December 2, 2019 - No. 094 In This Issue L&T Technology Services Wins Avionics Contract from Airbus Flight shaming, offsets and electric planes: How aviation is tackling climate change EASYJET COMMITS TO CARBON-NEUTRAL FLYING, ELECTRIC AIRCRAFT RESEARCH The Mobile Dead Zone on Airplanes GOL launches new aircraft MRO business unit in Brazil Bell Boeing gets $218 million Osprey support contract modification DJI Remote ID : A Wireless License Plate for Your Drone Harbour Air to test fly world's first commercial electric plane Inside Larry Page's Turbulent Kitty Hawk: Returned Deposits, Battery Fires And A Boeing Shakeup SpaceX Starship hardware mystery solved amid reports of Florida factory upheaval L&T Technology Services Wins Avionics Contract from Airbus BENGALURU, India--(BUSINESS WIRE)--L&T Technology Services (NSE: LTTS), a leading global pure-play engineering services company, announced that it has been selected by Airbus India to manage their Avionics S/W Development, V&V (Validation & Verification) and Data Analytics. The win has been a direct result of LTTS' years of expertise in the aviation space and the company's timely investment in cutting-edge technologies. LTTS' distinct advantage in the aerospace landscape includes ITAR (International Traffic in Arms) Compliance & CEMILAC (The Centre for Military Airworthiness & Certification) Certified State-of-art facilities, strong global customer base, robust lab & testing infrastructure and strategic alliances with Fortune 500 companies. Abhishek Sinha, Chief Operating Officer and Member of the Board at L&T Technology Services commented, "The new-age business opportunities in aviation sector call for a transformative approach including fresh ideas, elaborate evaluation of best-fit technology solution and capability to accelerate business growth through innovation. We are pleased that Airbus India has chosen LTTS to deliver on all these aspects. We look forward to co-developing innovations in the aviation space and ushering in newer benchmarks of industry excellence." About L&T Technology Services Ltd L&T Technology Services Limited (LTTS) is a listed subsidiary of Larsen & Toubro Limited focused on Engineering and R&D (ER&D) services. We offer consultancy, design, development and testing services across the product and process development life cycle. Our customer base includes 69 Fortune 500 companies and 51 of the world's top ER&D companies, across industrial products, medical devices, transportation, telecom & hi-tech, and the process industries. Headquartered in India, we have over 16,700 employees spread across 17 global design centers, 28 global sales offices and 49 innovation labs as of September 30, 2019. https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20191202005383/en/LT-Technology-Services-Wins- Avionics-Contract-Airbus Back to Top Flight shaming, offsets and electric planes: How aviation is tackling climate change Delegates from more than 200 countries will be travelling to Madrid this week to take part in COP25, the UN's annual climate conference. The perceived hypocrisy of so many people flying from all corners of the globe to try to tackle the climate crisis has led some to call for an air travel ban for participants. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), domestic and international aviation accounts for approximately two per cent of global CO2 emissions produced by people. It estimates international aviation alone is responsible for 1.3 per cent of global CO2 emissions. But air travel is only growing. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) predicts 7.8 billion passengers will be flying by 2036, a near doubling of the four billion who flew in 2017. According to Reuters, a Swedish-born anti-flying movement - perhaps inspired by teen climate activist Greta Thunberg - is creating a whole new vocabulary, from flygskam (which translates as "flight shame") to tågskryt ("train brag"). The agency reports the movement is spreading to other parts of Europe. What is the aviation industry doing? In 2009, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the industry's trade organization, set out to make the industry more fuel efficient and reduce CO2 emissions to half of 2005 levels by 2050. The plan was built around: The use of more fuel-efficient aircraft and sustainable low-carbon fuels. More efficient aircraft operations - such as reducing on-board weight. Technology and infrastructure improvements, including modernized air traffic management systems, to allow for more direct routes. In 2016, ICAO airlines (about 290 worldwide) also agreed to the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA). CORSIA aims to offset 2.6 billion tonnes of CO2 emissions by 2035, by providing more than $50 billion Cdn for climate projects. All participating countries will be required to begin offsetting any emission growth from 2019-20 levels starting in 2021. (As a signatory of CORSIA, Canada began monitoring and verifying emissions from international flights on Jan. 1, 2019.) Do offsets really work? As CBC News reported earlier this year, the general consensus is that carbon offset programs have improved. But there is still debate about whether they actually work. The anti argument says they do nothing to actually reduce carbon emissions. The pro argument says if they weren't tied to carbon offset projects, climate-friendly initiatives such as tree planting or wind and solar energy development would never happen. Kathryn Ervine, an associate professor at Saint Mary's University in Halifax who has researched carbon offsets, said they are simply a way for airlines and individual travellers to try to appease their guilt, and aren't beneficial. Her suggestion? "Go and find a worthwhile green initiative that you know is making an impact and make a financial contribution to it." Are individual airlines doing anything? Many airlines encourage travellers to buy carbon offsets, fly direct (which uses less fuel) and even to pack less (lighter planes use less fuel). KLM has gone a step further by encouraging potential customers to consider travelling by train instead. It points out some train travel between major European cities is faster than flying. British Airways recently announced plans to offset its domestic travel beginning next year, after becoming the first airline to commit to net carbon zero flying by 2050. But an investigation by BBC's Panorama revealed the airline was also using a cost-cutting measure called fuel