own engines, it is the culmination of 20 years' research.

While some of the players entering the aviation market are testing new materials and technology that could be used for military applications, the motoring giant clearly has its eye on the corporate market.

Michimasa Fujino, chief executive of Honda Aircraft and leader of the HondaJet development team, says the company is predicting sales split roughly 50-50 between self-owning pilots and corporate charter, though demand for fractional ownership had been higher than expected.

A symbol of the opulence of the 1980s, the use of private jets in the corporate world, especially through shared ownership or "airtaxi" schemes, is on the increase, even before the more affordable VLJ class begins to enter the market in force.

NetJets Europe, the largest operator of private jets in Europe, recently reported that the number of flights it operated had risen to almost 60,000 in the first 11 months of 2006, 30 per cent more than in the whole of 2005. The company charges £85,000 for 25 hours in a seven-seat jet, at as little as 24 hours' notice. It has indicated it will add 16 planes to its current fleet of 114 as popularity increases.

The new VLJ breed is also predicted to grow quickly, with the FAA estimating that 5,000 will be in use in just a decade. Engine maker Rolls Royce predicts the number could be as high as 7,500, with up to 10 per cent delivered to customers in the fast-growing economies of China, India and Russia.

While city bonuses and spiralling packages paid to top executives mean the amount of cash in the market for such planes is increasing, the simple business case is also strengthening.

VLJs have smaller engines and lower overall weight than older, larger planes, reducing the operational costs, and the start-up costs have been cut dramatically. A ten-seat Learjet is likely to cost a business user at least $10 million (£5.2m) to buy, while the Eclipse 500, which can be delivered this year, costs as little as $1.5m. Cessna, the icon of small planes, is already delivering the Citation Mustang for $2.62m. Take into account time conventionally spent in departure lounges because of lengthy security checks - time away from the Blackberry must these days be counted as an expense - and the economic appeal is clear.

Indeed, early buyers of the new VLJs have made great play of the economic grounds of their purchases. David Murdock, owner of US-based Dole Food Company, bought three Eclipse 500 planes to fly executives between mainland US, Hawaii and Latin America. He says: "The decision to purchase these jets was made based on safety, performance and economics."

The luxury is not always at the same level as the traditional corporate jet. The Eclipse 500, expected to be the cheapest of its class, does not even have a private toilet (passengers can, however, take a plastic container), in common with several other VLJs awaiting aviation authority clearance. Eclipse, headed by former Microsoft executive Vern Raburn - Bill Gates is one of the company's backers - has said that as most of the flights will be less than 90 minutes long, the lack of facilities for passengers to relieve themselves will not be a factor, although others in the industry are not convinced.

Only a handful of the Cessna jets are now in the hands of customers, but orders have been placed for at least 3,000 of the VLJs. So while the environmental lobby may be fighting to reduce the impact aviation is having on the atmosphere, the number of jet-powered aircraft in our skies is likely to grow quickly over the next decade.

pc

Happy New Year.

[pc4900074200] 22/12/2006 09:52

Added to Fav. for future posts.

:-]

pc

[ariane] 22/12/2006 09:47

see also ead thread


cheers pc

[pc4900074200] 22/12/2006 09:05

The Scotsman. 22-12-2006.



Airbus order boost.

QANTAS, the Australian airline, has ordered eight more A380 superjumbo planes from Airbus, taking its total order for the delay-hit aircraft to 20.

But despite a recent jump in sales by Airbus, as it placates disappointed A380 launch customers with contract extensions at attractive terms, rival Boeing is likely to end 2006 with more new plane orders than the European group for the first time since 2000.

Estimates show Boeing had clocked up 875 new orders by 21 December against Airbus's 694.

This article:

pc

[ariane] 22/11/2006 11:36

Airbus sees global plane market worth 2.6 trln usd over next 20 yrs

- Airbus said it expects the global civil aviation market to total 22,700
planes valued at 2.6 trln usd between now and 2025.
The forecast is 5,400 planes more than its previous 20-year predictions.
The planemaker also sees passenger revenue kilometres growing by an average
of 4.8 pct per year over the period.
Of the 22,700 planes, 1,660 will be very large aircraft, including 1,260 for
passengers, it said in a global forecasts presentation to journalists.




