Summary of the 28th SFTE EC Annual symposium

The 28^th Symposium took place in Italy at the facilities of the “Politecnico de Milano” from 13-15 September 2017. This university is renowned for engineering studies in Italy.

There were two days of technical sessions and a visit to the Leonardo helicopters facility Final Assembly Line and Flight Line in Vergiate.

The main novelty of this year was that we joined the 43rd European Rotorcraft Forum event. This was the first time that we shared the event with this community. Thanks to the management of “Politecnico” this combined event was possible.

We also enjoyed the benefits of sharing, as attendees from ERF joined us during some sessions, and our people could do as well. The experience has been a full success and we keep this in mind for future collaborations. The number of participants has remained similar to previous symposiums, but because of the exposure to the ERF and the university, our message has been more widely spread. Attendees heard presentations from twenty-one papers during the symposium.

The first day we enjoyed a keynote presentation on “Certification of AW189 LIPS-FIPS (Limited and Full Ice Protection System).” Leonardo helicopters managed to bring a helicopter to the campus each day of the event. Those were prototypes and current testing vehicles which increased the value for SFTE-EC members. Attendees were able to visit the helicopters and ask questions to Leonardo personnel.

The gala dinner was done in an extraordinary environment in the main hall of the science and technology museum in Milan. This museum is a must see when you are in Milan. We had the previous cocktail social beside a submarine that is part of the exhibition.

The level of the presentations was very high and there were good variety of subjects. Nevertheless, as it was expected, rotorcraft subjects dominated. The best paper award was delivered to “DLR-HY4 Flight Test Campaign,” delivered by Paolo Romagnolli from Pipistrel. The board had a difficult task on deciding the winner because of the quality and technical level of most of the presentations.

During the business meeting, the board made the following announcements to the SFTE members:

• The new Logo, as a result of the open contest launched last year is already active.
• The 29th Symposium will take place in NLR in Amsterdam. Date will be fixed soon, but expect it to be around the last week of May.
• The election and renewal of the board was achieved under the current rules, and with no other candidacy the present board remains in place for the next two years.
• The chapter approved a new award for flight test merit and relevance, and it will bear the name of JESUALDO MARTINEZ, our colleague killed in the crash of the A400M in Seville in 2015. This prize will be awarded every 2 years, so the first one will be in 2019, and it will be delivered in the European Chapter Symposium. Rules will be published on the SFTE-EC web page.