tankering, in which planes load up with extra fuel to avoid refuelling costs at their destination Panorama reported that carrying that extra fuel meant the airline generated an extra 18,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide last year. BA said it would review the practice. Qantas followed BA's lead on lowering emissions with a pledge to also be a net zero emitter by 2050. Australia's national carrier has already experimented with flying a plane from Los Angeles to Melbourne using mustard seed biofuel. "So, we know the technology's possible," CEO Alan Joyce told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. He said the challenge is doing it commercially, at scale. "That's why it'll take some time to get there." Other airlines - including Air Canada - have committed to using more sustainable fuels. An aviation carbon tax But all of this isn't enough for some European countries. Transportation is the only European sector currently increasing its emissions, so nine EU countries (the Netherlands, Germany, France, Sweden, Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg, Denmark and Bulgaria) are calling for the creation of an aviation tax. In a letter to the EU chief executive of climate, the countries' finance ministers said an aviation tax where "the polluter pays a fairer price for the use of aviation transport" is necessary to combat climate change. "Compared to most other means of transportation, aviation is not sufficiently priced," the letter said. The European Commission has said it plans to respond by the end of December. A ban on business class? Jozsef Varadi, the head of Hungarian economy flyer Wizz Air, is calling for a ban on business class for flights under five hours. It's not an entirely new idea. The World Bank studied the environmental impact of flying first and business class versus economy in 2013, and found that the higher-paying passengers generated about three per cent more carbon emissions. Why? First and business class seats on airplanes are bigger, fewer passengers sit in those sections and so the aircraft's fuel is used to move fewer people Indeed, according to this online carbon calculator, a round trip flight in economy class from Toronto's Pearson International Airport to London Heathrow produces 4.9 tonnes of carbon emissions. The same trip in business class produces 9.5 tonnes. What's the future of flying? In a word: electric. Companies around the world are working on building all-electric aircraft. One of them is Vancouver- based Harbour Air. The company's founder and CEO is getting set to fly a DHC-2 de Havilland Beaver float plane that's been retrofitted with a 750-horsepower electric motor for the first time Dec. 11. It should be about a 10-minute flight but will add to the growing body of research about electric aviation. NASA is also playing a big part in that research. Its first all-electric aircraft - the X-57 Maxwell - arrived at the Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, Calif. in early October. NASA has been involved in the research, development and testing of electric aviation technology for decades. Its goal is not to build the first all-electric commercial airliner - or even a prototype - but to help the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) establish standards for electric flight. "Before electric aircraft start flying everywhere, [the] FAA needs to set certification standards for certain systems," said Matt Kamlet, senior public affairs specialist for aeronautics. "And our goal with X-57 is to help set those standards." That has involved years of designing and redesigning the model, as well as experimenting with different energy sources. "We needed electric motors which take the electric power and drive the propellers," said Sean Clarke, principal investigator for the X-57. "We needed motor inverters or controllers that take the DC power that batteries provide and turn it into a rotating power for the motor to use. And then we also needed batteries." So the team modified some commercial battery cells - the 18650 cell - and repackaged them with the requirements for aircraft. The whole system weighs about nearly 400 kilograms and provides about 45 minutes of travel Clarke said NASA will be ground testing its electric plane in the next six to eight months and doing its first crewed flight test by the end of next year. The aircraft will be far quieter than current aircraft and in flight, it would be completely carbon-free. If you think that 45 minutes of carbon-free flight isn't of much use, Clarke pointed out that the technology will almost certainly benefit large aircraft as well. "Hybrid aircraft - which could use a lot of the technologies from this vehicle and even batteries to some extent - could make a lot of sense at small scales up to ranges of two or three hundred miles [320 to 480 kilometres] pretty soon." So, should COP25 ban delegates from flying to Madrid? Natalie Jones, a research associate at the Centre for Existential Risk at the University of Cambridge, said no. Given the conference is in Spain, you'd have delegates from European countries who could take the train, maybe delegates from some North African countries who could sail across the Mediterranean and perhaps North American representation, if their delegates could afford a two-week trip by sea across the Atlantic. That would leave those most affected by climate change on the sidelines. "You're missing most of Asia, probably. You're missing most of Africa. You're missing most of the poorest countries, the small island states in the Pacific. How are they going to send people?" What about video conferencing? Jones said for many less-developed countries, the technology can be unreliable. Plus, so many key conversations at conferences like COP happen in hallways, in smaller rooms, even the lunch line. So being confined to one video line would be of little use. "Arguably you'll be locked out of kind of where the ... actual power is," she said. "And so if you're not there, then your interests are going to get absolutely trampled on." https://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/cop25-airline-travel-carbon-emissions-offsets-electric-planes- 1.5367158 Back to Top EASYJET COMMITS TO CARBON-NEUTRAL FLYING, ELECTRIC AIRCRAFT RESEARCH UK airline easyJet has committed to flying carbon neutral while working with Airbus on hybrid- electric aircraft designed to further improve its environmental footprint. The low-cost carrier in November