[e-mail]
afp/jms

[ariane] 06/11/2006 06:39

Last Updated: Monday, 6 November 2006, 04:30 GMT



The birth of a quieter, greener plane
By Tim Bowler
Business reporter, BBC World Service


More and more of us fly every year. As we do so, the political pressure to act to curb greenhouse gas emissions from planes is rising.


One day, all airliners could look like this


Now a team of researchers in Britain and the US has come up with a revolutionary new aircraft design that could make a dramatic contribution to curbing climate change.

The SAX-40, which has been developed by the Cambridge-MIT Institute, is a radically different shape of aircraft.

Officially, it is what is known as a "blended wing". It has a tailless wedge-shaped body with two bat-wings.

The Silent Aircraft Initiative (SAI) team has succeeded in coming up with a radically quieter plane. Crucially, the SAX-40 is also 35% more fuel-efficient than any airliner currently flying.

The case for radical change is getting stronger

Prof Ann Dowling, SAI's UK team leader

Oil prices may no longer be the $78 a barrel they were a few months ago, but with high fuel costs likely to continue, fuel efficiency is a major factor in all airlines' calculations.

Yet none of this means the SAX-40 will necessarily be built. Ever since the Boeing 707 first flew in 1957 and ushered in the commercial jet age, airliners have changed very little in their basic appearance.

Airliners still consist of a tube-like fuselage, with two swept-back wings and engines slung underneath.

Innovation costs

There are good economic reasons why design has remained so conservative.

By making the fuselage a tube, aircraft-makers can easily build a family of larger or smaller variants, utilising many of the same parts.

And by sticking engines under the wings, it's easier to maintain them, or upgrade them halfway through an aircraft's 30-year lifespan.

Naturally, aircraft manufacturers have made considerable improvements in the past 50 years, for instance using composite materials and lighter, more efficient engines.


The SAX-40 will be far less noisy than current jets

Yet future improvements to the basic design are getting harder to make, according to Professor Ann Dowling, professor of mechanical engineering at Cambridge University and SAI team leader in the UK.

"The case for radical change is getting stronger," she says.

"It's only through such a change that one can achieve step-changes in fuel burn."

But for aircraft manufacturers like Boeing or Airbus, any design changes need to produce a quick return on their investment.

Boeing is working on developing fuel cells to power aircraft air-conditioning and electrical systems. Currently, these are run off a plane's engines, reducing their efficiency.

Bill Glover, Boeing's director of environmental performance, commercial airplanes, says using fuel cells would give significant savings.

"With fuel cells we can take conventional fuel, convert it into hydrogen and produce electricity very efficiently," he says. "The only other emission is water."

But even this is still 10 to 15 years in the future.

Radical shift?

There is a good reason for the aircraft manufacturers' caution. Building totally new planes is both costly and risky.

After Boeing launched its Boeing 747 jumbo jet in 1968, it ran into serious financial difficulties when the demand for its new plane stalled.

To survive, the company slashed its workforce from 100,000 to 38,000.

Today, Airbus is also having financial problems with its giant double-decker A380.


The Airbus A380 has run into difficulties in recent months

For manufacturers, it is much safer to develop new airframes out of what has gone before, rather than re-tool completely with a brand-new production line.

Yet with increasing concern over climate change, we could see a radical shift in aircraft design.

This would be more likely if airlines had to pay "green" taxes on their airliners' emissions of greenhouse gases.

But the skies are not going to fill with radically new aircraft shapes any time soon.

When an airline buys a new plane, it will keep it flying for decades in order to make it pay its keep.

Which means even if this design gets the thumbs-up from the manufacturers, we won't be queuing up to board planes like the SAX-40 before 2030 at the earliest.

