Aerospace Daily & Defense Report

By Jay Menon
An Indian air force Hawk advanced jet trainer (AJT) crashed in the eastern state of Odisha on June 3, marking the fourth accident in recent months.

The U.S. Navy hopes to continue to bolster its service contract deals, but will also keep a sharp eye out for the way those transactions are structured, Navy officials responsible for overseeing such work say.

Northrop Grumman recently completed the Consolidated Afloat Networks and Enterprise Services (Canes) program’s design, development and limited deployment phase for the U.S. Navy, the company says.

By Tony Osborne
Canadian helicopter operator HNZ Group has purchased an interest in Norwegian offshore helicopter operator Norsk Helikopterservice (NHS), giving the company its first inroad into the North Sea helicopter market.

The U.S. Air Force is investigating an accidental release of sensitive information that occurred leading up to the June 2 request for proposals for the service’s Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle program.
Defense

BOEING opened 10,000-sq.-ft. avionics maintenance facility in Yeongcheon, South Korea, to support Republic of Korea air force. HARRIS CORP., FL

The 2015 Navy Opportunity Forum is underway this week through Wednesday in Arlington, Virginia, showcasing service-sponsored small business innovation

Selected U.S. military contracts for the week of May 26-29, 2015. Selected U.S. military contracts for May 26, 2015 U.S. NAVY Lockheed Martin Mission

A new type of solar-electric propulsion that is approaching flight test with NASA backing could widen the range of applications for small satellites, and particularly cubesats.

By Mark Carreau
Russia’s federal space agency, Roscosmos, plans to present a more defined schedule of Soyuz crew and Progress cargo mission launches and departures in support of International Space Station operations next week, after a state commission presented its findings in the failed April 28 launch of the Progress M-27M/59 resupply capsule.

Northrop Grumman is flying prototypes of a new quick-change targeting pod designed to carry multiple payloads, including a Selex-ES infrared search and track (IRST) system, and has a contract to test it on an unspecified tactical aircraft.

By Guy Norris
Boeing is accelerating production of its P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft amid mounting signs of additional international sales and solid funding for planned U.S. Navy procurement.

By Tony Osborne
Defense ministers in the Baltic States are discussing options for a joint midrange air defense system to cover the three countries to counter potential Russian aggression.

U.S. Navy Naval Air Systems Command (Navair) program managers failed to follow U.S. Navy policy concerning waivers and certification for initial operational test and evaluation (IOT&E) of the E-2D Advanced Hawkeye aircraft and the distributed targeting system for the P-8A Poseidon, the Pentagon Inspector General (IG) says.

The Los Angeles-class attack submarine SSN 754 USS Topeka arrived at its new homeport of U.S. Naval Base Guam recently – the fourth submarine assigned there.

In the wake of a recent review of U.S. Navy homeporting operations, the U.S. Government Accountability Office is calling for better accounting of the strategy.

By Graham Warwick
Google is to continue with development of a solar-powered stratospheric unmanned aircraft for Internet delivery, despite confirming the prototype crashed on its first flight in New Mexico.
Aerospace

By Mark Carreau
Mars One is pledging new transparency in its increasingly scrutinized, three-year-old, investor and reality television-based campaign to establish a small but growing permanent human settlement on the Red Planet in the late 2020s.

By Guy Norris
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden is once again warning that, unless its commercial crew efforts are fully funded in fiscal 2016, the agency will miss its 2017 deadline of using U.S. spacecraft to deliver astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS).

By Tony Osborne
BAE Systems has been awarded a £1.7 million ($2.58 million) contract to study the feasibility of a common weapon launcher capable of dropping multiple air-to-ground weapons from a single pylon.

The U.S. and its Asia-Pacific allies – like Australia, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Thailand, and the Philippines – need to change their relationships to match the times, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter says.

Scott Seymour, president and CEO of Aerojet Rocketdyne, is retiring and will be succeeded by Eileen Drake, the company’s chief operating officer. The changes take effect June 1, the company announced.

By Mark Carreau
John Grunsfeld, Steve Lindsey, Kent Rominger and Rhea Seddon were inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame on May. 30.

The guided-missile cruiser CG 62 USS Chancellorsville departed from San Diego recently for Yokosuka, Japan, where the ship will join the U.S. 7th Fleet’s Forward Deployed Naval Forces as the first forward-deployed ship fitted with the latest Aegis Baseline 9 combat system.

By Mark Carreau
The Planetary Society’s LightSail-A mission planners have plotted a possible June 2 early deployment of their novel Mylar solar propulsion technology after re-establishing contact with their tumbling, software-hobbled 3U CubeSat.