claimed the mantle of being the first major airline to offset the carbon emissions of fuel used on all of its flights on behalf of customers. It began the net-zero carbon flights from November 19 through schemes accredited by third-party verification bodies Gold Standard and VCS. Offset projects include forestry, renewable and community-based projects. However, the airline acknowledged that offsets were an interim measure while new technologies were being developed. It noted the ultimate aim was to reduce the reliance on carbon offsetting through the use of emerging technologies. This has seen it sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Airbus on a joint research project aimed at understanding the operational and infrastructure opportunities and challenges of hybrid and electric aircraft. European carriers have become particularly focused on climate issues because of the emergence in their market of the "flight shaming" movement aimed at convincing people to cut flying. EasyJet says it has reduced carbon emissions per passenger kilometre by close to 37 percent since 2000 through initiatives such as newer aircraft, more efficient flying and maximizing passenger loads. Other initiatives have included the introduction of light-weight carpets, trolleys and seats, single- engine taxiing and removing paper manuals from aircraft. Hybrid and electric aircraft are seen as climate-friendly alternatives to jet fuel on short-haul aircraft but the technology is still being developed. The budget carrier has been working with Wright Electric since 2017 to produce an all-electric 'easyJet sized' plane which could be used for short-haul flights. It has also been working with Rolls Royce and Safran on new technologies to reduce carbon emissions as well as at the future use of sustainable aviation fuels and carbon capture. It says more immediate action could include the introduction of technologies such as e-taxiing and electric APUs as well as the greater use of renewable energy. "We acknowledge that offsetting is only an interim measure until other technologies become available to radically reduce the carbon emissions of flying, but we want to take action on carbon now,'' easyJet chief executive Johan Lundgren said. "People have a choice in how they travel and people are now thinking about the potential carbon impact of different types of transport. But many people still want to fly and if people choose to fly we want to be one of the best choices they can make. "EasyJet has a long tradition of efficient flying - the aircraft we fly and the way we fly them means that easyJet is already more efficient than many airlines. "However, our priority is to continue to work on reducing our carbon footprint in the short term, coupled with long-term work to support the development of new technology, including electric planes which aspire to radically reduce the carbon footprint of aviation." Lundgren warned aviation would have to reinvent itself as quickly as it could and this was why easyJet was working with partners on new technology. "We also need governments to support efforts to decarbonize aviation,'' he said. "In particular they must reform aviation taxes to incentivize efficient behavior, fund research and development in new technology and ensure that early movers such as easyJet are not penalized." https://www.airlineratings.com/news/easyjet-commits-carbon-neutral-flying-electric-aircraft- research/ Back to Top The Mobile Dead Zone on Airplanes You stow your bag, settle into your airline seat, and begin swiping away at your phone until takeoff. The signal is sluggish, and the bars of service blink between one and none. Twitter feeds don't load, email struggles to come through, and texts hang unsent. It's frustrating-there's still work to be done, or loved ones to be updated on your progress. But it's also confusing. The signal was fine just moments ago, in the terminal. Cellular reception is uniformly awful on airliners parked at gates. But why? The most obvious answers are vaguely conspiratorial: Maybe interference from the wiring or circuitry in the aircraft fuselage plays a part. Or perhaps a magic box in the cockpit somehow interrupts service to dissuade in-flight use. I wondered if a governing body like the Federal Aviation Administration might require airports to dampen cell signals, or if some carriers were affected more than others. I asked three commercial pilots (two from Delta, one from British Airways), and all of them agreed that cell reception is particularly bad at this odd juncture pre- and post-flight-for pilots as well as for passengers. "There are certain areas of ramps and jetways where our ACARS uplinks are sketchy for the same reason," one of them, Mark Werkema, told me. ACARS stands for "aircraft communications addressing and reporting system"; airplanes use it to communicate with one another and with control towers. It would seem like a safety concern if bad coverage affected important communications sent or received by the crew. Jon Brittingham, a technical pilot in the Airbus A319/320/321 program, explained the causes to me in greater detail. Older aircraft, such as the McDonnell Douglas MD-90, don't have the same electronic-systems shielding to protect cabin equipment from third-party signals that more modern airliners, such as the current Airbuses, have. In fact, this shielding is most dense around the front of the cabin-thus confirming my pilot friends' agreement about poor reception within the cockpit. (This same fact can also cause cell reception in first-class seats to be the worst in the plane, when parked by the gate.) Airports are giant swaths of empty space where large vehicles exit and enter the sky. That makes them poor candidates for cellular-antenna towers. Towers might grace the airport's edges, but the expanse of airfields, and the distance to the terminals, makes coverage a stretch. To compensate, airports use distributed antenna systems (DAS): small, targeted cellular-access points (some barely bigger than smoke detectors) that work particularly well in indoor, controlled spaces. A DAS provider explained the particular challenge of airports: "These spaces are often challenging topologies that have high ceilings, wide-open areas or are located in harsh environments that present a challenge to designing and deploying reliable wireless service." Harsh environments-what a nice euphemism for the sound and fury of terminals. It works, indoors at least. The Denver International