[grupo guitarlumber] 30/7/2006 06:07

The Sunday Times July 30, 2006


Honda leads race for 'air taxis' of the future
The market for small jets is fairly crowded but the Japanese are flying ahead, writes Dominic Rushe


IS it a bird? No it's a plane, but a very small one. Some time soon, if a dozen or so companies get their way, the skies will be dotted with tiny jets, bringing private air travel to the rich - not just the super rich.
In recent years the very light jet (VLJ) market has attracted growing interest from established aircraft manufacturers and entrepreneurs.



None of the planes is off the runway yet, but, according to the US Federal Aviation Administration, about 4,500 microjets will be flying by 2016.

Last week the market got a serious boost when Honda decided to join the party.

The Japanese giant has long had ambitions in the jet market, an area that the company believes is far larger than many have predicted.

So large in fact that Honda chief executive Takeo Fukui has talked of building the "Honda Civic of the sky". The first stage will be a six-seater, twin-engined Hondajet that looks set to be priced, though, beyond the pockets of most Civic owners.

The jet will be manufactured in America and should be in the skies within four years, according to Jeffrey Smith, Honda's vice-president for corporate affairs.

When it arrives, the Hondajet will have to queue on the runway with VLJs from Cessna, Eclipse, Gulfstream and a host of others.

John Walsh, president of the consulting firm Walsh Aviation, reckons there are close to a dozen companies with plans for VLJs.

"Eclipse have a VLJ at the low end of the market priced at about $1.3m (£700,000). They believe they can sell thousands of them. Cessna has the Mustang priced at about $2m and they predict they will sell 200 a year or so - which I think is more believable," he said.

The Hondajet has yet to be priced, but industry estimates put it close to $4m. Walsh, however, expects Honda will look at developing a range of aircraft.

Manufacturers believe the jets will appeal to business travellers who now take corporate jets, and to "air taxi" firms that hope to ferry passengers between American airports for the price of a first-class ticket.

One company, Dayjet, is already believed to have ordered 300 Eclipse VLJs.

Walsh is sceptical that the market is as big as the manufacturers believe.

"There is a bit of monkey-see-monkey-do about this," he said. "There are at least 10 companies rushing into a space that might fit three or four of them at best."

Already some VLJ projects have gone to the wall, including the Avocet and Safire aircraft.

Honda has long had ambitions in aerospace and already has an engine manufacturing joint venture in place with General Electric, GE Honda Aero Engines.

Honda has proved doubters wrong in the past. Founder Soichiro Honda started the company in 1948 as a motorcycle manufacturer. It went on to all but destroy the then dominant British motorcycle companies before becoming a big player in the car industry. But both those markets were well established before Honda entered them.

Smith said Honda had thoroughly researched the market and that reaction to the Hondajet had been very enthusiastic.

He added that people had tried to put down deposits in the hope of jumping an expected queue when a prototype of the plane was shown at the Oshkosh air show in Wisconsin last week.

Honda's dream seems to be coming true.

"Hopefully it'll turn out to be more than wish fulfilment," said Walsh.

[grupo guitarlumber] 18/7/2006 06:18

QUINCY, Massachusetts, July 18 /PRNewswire/ --

- Jet International's European Program Combines Guaranteed Fees with
Market-Driven, Online Auction for Additional Savings



Jets International ( a leader in superior private
jet services, today announced the launch of its International Titanium
Membership Program, offering guaranteed hourly rates for clients traveling
between countries within Europe.


Offering a wide range of preferred features, the Titanium program, which
has been so successful in America, was a driving force in Jet International's
inclusion as #66 on the 2005 Inc. 500 List. Titanium members are not only
guaranteed maximum flexibility, premier concierge services, the highest
safety standards, consistent quality, and set hourly pricing for private jet
services, but they also have access to the company's exclusive, online
auction for the possibility of additional savings. If, through the auction, a
lower per hour price can be obtained, that is the price that the Titanium
member will pay.


Countries that qualify for Jets International's intra-European rates
include: Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France,
Germany, Gibraltar, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway,
Poland, Portugal, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and
the United Kingdom.


