Aerospace Daily & Defense Report

By Mark Carreau
NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover could be ready to resume science operations within a few days, after a near week-long round of troubleshooting to determine why it placed itself in “safe mode” on July 2.
Space

Canada is reaching out to fighter aircraft manufacturers and other nations such as Denmark, France, Germany and Sweden to figure out the best way to replace its 34-year-old CF-18 fighter fleet.
Defense

By Bradley Perrett
Israel Aerospace Industries and Elta are well placed to fill a Japanese requirement for up to eight unmanned surveillance aircraft that would economically complement the Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk.
Defense

By Bradley Perrett
The Japanese air force’s Air Development and Test Wing at Gifu Air Base received the first C-2 on June 30, the defense ministry says.
Defense

To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. For a complete list of Aviation Week Network’s upcoming events, and to register, visit www.aviationweek.com/events (Bold type indicates new calendar listing). July 13—Commercial Aerospace Manufacturing Briefing (CAMB), co-located with the Farnborough International Airshow, Farnborough, U.K. For more information go to www.awin.aviationweek.com/events

The U.S. Air Force’s chief of information dominance says contractors and their suppliers are being held to a “higher standard” in cybersecurity as digitally dependent weapons like the Northrop Grumman B-21 bomber enter development.
Defense

View the Fighter Engine Deliveries By Manufacturer 2016-2025 chart in PDF format.

By Tony Osborne
F-35 test pilots have begun testing the aircraft’s ability to carry asymmetric external loads in powered-lift flight.
Defense

Pratt snagged a $1.5 billion deal for the tenth batch of F135 propulsion systems, bringing the total low-rate initial production (LRIP) lot 10 contract value to $1.95 billion overall.
Defense

TDA Armaments SAS, a subsidiary of Thales, will develop and produce the new 68mm induction laser-guided rocket.
Defense

The U.S. and South Korea agreed July 8 to deploy Lockheed Martin’s Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense system to the Korean peninsula.
Defense

ESTONIA re-organized defense ministry, combining three departments into Defense Investments Department. Finance department to be eliminated. FNSS SAVUNMA SISTEMLERI A.S. has contract to upgrade Turkish Land Forces Kaplan and PARS 4x4 vehicles with anti-tank missiles. SAAB has AUS37m ($28m) contract to sustain combat system on Australian Anzac-class frigates. Covers work from July 2016 until December 2017.

Seven Turkish military personnel have been killed after their Sikorsky S-70 Black Hawk crashed in Northern Turkey. The S-70A operated by Turkey’s Jandarma General Command crashed into a forest in low-visibility conditions near the town of Giresun on Turkey’s Black Sea coast. Seven of the 15 onboard were killed; the other eight were injured and taken to the hospital. The helicopter had been returning to Giresun after visiting outposts in the region. In a statement, the Turkish Armed Forces General Staff said the cause had not been determined.

As the F-35 makes its debut in the U.K. this week, a top U.S. Air Force general says there are no major hurdles to declaring the F-35A operational close to its target date of Aug. 1.
Defense

By Michael Bruno
Euroconsult says around 200 organizations built a smallsat between 2006 and 2015, and the coming decade will show a similar pattern, with the results about to be evident in orbit.
Defense

North America

The Certifiable Predator B has been designed and developed with airspace rules and compliance in mind, and is expected to meet NATO’s unmanned air vehicle airworthiness requirements.
Defense

The U.S. Navy could soon begin far-field range testing of its next-generation air and missile defense radar against live targets.
Defense

By Maksim Pyadushkin, Bradley Perrett
The preponderance of Chinese demand for the aircraft, known as Advanced Heavy Lifter (AHL), is the likely reason for Avic taking over what was originally promoted as a joint program.
Defense

By Mark Carreau
The Soyuz is expected to carry out an automated docking with the ISS’ Russian-segment Rassvet module July 9 at 12:12 a.m. EDT.
Defense

The Marines’ Deputy Commandant for Aviation is singing the F-35B's praises after it demonstrated a 24 to zero “kill ratio” during a Weapons and Tactics Instructor course at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Arizona, last spring.
Defense

By Bradley Perrett, Kim Minseok
South Korea’s has begun exporting precision air-to-surface weapons to an unnamed country.
Defense

By Marhalim Abas
Singapore will commission a locally developed tracked vehicle, the Armored Fighting Vehicle (AFV), in 2019 to replace the aging M113 armored personnel carrier.
Defense

By Tony Osborne
The loss of Flight Test Vehicle 1 will be a significant setback for the 525 program as the company pushes to bring the first commercial fly-by-wire helicopter into service.
Business Aviation

RAYTHEON has $291.7m U.S. Navy contract for 660 AIM-9X Block II All Up Round Tactical Full Rate Production Lot 16 Missiles for U.S. Navy (160), Air Force (429), Army (7) and governments of Japan (4), Norway (20), Taiwan (40). ISRAEL AEROSPACE INDUSTRIES subsidiary AVIONICS SERVICES S.A. of Brazil on June 30 introduced Caçador medium-altitude/long-endurance UAV, based on Heron-1. OTOKAR has €106.1m ($117.4m) order for Cobra II tactical wheeled armored vehicles for Turkish domestic security forces, due for delivery by Q1 2017.