Airport, for instance, has been lauded for its use of DAS networks to provide superior service to passengers in the terminal and throughout the concourses-even better than customers are used to at home in the suburbs. But once you're sitting on the plane, the signal problems begin. As Wiredreported several years ago, that may have to do with conflicting signals caused by the plethora of small cellular antennae inside the terminal and the cell towers beyond the air field. (There's also onboard Wi-Fi, further complicating things. That's another issue, but one more reason, as a Delta ad put it, we've come to "expect the internet" when flying.) Basically, on the plane your phone can't decide which antenna to connect to, and this confusion contributes to the slow service. It doesn't help that on any given plane, anywhere from 50 to 300 passengers might be clambering for a signal as soon as they are seated or as soon as the plane touches down. Pair this with certain aircraft models, such as the Boeing 787, whose structural materials may impede cell signals, and you get a perfect storm of poor service. A coverage rift erupts most noticeably between the terminal's interiors and the surrounding cellular landscape. On the airplane, you're neither inside the airport nor clearly outside it-you're in a bizarre netherworld, where cell signals are muddled. Bad service on parked planes becomes a useful parable for thinking about the overlapping promises of mobile technology and commercial flight. You want to think of yourself as standing at the center of the travel experience: it's your journey, your life, your social-media posts. But complex infrastructure and collective behaviors make the whole enterprise chug along. To provide maximum service to users, carriers oversupply the airport concourses, but at the expense of the tarmac areas that fall just out of reception zone for the terminal antennae, which are also just a bit too far from nearby cell towers. It's a compromise in service of a larger (if imperfect) arrangement. When cell signals go dark on the plane after boarding, it's a low-grade reminder of how air travel is woven into people's lives on the ground. Landing passengers need to communicate with family, friends, or drivers arriving for pickup; urgent work tasks may need attending to. An ongoing "searching" icon can be infuriating. It seems like these are two separate realms and they should connect more discretely, yet also seamlessly. But the truth is, flight is always messily entangled with infrastructure on the ground. That's an anxiety that pervades airports, places where connections of all kinds get made and broken. There's a reason the China Philharmonic Orchestra staged a flash performance at Beijing Capital International Airport in February: It was sure to be captured by phone and shared online, thanks to saturated DAS antennae. The recent Hong Kong airport protests were effective because they interrupted the traffic (and thus economic) flows around the huge site-but just as much because these interruptions were disseminated via smartphones. When Newark airport was suddenly and terrifyingly evacuated in September, the chaotic scene was uncanny not just for what it was (or wasn't), but for how it quickly dominated social-media feeds far beyond the New York region. Live shooters and terrorists preoccupy Americans' minds, and the airport was ready-made for an incident of this type. Everyone is on edge at the airport. Will I make my flight? Am I a bad parent for traveling to make a living? Can I afford this vacation? That makes it even more irritating when something seemingly simple, like mobile coverage, breaks down. But maybe the uncertainty causes most of the anxiety. Flyers are worried about what they cannot control. In the face of ignorance, any knowledge is a comfort: You're definitely going to miss your connection; or you saw your bag being loaded onto the plane. When the specter of bad coverage takes your pre- or post-flight calls and app updates out of commission, take it as another new certainty: There's nothing you can do but wait. It's not about you anymore, but an accident of infrastructure. Flyers might take this moment as a chance to feel humility rather than self-centered frustration. Look around, and appreciate the complexity of the system at work. Appreciate that it works as well as it does, most of the time. Instead of searching for a cell signal (or an email, or an Instagram update), look for a signal of a different kind. Everything's going to be okay-and, for now, there's nothing you can do about it anyway. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/12/why-cell-reception-so-bad-after- boarding-plane/602812/ Back to Top GOL launches new aircraft MRO business unit in Brazil Brazilian low-cost carrier GOL Linhas Aéreas Inteligentes has launched new aircraft maintenance, repairs, and aircraft overhauls (MRO) business unit in Brazil. Named as GOL Aerotech, the new business unit is located at Confins Airport in Minas Gerais, Brazil. The new facility is designed to conduct maintenance services on Boeing 737 Next Generation, 737 Classic, 737 MAX and Boeing 767 family aircraft. GOL Aerotech has received approval to perform MRO services from national and international regulators, including Brazil's National Agency Civil Aviation Administration (ANAC), the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA). GOL operations vice-president Celso Ferrer said: "Our maintenance centre is already recognised as the most advanced in Latin America, and with the launch of GOL Aerotech we create a new competitive advantage. "With more than 13 years of aircraft maintenance experience performed on GOL's own aircraft, we have refined key processes and advanced the necessary requirements to serve our customers with excellence." Covering an area of 145,000m², the new service centre has two hangars for maintenance and a hangar for painting. It also has six workshops that are equipped to perform repair and overhaul of wheels, brakes and steel structures, as well as the inspection of engines and other components. With the assistance of more than 760 employees, which includes engineers and technicians, the facility is capable of serving an annual average of 80 aircraft. Additionally, GOL Aerotech will provide over 600,000 hours of maintenance availability. Having an investment exceeding R$130m ($30.6m), GOL is expecting revenues of R$140m ($33m) from the new facility by 