"Now we are able to offer our European clients the benefits of our very
popular Titanium membership program," said Nathan McKelvey, CEO of Jets
International. "Not only will they have the jet and operator of their choice
at a fixed, per-hour cost, but they also will be given the opportunity for
additional savings through our online, market-driven auction. These factors
plus the highest levels of safety and concierge service, combined with
transparency, consistency, and market-driven savings, provides the best of
all worlds in private jet services for our European members."



Titanium membership features include:
- Guaranteed Jet Availability -- Jets International guarantees
availability with 24 hours advance notice.
- No Repositioning Costs -- Members pay only for the time they are in the
plane. This guarantee stands no matter where the plane has to come from
to begin a flight, or where it has to go after the flight.
- One-Way Pricing -- Titanium members have guaranteed pricing for any
one-way itinerary, according to the type of plane that is used and only
pay for the hours they are in the plane.
- Larger Plane & Simultaneous Plane Usage -- If a member needs a larger
plane than he/she ordinarily flies, or if he needs two planes at the
same time, Jets International can meet that demand. Each plane will be
priced separately, but at the same guaranteed rates.
- Aircraft and Flight Crew Qualifications -- Every aircraft utilized by
Jets International flies under FAA Part 135 U.S. regulations (the most
stringent regulations) and has been reviewed by ARG/US, an independent
aircraft safety auditing agency. This process ensures the safest
standards in the industry. Standards that are tougher than those
required by fractional companies.
- Insurance Coverage -- Jets International provides US$25 million of
total insurance coverage
- 24/7 Concierge -- Jets International provides 24/7 Customer Support.
This includes flight scheduling, weather updates, catering, customized
"group" accessories, ground transportation and flight tracking.


Titanium memberships begin at GBP 184,310 / EUR 127,539, which are
deposited into a personal escrow account. The following are Jets
International's intra-European rates for Titanium members:



Jet Type One Way/Hour Round Trip/Hour
Light Jet GBP 3,433.80 / EUR 4,958.28 GBP 2,561.72 / EUR 3,699.04
Medium Jet GBP 4,523.89 / EUR 6,532.34 GBP 3,243.03 / EUR 4,682.82
Heavy Jet GBP 7,249.13 / EUR 10,467.4 GBP 5,886.51 / EUR 8,499.92


Aircraft availability is guaranteed with 24 hours advance notice.
Inclusion of trip request in online auction requires three days notice. For
additional information on Titanium membership please contact Jets
International's Paris- based Membership Sppecialist, Peter Bradfield, a
(Europe) [phone], or (UK) 0790-463-9808, or via email at
[e-mail].



About Jets International

Placing in the top 15% of the 2005 Inc. 500, named as one of ten
finalists in the Small Business Excellence in Customer Experience Award
sponsored by Dell Computer and the National Federation of Independent
Business (NFIB) and honored as a Rising Star Company for North America by
Deloitte Technology, Jets International's mission is to deliver the safest,
most consistent and highest quality private air travel services at the most
competitive prices possible. The company provides world-class private jet
industry expertise, jet specific travel selections, third party safety
reports and the ability to view the internal and external features of one's
aircraft before the flight through a visual online database. Jets
International's exclusive technology and its development of the largest empty
leg database in the industry, enable aircraft operators to quote costs for
point to point trips, ability unheard of prior to Jets International's
Internet presence. Jets International is headquartered in Quincy,
Massachusetts and has additional offices in White Plains, New York and
Louisville, Kentucky. For more information, please visit the web site at
or call [phone].


Jets International.com, Inc. does not own or operate aircraft. Jets
International.com, Inc. is a contracted agent of a network of FAA Part 135
air taxi operators.



Editorial Contact:
Barbara Rudolph
Rudolph & Company
[phone]
[e-mail]


Web site:

[grupo guitarlumber] 14/6/2006 16:46

Art Basel Fair Draws Wealthy Collectors in More Than 100 Jets June 14 (Bloomberg) -- Art Basel opens today to the public after a series of private views yesterday, when buyers stampeded the stands of PaceWildenstein, Barbara Gladstone and Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, carrying off works by Pablo Picasso, Richard Prince and Georg Baselitz.

