Aircraft

Navy Lt. Mark Tedrow has no problem reconciling an air show with a commemoration of the War of 1812, an era that precedes flight by almost a century. The Blue Angels pilot said he looks forward to flying over the Inner Harbor, Middle River and Fort McHenry - birthplace of the national anthem - during a bicentennial celebration in June. "It will be outstanding to perform multiple maneuvers over Fort McHenry," he said. "It will show just how far we have come. " Tedrow and his co-pilot flew into Martin State Airport in Middle River on Thursday to give a small preview of what the Navy's renowned flight team will do for the bicentennial maritime and air festival that kicks off June 13. "Stake out your places on the waterfront so you don't miss a thing," said Lt. Cmdr.

A company that manufactures airplanes in Hagerstown that are used to monitor the nation's borders would receive $43 million to continue production under legislation approved by the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee on Tuesday. Sierra Nevada Corp., a Nevada-based company with a plant in Hagerstown, outfits the twin-engine aircraft with sensors that assist Customs and Border Patrol agents on the ground with catching people who cross the border into the U.S. illegally. If approved by Congress, the funding will keep the company's production line open, allowing it to begin work on two new aircraft.

If all goes as planned, sometime this morning a spacecraft will blast off from its launchpad in Cape Canaveral, Fla., and ride a fiery plume of contrails upward through the pre-dawn darkness to begin a two-week journey to the International Space Station and back. But the flight won't be just another NASA resupply mission. Instead, the Falcon 9 rocket and its unmanned Dragon cargo capsule built by Space Exploration Technologies Corporation - SpaceX for short - will be the first commercially owned and operated vehicle ever to rendezvous with the station's orbiting astronauts.

Longer and more comfortable, and able to make flights to the Caribbean, Mexico and Hawaii, the first of Southwest Airlines' new Boeing 737-800 jets is set to arrive in Baltimore next week. The new cabins are the company's first redesign in a decade, with seating tested by people with 20 different body types — from the very short to the very tall. Robert Jordan, the airline's chief commercial officer, said the jets herald "the Southwest of the future. " Southwest will take delivery of 33 of the 800-series planes, which cost about $84.4 million each, this year and 41 next year.

THE OLD imagery of "free traders" versus "protectionists" is giving way to a much more practical and less ideological search for common rules to govern trade among nations. The latest of these is the tentative agreement between the United States and the European Community limiting government subsidies for the development of aircraft.This agreement, whose final details are still being hammered out, is emblematic of the new pragmatism. The deal, reached after six years of talks,would limit direct subsidies to about one-third of a plane's total development costs, and indirect subsidies to about 5 percent of them.

The Department of Defense is rethinking its recent decision to cancel a new electronic system for identifying military aircraft that was being developed by the Towson-based Bendix Communications Division of Allied-Signal Inc., two members of Maryland's congressional delegation said yesterday.At the urging of Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski, D-Md., and Representative Helen Delich Bentley, R-Md.-2nd, the DOD has asked Gen. Colin L. Powell, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to re-examine the need for a system that would include identification of ground vehicles as well as aircraft.

A Carroll County government lapse may jeopardize or delay a new aircraft manufacturer's plans to open a plant here.County officials are scrambling to find another location for Freewing Aircraft Corp. after learning in the past two weeks that the proposed site will conflict with needed landing space at the county airport.Freewing was scheduled to lease a 20,000-square-foot manufacturing plant that the county planned to build on a 3-acre county-owned lot in the Air Business Center along Route 97 north of Westminster.

Freewing Aircraft, a Westminster experimental aircraft manufacturer, is one of three recipients of $5,000 "Excellence in Design" awards from a national engineering magazine.Hugh Schmittle, Freewing's president, was honored by Design News for the company's "freewing" concept, a wing that flexes with turbulent air to allow a smoother and safer flight. Traditional aircraft use fixed wings, which must be adjusted by the pilot and which force planes to move up and down in turbulence.Mr. Schmittle and his partner, Odile Legeay, are using the concept on small, two-seater aircraft and unmanned drones suitable for military reconnaissance.

WASHINGTON -- A prototype of the V-22 Osprey, a tilt-rotor aircraft whose future was already the subject of furious debate, crashed yesterday in the Potomac River with seven people on board. Pentagon officials said no survivors had been found.The aircraft, which takes off like a helicopter and flies like a plane, was headed for a landing at the Marine Corps air station in Quantico, Va.The aircraft was developed by a partnership of Bell Helicopter Textron and the helicopter division of Boeing Co. Pentagon officials and spokesmen for the two companies said they did not know the cause of the crash, but would investigate.

Theodore F. Elliott Sr., 85, aircraft training director Theodore Franklin Elliott Sr., a retired aircraft training director who later owned a tavern, died Tuesday of kidney failure at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center. The Salisbury resident was 85. Born in Baltimore and raised in Highlandtown, he attended City College before becoming an accountant for a Pulaski Highway oil company. After serving in the Army Air Forces during World War II, he joined the Glenn L. Martin Co. in Middle River, where he became director of training before his 1969 retirement.