2020. https://www.aerospace-technology.com/news/gol-launches-new-aircraft-mro-business-unit-in- brazil/ Back to Top Bell Boeing gets $218 million Osprey support contract modification Bell-Boeing, a joint-venture between Boeing and Bell Helicopter, has been contracted for "based logistics and engineering support" for the V-22 Osprey aircraft, according to a recent U.S. Department of Defense news release. The contract modification, from Defense Logistics Agency Aviation, Philadelphia and announced on Friday, is valued at more than $218 million. "Bell Boeing Joint Project Office, has been awarded a maximum $218,749,892 modification (P00006) exercising the first one-year option period of a one-year base contract (SPRPA1-20-F- CD01) with four one-year option periods for performance based logistics and engineering support for the V-22 platform," the DoD message states. Also added that locations of performance are Texas and Pennsylvania, with a Nov. 30, 2020, performance completion date. Using customers are Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Foreign Military Sales to Japan. Bell Boeing supports V-22 readiness through a comprehensive sustainment effort that includes maintenance, training, on-site field representatives and data analytics. Bell Boeing is also working with the V-22 program office on several efforts to improve V-22 readiness. The Marines' Common Configuration Readiness and Modernization program (CC-RAM), the Air Force's configuration reducing modification plan, and nacelle wiring and structure improvements are expected to increase readiness of the V-22 fleet. The Boeing's website said the Osprey platform is a joint service multirole combat aircraft utilizing tiltrotor technology to combine the vertical performance of a helicopter with the speed and range of a fixed-wing aircraft. With its rotors in vertical position, it can take off, land and hover like a helicopter. Once airborne, it can convert to a turboprop airplane capable of high-speed, high- altitude flight. This combination results in global reach capabilities that allow the V-22 to fill an operational niche unlike any other aircraft. For its part, Bell noted that V-22 Osprey is the world's only production tiltrotor aircraft. The V-22 has been battle-tested in combat and contingency operations throughout the world. Commanders demand the V-22 when they need to carry out the toughest missions in the most challenging operating environments. The V-22's multimission capabilities reshape what is possible, both on and off the battlefield. Currently, the V-22 fleet of tiltrotor aircraft has topped the 500,000 flight hour milestone. More than 375 Ospreys logged the hours, including the U.S. Air Force CV-22 and the U.S. Marine Corps MV-22. https://defence-blog.com/news/bell-boeing-gets-218-million-osprey-support-contract- modification.html Back to Top DJI Remote ID : A Wireless License Plate for Your Drone Have you ever looked up in the sky, seen a drone flying past, and wondered what it was up to? Soon with Remote ID, there will be a simple way to find out. So What is Remote ID? It should come as no surprise that as drone technology continues to become more powerful and more popular, governments and industries would want to have a more detailed picture of what is moving in the airspace around them. DJI has previously developed AeroScope, an infrastructure solution that scans for controller-to-drone connections. Aeroscope is important, but requires custom hardware and is generally intended for prisons, airports, and the like. So ASTM, a global forum that helps develop standards, stepped in to help broaden the toolkit. They worked with companies and governments for the past 18 months, and the new standard is in. The answer is "Drone-to-Phone" communication. DJI demonstrated it at the International Civil Aviation Organization's Drone Enable conference. How does it work? Remote ID runs off of Wi-Fi Aware, a protocol that allows devices to exchange limited information over wifi, without having to first form a secure two-way connection. Your phone can discover an object and request simple information from it directly. This can be used to send documents to printers, play mobile games together, or now identify drones like the DJI Mavic Mini or Mavic 2 Pro. Before you start to worry, drone owners, there is no new hardware. This utilizes the same wifi connection your drone already uses to communicate with its controller. There's no need for towers, no need for cell signal or GPS, no hardware upgrades, and so no major imposition on you. While there is a myriad of communication technologies today that could have been put into play, ASTM decided to keep it real simple. That's a bonus for operators, but also for developing countries and remote areas with limited infrastructure. The drone does all the talking, without the help of anyone or anything else, up to about 1km. It's too early to know whether this will have a meaningful impact on battery life or flight time. When? There is no download link at the end of this article because the firmware updates don't exist yet. Neither does an app that can detect and report on nearby drones. DJI successfully demonstrated that the technology works, but they are holding back on public release "pending further direction from aviation regulators and final publication of the ASTM International standard." But the FAA in America has made it very clear that this is a need, and has encouraged development and adoption as it finalizes its rules over the next year or so. So keep your eyes peeled - this update is coming sooner rather than later. https://www.cinema5d.com/remote-id-wireless-license-plate-drone/ Back to Top Harbour Air to test fly world's first commercial electric plane Harbour Air plans to test-fly what it calls the "world's first fully electric commercial aircraft" on Dec. 11 at Vancouver International Airport's south terminal. The Beaver seaplane is retrofitted with a 750 horsepower all-electric magni500 propulsion system, Harbour Air said. The airline said that the following has been completed for the upcoming test flight: All batteries are installed. A battery-management unit is installed. All systems are connected and tested. Power is turned on and static testing is completed. The plane's propeller has turned using only battery power. Full-power test runs on the ground have been done. Wings are installed. Flight controls are rigged. The next steps include continuing to check systems and testing to ensure crews are prepared. Harbour Air's 450 