More than 100 jets were booked for the fair, said Mark Booth, chief executive officer of the European unit of NetJets Inc., the fleet operator owned by Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Some 55,000 visitors will spend more than $300 million through June 18, said Sam Keller, the fair's director.

``These days, the wealthy fly EasyJet or NetJets,'' Booth said in an interview in the NetJets lounge.

Art fairs are benefiting from newly rich buyers who are decorating their homes or making speculative investments. Basel's sales indicate buyers are so far shrugging off jitters about the outlook for interest rates and distractions such as the World Cup.

A World Cup viewing room in the collectors' lounge had only half a dozen people in it late yesterday.

New York's PaceWildenstein sold two Picassos out of four by yesterday afternoon and had one on reserve, the dealer Marc Glimcher said. The biggest Picasso, for $8.5 million, hadn't gone yet. A Willem de Kooning painting sold to one of two contenders.

Four collectors and one institution were lined up to buy a 1973 Donald Judd sculpture resembling orange-lined silver drawers going up the wall, Glimcher said.

``The buying is like in the late 1980s,'' before the art market last crashed, Glimcher said. ``People keep saying it's different this time, but it probably isn't.''

Looking for Masters

Miami collector Marvin Friedman said he'd been looking for 20th-century masters and may have found one he liked, which he wouldn't identify. Friedman's collection runs from Roy Lichtenstein to James Rosenquist. The stock market hadn't been bad enough to affect art buying, he said.

``Make no mistake, if there's a major correction, it will have an impact,'' he said.

Philip Hoffman, a Londoner who runs the Fine Art Fund, said he'd spotted an early Magritte he liked, and hadn't bought it.

``Prices seem to have moved up 40 percent in the past month,'' Hoffman said.

Demand has driven up contemporary art prices more than sevenfold since 1985, according to Art Market Research. The Contemporary Art 100 index of the top 10 percent most-expensive pieces stands at an all-time high, according to the index-maker.

By the afternoon, the Ropac gallery of Paris and Salzburg had sold 20 works, including a 264-centimeter-high painted bronze Baselitz sculpture, ``Donna via Venezia,'' at $1 million -- one of an edition of three -- a Tony Cragg wood sculpture, ``Lost in Thought,'' 250 centimeters high, and a Stephen Balkenhol wood carving of a woman seated with crossed legs.

`Old Collectors'

Twelve of the works were bought in the past 10 days by collectors who hadn't seen them until yesterday, dealer Thaddaeus Ropac said. ``It's not only the new money that's behaving like that,'' he said. ``It's my old collectors too. I said they had to come in and see the works.''

Geneva dealer Jan Krugier sold a 1957 Miguel Barcelo set of two panels, 498 centimeters long, and ``some'' of its eight Picassos, which go as high as $20 million, Krugier's associate Martin Summers said.

At New York's L&M Arts, owned by Robert Mnuchin, a former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. equity-trading chief, there were red dots by afternoon on a 1966 Tom Wesselman nude, priced at $160,000, a 2002 Takashi Murakami painting of a creature with garlands for eyes, and a David Hammons work.

Canceled Checks

Upstairs, where dealers offer newer art, New York's Barbara Gladstone sold four or five pieces in 30 minutes, including a large 2006 Richard Prince collage, ``I'm Not Sure,'' featuring canceled checks, Gladstone said.

Russians are the fastest growing group of collectors at Art Basel; the Chinese contingent is expanding too, Art Basel's Keller said.

Art Basel, the world's biggest modern and contemporary art fair, is part of a more than $1.5 billion spring sale cycle, from New York's May auctions to London's this month.

Some collectors are starting to resist the run-up in prices. In May, a Lichtenstein sunset and an Andy Warhol soup-can painting sold at auction below their top estimates.

