Industry News

Danish IT Consultancy Netcompany and Copenhagen Airport (CPH) have partnered to form a new company called Smarter Airports, which has launched AIRHART, a real-time data platform for the airport.

According to the airport, AIRHART will “drastically improve the operation and effectiveness of the airport across the ecosystem”.

The platform connects and merges over 100 different systems at the airport with a single, real-time data platform. AIRHART replaces the airport’s old Airport Operational Data Base and introduces a total airport management ecosystem for the entire stakeholder landscape.

CPH says that the new platform consolidates various digital systems and processes and creates a modular foundation for future AI breakthroughs, helping the airport increase its capacity from 30 to 40 million passengers per year.

Smarter Airports claims that AIRHART will improve the passenger travel experience, reduce emissions, and make airport operations more sustainable. It says that the platform significantly reduces the need for manual inputs, increases operational effectiveness, and improves maintenance and disruption prediction.

Hybrid Air Vehicles (HAV)has confirmed a show flight of its Airlander 10 rigid airship at the 2027 Royal International Air Tattoo RIAT. 

The Airlander is still in its preproduction development and testing phase, although the first model has progressed through its test flight schedule and HAV announced its intention to build its construction facility in Doncaster, UK.

HAV says that the Airlander is capable of cutting GHG from long and short-haul flights by 90% and the first Airlander is scheduled for completion in 2026.

HAV hopes to instigate a move away from traditional planes for long-and-short-haul travel and freight flights. Along with Airlander 10, which will carry 10 tonnes of load, the company is working on a design for a 50 tonne version, with room for 200 passengers and a maximum range of 2,200km with a full load. 

The personal details of thousands of pilot applicants for American Airlines and Southwest Airlines have been stolen after a data breach at recruitment software Pilot Credentials.

The two airlines first learned about the hack in May but have just alerted the over 8,000 people affected, the majority of which were applicants to American Airlines.

In a letter sent by the airline to those affected and filed with the Maine Attorney General’s office, the company said that it was cooperating with an investigation by law enforcement and would use an internal portal for pilot applications going forward, as is Southwest Airlines.

The information thought to have been gained by the hackers included the names, social security numbers, passport numbers, dates of birth and driver’s license numbers of those who had applied for pilot and cadet jobs.

American aerospace company Boom Supersonic (Boom) has released new details regarding its Overture supersonic aircraft.

Spanish aircraft components manufacturer Aernnova will design and develop the wing structure for the Overture. Overture’s gull wings, which are structurally thinner than typical subsonic wings to reduce drag, are shaped to enhance supersonic performance and improve subsonic and transonic handling.

Italian multinational Leonardo will act as the primary engineering lead for major fuselage structural components. Leonardo was also selected as the design and build partner for two major fuselage sections of the Overture, including the wingbox.

Spain-based Aciturri, a tier-one leader across aerostructures and aero-engines components, has been selected to design and develop the empennage for the Overture.

Boom has also released details on the Overture’s propulsion system, which it says is optimised for 100% sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

A new autonomous vehicle, called evoBOT, has completed its first practical trials in the cargo terminal and on the apron at Munich Airport.

The robot, developed at the Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics (Fraunhofer IML), features two wheels and gripper arms and can keep itself perfectly balanced, as it is designed based on the principle of an inverse compound pendulum.

This makes it possible for the evoBOT to move on different and uneven surfaces, even with slopes.

The key difference of the dynamically stable evoBOT when compared to other robot designs is its two arms that make ‘and the “adaptive load pickup” possible.

This means that the arms allow the robot to adapt to different shapes and sizes of objects and pick them up.