employees operate up to 300 daily flights using 53 planes in B.C. and Washington state. The company is a pioneer in trying to get Transportation Canada and the U.S. Federal Aviation Authority to regulate electric-powered, commercial planes - something that neither currently does. Harbour Air also says it is North America's largest and first fully carbon-neutral airline. Its plan is to eventually have a fleet of electric seaplanes, but it may be several years before any electric planes carry passengers for extended flights. Harbour Air CEO Greg McDougall said current electric technology is only appropriate for shorter Harbour Air flights, such as between Victoria and Vancouver, and Nanaimo and Vancouver. https://www.princegeorgematters.com/local-news/harbour-air-to-test-fly-worlds-first-commercial- electric-plane-1892766 Back to Top Inside Larry Page's Turbulent Kitty Hawk: Returned Deposits, Battery Fires And A Boeing Shakeup In 2017, success seemed to be just around the corner for Kitty Hawk, the secretive flying car company that's bankrolled by Google co-founder Larry Page and run by Sebastian Thrun, the Stanford AI and robotics whiz who had launched Google's self-driving car unit. Kitty Hawk had just shown off a prototype of the Flyer, a single-seat, battery-powered aircraft intended to be a low- altitude fun machine for use over water, like a jet ski on rotors, with handling that would make flying as easy as driving. "I'm excited that one day very soon I'll be able to climb onto my Kitty Hawk Flyer for a quick and easy personal flight," Page said at the time. The startup promised to put Flyer in eager buyers' hands by the end of the year. Late that year the Mountain View, California-based company also began flight-testing a more ambitious project in New Zealand: a two-seat electric self-flying taxi called Cora that Kitty Hawk says will enable city dwellers to soar over gridlocked streets. "Just imagine travelling at 80 miles an hour in a straight line at any time of day without ever having to stop," Thrun told the Guardian a few months after Cora was unveiled. "It would be transformational to almost every person I know." Two years later, however, Kitty Hawk's promise to bring personal flying to the masses has failed to take wing yet amid technical problems and safety issues with Flyer and unresolved questions about its practical use, according to four former Kitty Hawk employees who were among six who spoke to Forbes on the condition of anonymity due to non-disclosure agreements. At the same time, it may have given up control of Cora, sources suggest. Kitty Hawk confirmed to Forbes that, after unveiling a more polished version of the Flyer last year, it has decided not to sell the one-seater to individuals and has returned deposits to would-be buyers. Behind closed doors, Flyer encountered problems, including frequent breakdowns and fires involving batteries, electric motors and wiring, two former engineers said. Last year, the Mountain View Fire Department was called to put out an early morning blaze at the Flyer building, city records show; former employees said the fire at the Google-owned building involved damaged batteries that had been pulled out of a Flyer that had crashed the previous day in flight testing under remote operation. "No person has ever been harmed or exposed due to undue risk in over 26,000 test flights with over 100 prototype vehicles," wrote Shernaz Daver, an advisor to Kitty Hawk, in an email response to a list of questions sent by Forbes. She did not comment directly on the fires or reports of breakdowns or problems with its batteries. Intent on bringing Flyer to market quickly, management in several instances brushed off workers who expressed worries that problems with the aircraft could endanger passengers, two former employees say. At least two members of the flight test team were let go after questioning the safety of the aircraft, they say, and some other members of the Flyer team who spoke up quit or jumped to another program at Kitty Hawk. Those individuals declined to comment when reached by Forbes. "It was a pattern - if you talked about safety you were done, so you just didn't," said one former employee. "That's just how it had to be if you wanted to keep getting a paycheck." Daver did not directly comment on reports of employee departures, but said employees at Kitty Hawk are required to report safety-related issues to their managers, or through a confidential digital channel directly to the general counsel and human resources, and can anonymously discuss safety concerns with an external safety director. Kitty Hawk got off to an earlier start than many of the scores of startups now attempting to build electric urban air taxis, and the deep pockets of Page, who has a nearly $60 billion fortune, have been a huge advantage, enabling the company to hire hundreds of engineers, machinists and designers to create cutting-edge aircraft. However, the company faces the same problems as any aspirant in the field: the poor energy density of the current generation of batteries severely limits the flight times and carrying capacity of electric aircraft, and building a functioning prototype is faster and easier than turning it into a reliable product that satisfies aviation regulators' safety requirements. In the case of urban air mobility, many of the requirements don't yet exist. These challenges may explain why a strategic partnership with Boeing announced in June could go much deeper than publicly announced. Public filings and organizational shifts at Kitty Hawk described by former employees indicate that there's been a change of control of the Cora program, and Boeing seems the likely acquirer. The jetmaker and Kitty Hawk declined to comment. That would leave Kitty Hawk with two other aircraft: Flyer and Heaviside, an autonomous winged one-seater unveiled in October that, in an attempt to solve the noise problem that has made heliports unwelcome neighbors, was designed to be 100 times quieter than helicopters, as well as faster. The company has shelved the idea of marketing Flyer aircraft as a recreational device and is exploring commercial options, perhaps running it as a kind of aerial ferry. "We have moved to seeing it as a transportation service and not as a vehicle for individual purchase," said Daver. "It is going to be a ride sharing model for transportation services." Larry Page began dabbling in aviation in 2010, quietly funding a company called Zee.Aero led by a Stanford