While the top 10 percent of contemporary works may still be rising, the Contemporary Art 100 index of the top 25 percent peaked in September and had lost 6 percent from its high by the end of May, according to Art Market Research.

Market Crash

Contemporary art is volatile. As the effects of the 1987 stock-market crash reached the art world in 1990, the top 10 percent index dropped by half in the six years through 1996.

Zurich-based UBS AG, Europe's biggest bank by assets, is Art Basel's main backer.

Art Basel and its sister fair, Art Basel Miami Beach, are the two biggest contemporary fairs, said Gerard Goodrow, Art Cologne's director, who tracks rivals' sales. The Miami fair's sales probably exceed $100 million, he said. Based on 2005 figures, he ranks Cologne third, with more than $85 million in 2005, followed by London's Frieze Art Fair, with $57 million.

New York's Armory Show bounded ahead in 2006, with March sales of $62 million, up 37 percent from 2005's.



To contact the reporter on this story:
Linda Sandler in London at [e-mail].
Last Updated: June 14, 2006 05:51 EDT

[ariane] 23/3/2006 18:26

Hypersonic jet ready for launch
Jonathan Fildes
BBC News science and technology reporter



The launch will be the third for the Hyshot consortium
A new jet engine design able to fly seven times the speed of sound is scheduled to launch over Australia on Friday.

The scramjet engine, known as Hyshot III, has been designed by British defence firm Qinetiq.

If successful, it could pave the way for ultrafast, intercontinental air travel, and substantially cut the cost of putting small payloads into space.

The engine will launch on a rocket owned by the University of Queensland.

It is the first of three test flights planned for this year by the international Hyshot consortium.

The first Hyshot engine was launched in 2001 but the test flight failed when the rocket carrying the engine flew off course.

Simple engines

A supersonic combustion ramjet, or scramjet, is mechanically very simple. It has no moving parts and takes all of the oxygen it needs to burn hydrogen fuel from the air.

This makes it more efficient than conventional rocket engines as they do not need to carry their own oxygen supply, meaning that any vehicle could potentially carry a larger payload.

However scramjets do not begin to work until they reach five times the speed of sound.


You're dealing with extremes of conditions. You've got to expect things to go wrong

Dr Allan Paull, University of Queensland
At this speed the air passing through the engine is compressed and hot enough for ignition to occur. Rapid expansion of the exhaust gases creates the forward thrust.

To reach the critical speed, Hyshot III will be strapped to the front of a conventional rocket and blasted to an altitude of 330km before being allowed to plummet back to Earth.

On its descent the engine is expected to reach a top speed of Mach 7.6 or over 9,000km/ hour.

Making sure the flight happens correctly is incredibly difficult, according to Dr Allan Paull, project leader of the Hyshot programme at the University of Queensland.


See the scramjet experiment in detail
"You are dealing with extremes of conditions. You're working out on the edge and with a lot of the stuff no one has ever tried [it] before," he told the BBC News website. "You've got to expect things to go wrong".

If everything goes to plan, the experiment will begin at a height of 35km. As the engine continues its downward path the fuel in the scramjet is expected to automatically ignite.

The scientists will then have just six seconds to monitor its performance before the £1m engine eventually crashes into the ground.

New design

The scramjet will not provide forward thrust during the flight, necessary if the engine is ever to power a vehicle. But the test will be enough to show that burning starts automatically and to verify trials already done in a wind tunnel.


Nasa's X-43A holds the current speed record

"The wind tunnels operate for milliseconds," Dr Paull explained. "The difficulty is whether or not you can even see the supersonic combustion in this period of time."

Although the Qinetiq engine has never left the ground it is more realistic than previous Hyshot experiments.

It has a more efficient air intake on the front and can operate over a greater range of speeds. It also scoops air into the combustion chamber at a lower temperature, closer to that needed in a commercially useful engine.

If the test flight is successful, it will be followed four days later by the test flight of another Hyshot engine designed by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (Jaxa). This will be followed in June by the launch of an engine that will fly at Mach 10, designed by the Australian Defence Science and Technology Organisation (DSTO).

