Summary of the 26th SFTE Annual Symposium "Open Sky"

The 26th Annual Symposium in Berlin was a great success. It was well supported with attendees from throughout North America, Europe and Asia. The symposium got off to a great start with the keynote during the reception; a successful change of format. Herr Hartmut Mehdorn, President Aircraft Group Dailmer-Benz Aerospace spoke about what scope visionaries have in the modern aerospace world.

The first day of presentations started with the Open Skies theme and, during the panel discussion that followed, it became apparent that there were many people not familiar with this program and a very interesting discussion ensued.

In the afternoon, there was a unique mix of aircraft programs presented ranging from the historical Fairey Rotodyne to the latest Boeing 777-200. Wednesday was equally stimulating with the high point being the luncheon speech given by David Gibbings, the 1993 "Kelly" Johnson award winner. David kept his audience interested and amused by his witty and thought-provoking words.

The final day of presentations was packed with some highly technical papers, which meant that concentration was the order of the day. Topics included Techniques to Ensure the Proper Rigging of Highly Augmented Aircraft and Testing of the SAAB 2000 Elevator Control Systems.

The Technical Committee again did a great job of organising the judging and presenting the Best of Session awards. This year a new award was added for the paper judged Best of Symposium.

The task of judging the many fine presentations seems to get more difficult each year. Joe Turner and his "volunteers" are to be congratulated on their efforts towards this scheme, which is designed to encourage high standards for presentations. During the week the spouses were very well cared for with several interesting trips around East and West Berlin, Potsdam and Sans-Souci. A fascinating event that coincided with the symposium was the wrapping of the Reichstag by artists Jeanne-Claude and Christo. It was noted by the flight test community that even this event was delayed because of the weather!

The Society was fortunate to have Udo Drager, president SATIC G.I.E. as the banquet speaker. He provided some amazing statistics on the A300-600 ST Airbus Super Transporter.

The grand banquet provided an enjoyable end to a very successful week and took place at the historic Opernpalais on the famous Unter den Linden. During the evening, the presentation of the "Kelly" Johnson and Director\'s Awards were made. The recipients were Joe Dunn for the "Kelly" Johnson Awards and William Cuttler for the Director's Award. Judging by the reception they received from their SFTE colleagues they proved to be very popular choices and were warmly congratulated by those present. On Friday, those who took advantage of an opportunity to visit the BMW/Rolls Royce Engine Test Facility at Berlin Dahlewitz were not disappointed by this impressive new facility.