aerospace professor, Ilan Kroo, near the Google campus. The original vision was to produce a literal flying car , with folding wings so it could fit inside a home garage, but that was quickly abandoned as impractical, and Zee went on to try other designs, including one registered with FAA under the name Mutt because of its marriage of new elements with an older configuration. It tested a piloted electric aircraft that the company considered selling as a kit to be assembled by buyers. Eventually Zee decided the plane should be developed into a pilotless air taxi, now dubbed Cora. In 2015 Page set up another stealth startup next door to Zee.Aero and called it Kitty Hawk after the tiny coastal village in North Carolina's Outer Banks where the Wright brothers tested their own flying experiments. The modern-day Kitty Hawk was run by Thrun, who previously directed Google's moonshot R&D program and founded online education company Udacity. It tinkered with a series of concepts, including a complicated scheme to suspend a pod from aircraft by tethers that could pick up a person or cargo on the ground while the aircraft circled overhead. Eventually Kitty Hawk, which went on to absorb Zee.Aero, embarked on a mission to be the first to get an electric passenger aircraft to market that could take off and land vertically. Thrun wanted a small team to work fast and creatively, using as many off-the-shelf components as possible, according to former employees. "The term thrown around was we were the cowboys of Kitty Hawk, we were doing crazy stuff," says one. Kitty Hawk's Flyer, as the project came to be called, was intended to be small enough to avoid safety certification altogether, weighing in under 254 pounds so it could qualify under Federal Aviation Administration rules as an ultralight, a category of aircraft that's long been the province of hobbyists and tinkerers. Operation of ultralights is restricted - they can't be flown over populated areas or at night - but ensuring the aircraft is safe is left up to the maker. With an engineering team fewer than 20, Flyer made rapid progress. Kitty Hawk offered a rare peek behind the curtain to the New York Times in 2017, showing off what appeared to be a motorcycle on a spiderweb with eight downward-facing rotors. Then in 2018 it started giving a small number of media test rides at Lake Las Vegas of a more finished vehicle with a composite frame with a constellation of 10 upward-facing rotors around it. Though Flyer was capped to 10 feet in altitude and 20 mph in speed, and said it was intended to be flown over water, for safety, the company was presenting it as a thrill ride, putting up web pages to take applications for the first production models from individuals and potential fleet operators like amusement parks or resorts. The YouTube personality Casey Neistat gave it a try, publishing a video that was watched 2.2 million times in which he shouts happily while banking and spinning Flyer around the lake. But Flyer wasn't ready to thrill: the latest prototype was breaking down frequently and needed regular troubleshooting and repair by engineers, three former employees say. "This thing would break every few hours and need service," said one. Kitty Hawk did not respond to questions about Flyer's reliability. Among the failures were a series of fires during its development. To save on weight, two former employees say that engineers dispensed with the protective shielding commonly used between lithium-ion battery cells in cars, bundling cells together with tape, increasing the risk that if one ignited, others would catch on fire, too. Only recently did the Flyer program get its own battery expert on staff, one former employee says. Over the last six months, the Flyer program has gone through a reset, former employees say. The focus has been on improving reliability rather than iterating on the design, and on finding a use for the vehicles. "Kitty Hawk doesn't start from the principle of what's the economically viable thing we're going to build. It engineers something to solve a problem and then it's 'OK, here's a cool thing we built, what can we do with it?' " said an ex-employee who was among a wave of departures from the Flyer program this year. The latest idea: that Kitty Hawk would operate Flyer as a service. The company has scouted out cities where it could offer point-to-point rides across bodies of water, which would make for a more forgiving surface to come down on in the event of a crash, two former employees say. And riders will no longer have the freedom to take Flyer for a joyride, they say: the flight path will be automated. Kitty Hawk has applied for a permit in Jersey City, New Jersey, to develop a floating dock and hangar for a potential route across the Hudson River to Manhattan, and is exploring a route across San Francisco Bay, according to local media. It's unclear how Flyer would be regulated in such a use, with one grey area being whether it would be treated as a boat traveling above the water or a low-flying aircraft. Kitty Hawk has reached out to the U.S. Coast Guard to ask how it would classify Flyer, a Coast Guard spokesman said. "We are taking a deliberate look at determining what these vehicles are, as that determination will set precedence for years or decades to come regarding their place in the marine transportation system." The company's other major program, Cora, also faces daunting regulatory hurdles. Boeing might be the one to see it through. In June, Boeing and Kitty Hawk announced a strategic partnership that they said would "bring together the innovation of Kitty Hawk's Cora division with Boeing's scale and aerospace expertise." Public records and changes at the company suggest it goes deeper than that. In May, Kitty Hawk general counsel Molly Abraham made a filing in Delaware to incorporate a company under the name of Cora Aero at the same address as Kitty Hawk; a November filing lists Cora Aero's CEO as Gary Gysin, the former head of Liquid Robotics, a developer of wave-powered autonomous watercraft. His LinkedIn profile states he's head of a stealth mode startup. Former Kitty Hawk employees said that around the time the Boeing partnership was announced, access to the Cora building, which had contained a cafeteria and reception area shared by all, was abruptly restricted to workers only on that program, and IT, HR and other back office workers were divided between Cora and Kitty Hawk. Several said they believe Boeing is now in control of