Commercial reality

The Hyshot tests will bring the idea of a commercial scramjet one step closer to reality.

In the first instance these would probably be used to launch satellites into low earth orbit but many have speculated that they could also allow passenger airlines to fly between London and Sydney in just 2 hours.

Although this vision maybe many years off, it was given a huge boost when Nasa successfully flew its X-43A plane over the Pacific Ocean in 2004. The unmanned aircraft flew at 10 times the speed of sound, a new world speed record.

The team at the University of Queensland is also currently designing a vehicle that can fly under its own power.

If the plane works, it could be flying over the Australian desert within the next two years.



SCRAMJET ENGINE TEST

1. Two-stage rocket lifts the scramjet engine to altitude of 330km
2. Rocket free-falls back to Earth, reaching speeds of Mach 8
3. Experiment takes place at Mach 7.6 between 35-23km from ground and lasts 6 seconds

[ariane] 23/8/2005 08:06

Pennant wins Hawk jet training systems contract from BAe Systems
LONDON (AFX) - Pennant International Group PLC said it has won a
"multi-million pound" contract from BAe Systems PLC to deliver a computer aided
learning system for the Hawk trainer jet for a major customer of the blue chip
aerospace company.
AIM-listed Pennant did not disclose the value of the deal. But it said the
contract will run over about three years and includes computer based training, a
virtual aircraft training system and three electronic classrooms.
Pennant chief executive Chris Snook said the deal, one of several recent
training contracts with BAe Systems, is seen by both companies "as a step
towards striking a long-term relationship".
[e-mail]
jm

[ariane] 02/7/2005 14:41

First hydrogen plane tested in US

The plane has 50ft (15m) wings (picture courtesy of AeroVironment)
A US company says it has successfully completed test flights of a potentially environment-friendly aircraft powered by liquid hydrogen.
Liquid hydrogen stored on board and oxygen extracted from the air are combined in fuel cells. The electricity generated drives the propellers.

California-based AeroVironment says a full tank of hydrogen would keep the unmanned plane in the air for 24 hours.

Planes using fuel cells might help curb greenhouse gas emissions from aviation.

Greenhouse effect

The aircraft, called Global Observer, is a so-called high altitude - long endurance (Hale) aircraft.

It can operate at 65,000ft (20,000m) and be used for defence missions, weather and environmental monitoring, aerial mapping, and as a low-cost telecommunications infrastructure.

The plane, which looks like a glider, was first flown on 26 May at US Army's test range in Arizona. A second test flight took place on 2 June.

The company says it is confident it can be deployed for US government applications within two years.

"We are now ready to quickly satisfy an urgent national security need for an affordable, persistent Hale system for communications relay and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions," said Tim Conver, AeroVironment's president.

BBC environment correspondent Richard Black says that even though fuel cells produce water vapour which will act as a greenhouse gas, the new planes might contribute less to global warming than conventional ones.

[ariane] 22/6/2005 08:57

FRANKFURT (AFX) - EADS NV is secretly making a prototype of an unmanned jet
fighter whose test flights could possibly take place this year, Financial Times
Deutschland said, citing industry sources.
It said EADS head of military aircraft activities, Johann Heitzmann, has
told employees through the in-house newspaper that work is progressing on a
"UCAV Demonstrator" or test model for unmanned fighter jets.
The newspaper said the project, code name Barracuda, is being financed by a
customer.
Citing sources, the newspaper said the German defence ministry could be the
first potential customer.
It said work on the UCAV Demonstrator has already reached an advanced stage.
The report added that the project is a competitor of the so-called Neuron
Project, which is currently headed by France's Dassault.
It said Neuron's first flight is planned for the middle of 2010 and that
Sweden, Greece, Spain, Switzerland and Italy are project participants.
According to the report, EADS co-chairman Thomas Enders told analysts in
Paris yesterday that EADS expects to achieve a 10-15 pct share in the 10 bln eur
sales expected for the overall Unmanned Aerial Vehicle market by 2014.
mog/har