Robert Gaspar Leginus Sr., who flew gliders during World War II and later served as a military intelligence analyst, died Feb. 20. He was 98. Mr. Leginus died at Gilchrist Hospice Care in Columbia, said his son Robert Leginus Jr. He had lived in Columbia since the 1990s. Mr. Leginus was born in 1913 in Wyoming, Pa. He learned to fly at the Wilkes-Barre Wyoming Valley Airport, developing a lifelong fascination with flying and aircraft. "His biggest dream was to become an astronaut," his son said.

For months, the men and women of the 135th Airlift Group have been training on their new C27J Spartan turboprops for their deployment this spring to Afghanistan. Their job: carrying soldiers, equipment and supplies around the war zone as the fighting season resumes. It's a mission for which the Maryland Air National Guard unit has deep experience. In the last decade alone, members have deployed several times to Iraq and Afghanistan, while also responding to the Haiti earthquake, California wildfires and Hurricane Katrina.

Salvatore Joseph "Joe" DeMarco, a commercial artist and former manager of art services for AAI Corp. who was also widely known for his detailed drawings of World War I aircraft, died Friday of lung cancer at Gilchrist Hospice in Towson. The White Marsh resident was 93. The son of a dentist and a homemaker, Mr. DeMarco was born and raised on Lyndhurst Street in West Baltimore. He attended St. Bernadine parochial school and ended his formal education when he was 14. "His father died, and he had to go to work to help support his family.

Navy Lt. Mark Tedrow has no problem reconciling an air show with a commemoration of the War of 1812, an era that precedes flight by almost a century. The Blue Angels pilot said he looks forward to flying over the Inner Harbor, Middle River and Fort McHenry - birthplace of the national anthem - during a bicentennial celebration in June. "It will be outstanding to perform multiple maneuvers over Fort McHenry," he said. "It will show just how far we have come. " Tedrow and his co-pilot flew into Martin State Airport in Middle River on Thursday to give a small preview of what the Navy's renowned flight team will do for the bicentennial maritime and air festival that kicks off June 13. "Stake out your places on the waterfront so you don't miss a thing," said Lt. Cmdr.

The buzz of propellers drifted down over the airfield at Aberdeen Proving Ground as the stubby gray plane came into view. The loadmaster from the Maryland Air National Guard crew dropped the rear hatch open. One by one, six soldiers filed out of the airplane and into the sky. Special Forces soldiers with the Maryland National Guard spent the day Friday jumping out of the new C-27J Spartan, one of four the Guard will begin deploying to Afghanistan next year. The twin-engine turboprops, which may be used to transport cargo or troops, replace the Guard's eight C-130J Hercules.

The Collings Foundation, a private organization dedicated to preserving and depicting America's aviation history, is continuing its Wings of Freedom World War II living history program this weekend at Carroll County Regional Airport. As in past years, three of the foundation's vintage WWII-era airplanes — a B-17 Flying Fortress, B-24 Liberator and B-25 Mitchell — are in Westminster for a weekend of tours and flights across Carroll County. The annual World War II-era "Hangar Social" dance will also be held Saturday night, from 6:30 to 9 p.m. The charge for the dance is $10, with free admission for all World War II and Korean War veterans.

A. Frederick Romoser, a retired aircraft draftsman, died of stroke complications and kidney failure Sept. 24 at Lorien Columbia Nursing and Rehabilitation Center. The former Northeast Baltimore resident was 88. Born in Baltimore and raised in the Walbrook area, he was a graduate of Polytechnic Institute. Just before the start of World War II, he became a draftsman and technician at the former Glenn L. Martin Co. aircraft plant in Middle River. He later worked on the Gemini and Apollo programs for what became Martin Marietta.

William Raymond Benton, a retired aircraft engineer whose model of the moon was displayed for several years at the Goddard Space Center, died Wednesday of pneumonia at Maryland General Hospital. He was 79 and lived in Woodlawn. Fascinated by aircraft and the heavens as a young man, he continued his interest throughout his career as a structural test engineer and an electromechanical engineer at several major aircraft companies in Maryland. An internationally recognized authority on selenology -- the study of the moon -- he spent hours in the basement of his Valley Road home sculpting a 3-foot plaster model of the moon.

A civilian aircraft flew in restricted airspace Friday near Camp David in Frederick County, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, said in a statement. An F-15E fighter jet intercepted the Piper plane at about 4:45 p.m., NORAD said. NORAD said that the plane was out of radio communication and that it was escorted to an airport near Martinsburg, W.Va. President Barack Obama was not at Camp David at the time. The airspace over the presidential retreat was limited because he was scheduled to fly there Friday.

William S. Aiken Jr., former NASA director of aeronautics who earlier in his career had worked on the X-1, the first supersonic aircraft, died May 27 of a blood disorder at St. Agnes Hospital. The Charlestown retirement community resident was 90. The son of a gas company executive and a homemaker, Mr. Aiken was born and raised in Elizabeth, N.J. He was a 1938 graduate of Thomas Jefferson High School and earned a bachelor's degree in aeronautical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., in 1942.