Cora. Hard yards lie ahead for Cora in New Zealand, where Kitty Hawk chose to try to win safety certification due to enticing features of the country's air safety code, which promises to allow the company to collaboratively define airworthiness standards with that country's Civil Aviation Authority. Additionally, a unique provision of the regulations permits "adventure flights" by aircraft that don't have standard safety certifications, such as vintage warbirds, which could allow Kitty Hawk to launch a revenue-generating passenger service before Cora is fully certified, said James Lawson, an aerospace safety consultant who previously consulted with Kitty Hawk on Cora when the company was considering pursuing certification in the U.S. Cora is hand-built, largely of custom components made in-house, and still at the stage of proving out its technology, former employees on that program said. Another version needs to be constructed with safety systems, weatherproofing and passenger comforts, and that's designed to be easily manufacturable. Those final, long and painstaking steps promise to be a tall hurdle for many of the urban air mobility startups as they try to transition from Skunk Works-type inventors to real businesses, said Lawson - and it could account for the bulk of the spending. "The technology is one thing, but 80% of the effort is in productizing and building an aircraft that can be certified," said Lawson. https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeremybogaisky/2019/12/01/inside-larry-pages-kitty-hawk-returned- deposits-battery-fires-boeing-cora/#7398128e58ab Back to Top SpaceX Starship hardware mystery solved amid reports of Florida factory upheaval A SpaceX Starship hardware mystery has been effectively solved after rocket parts began arrived in Port Canaveral and were loaded aboard a transport ship, seemingly preparing for an unexpected journey by sea. In an unexpected turn of events, SpaceX appears to be preparing to ship major Starship hardware from its Cocoa, Florida facility to a similar worksite in Boca Chica, Texas. Spotted for the first time in a photo taken by local photographer Greg Scott on November 30th, that hardware - at least two large stands and a nearly-complete steel tank dome - abruptly appeared beside SpaceX's Port Canaveral dock space. Seemingly within hours of their appearance, new vessel GO Discovery also arrived in Port Canaveral and parked by the same SpaceX docks. Shortly thereafter, workers loaded her with both build stands and a Starship tank dome and secured the surprise cargo. As it turns out, another local SpaceX-follower and prolific photographer/videographer happened to capture the disappearance of both stands and dome from SpaceX's nearby Cocoa, FL Starship construction facility, where Starship Mk2 and Starship Mk4 were being built. This neatly ties up the minor mystery of where that hardware went: SpaceX clearly moved all three parts to Port Canaveral, where they have since been loaded on a small supply ship. Two main questions remain, however: why have they been moved to the port and where are they headed? THE BAND IS BREAKING UP Unfortunately, it appears that both questions can effectively be answered by a report published by YouTube channel "What about it?!". According to former Cocoa employee that spoke to reporter and channel creator Felix Schlang, SpaceX has reportedly laid off up to 80% of the Starship facility's workforce. Instead of the friendly internal competition that pitted Cocoa against Boca Chica in the race to first Starship flight, SpaceX is significantly slowing down its Florida build operations and will redirect as much of its workforce and resources as possible to Boca Chica. According to Schlang's source, this will likely result in several months of relative downtime in Florida, while he was also told that Starship Mk2 and Mk4 are now effectively dead before arrival as a result of several challenging and reoccurring technical issues. Starship Mk2 likely shares some significant heritage with Starship Mk1, which lost its top during a pressure test. Roughly two-dozen steel Starship Mk4 rings may also be scrapped after SpaceX's Florida team could not overcome a technical hurdle. Per the source, many of those single-weld steel rings were slightly different diameters, making it next to impossible to build a sound pressure vessel (i.e. Starship Mk4) with them. Combining the appearance of Starship hardware on GO Discovery just yesterday and reports of major Cocoa layoffs, it's all but certain that the Starship components on Discovery are going to head to Boca Chica, Texas. Schlang's source also indicated that all affected employees were given the option to transfer to Boca Chica or Hawthorne, a prime indication that this abrupt change in plans is more a strategic move than a financial one. With any luck, many of those laid off will be able to move, although such a major and abrupt change is likely a no-go for anyone with major ties to South Florida. The Starship dome and stands now likely headed for Boca Chica were built over the course of a month or two in Florida, meaning that they were either built under the impression that they would support Boca Chica's Starship Mk3 prototype or repurposed after SpaceX decided to pause work in Cocoa. Of note, something like 8-12 of Starship Mk4's steel rings were able to be stacked and all of those double-rings are still present at SpaceX Cocoa, while a number of single rings were indeed scrapped over the last few weeks. A header tank was also reportedly removed from Starship Mk2's more or less finished nose section. If any of that hardware is technically viable, there's a good chance that they may also be shipped to Texas to expedite Starship Mk3 integration. Ultimately, given how rapidly SpaceX makes and changes decisions, pausing work in Cocoa doesn't come as much of a surprise. It's also far from the end of SpaceX's Florida Starship-building efforts - Schlang indicates that SpaceX will instead focus on a similar facility located within Kennedy Space Center, making the process of building Starships offsite and transporting to Launch Pad 39A far more viable. With this latest surprise, it also appears that SpaceX is now laser-focused on getting Starship Mk3 ready for South Texas flight testing. Stay tuned for an update on a flurry of recent developments at SpaceX's Boca Chica Starship facilities. https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-starship-hardware-mystery-solved/ Curt Lewis