The Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) 3 Fort Worth’s MH-60R Sea Hawk helicopter and MQ-8B Fire Scout UAV are proving to be the stars during the ship’s Western Pacific deployment.
The LPD 20 USS Green Bay departed San Diego earlier this month for Sasebo, Japan, where the San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock ship will join the U.S. 7th Fleet’s Forward Deployed Naval Forces.
Eleven military personnel were killed and 21 others injured in the crash of a Greek air force F-16 Fighting Falcon during a NATO exercise in Spain that also damaged or destroyed several aircraft on the ground.
Commercial Crew Transportation Capability contracts awarded to the two companies in September – $4.2 billion to Boeing and $2.6 billion to SpaceX – will lead to an average per seat cost of $58 million versus the $76 million currently charged by Russia for three-seat Soyuz flights.
CAE is to take over running the NATO Flying Training in Canada (NFTC) program following its agreement to acquire Bombardier’s military aircraft training business for C$19.8 million ($15.4 million).
The competition to build South Korea’s proposed KF-X indigenous fighter will probably come down to price, putting Korean Airlines at an advantage, according to a government official.
The Planetary Society is preparing for the first test flight of its LightSail experiment in May, which is designed to assess the deployment mechanism for the four-part, 344-sq.-ft. Mylar sail from a three-unit CubeSat.
The project could give partners Lockheed Martin and Kaman an opportunity to demonstrate the combat-tested K-Max unmanned helicopter to a potential civilian government customer.
Russia will combine the functions of its Roscosmos space agency with the holdings of United Rocket and Space Corp. (URSC) to create a massive state-owned entity that consolidates most of Russia’s space sector.
While U.S. Navy officials say their growing focus on a smaller, dispersed surface force that will provide “distributive lethality” is global in nature, some naval strategists are emphasizing the potential success of the strategy against China in the Asia-Pacific region.
The Pentagon says the new defense cooperation agreements between the U.S. and India are “groundbreaking” and represent an important milestone in the U.S.-India strategic partnership.
Michael Gazarik, the first head of NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, will leave the agency at the end of February to become the director of Ball Aerospace’s Office of Technology. In that role Gazarik will “lead the alignment of Ball’s technology development resources with business development and growth strategies,” the Boulder, Colorado-based company stated Jan 22.
North America At a press conference on Jan. 15, U.S. Air Force (USAF) officials affirmed their commitment to achieving initial operating capability with the F-35A between August and December 2016. The schedule has been placed in doubt because USAF has not succeeded in implementing a clear strategy to make available the ~1,000 maintenance personal required to support the new fleet.
ALLIANT TECHNSYSTEMS (ATK) Board has established Feb. 2 as record date for previously announced spin-off of its Sporting Group business, which will then be followed by the merger of ATK AEROSPACE & DEFENSE and ORBITAL SCIENCES CORP. IKONICS and HONEYWELL announced an extension to their collaboration on MEMS technology for DARPA. GE AVIATION earned $4.97b on $24b sales in 2014 vs. $4.35b on $21.9b in 2013.
SpaceX has agreed to drop its lawsuit against the U.S. Air Force. In return, the service is vowing to increase the number of launches it plans to compete.
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicates new calendar listing.) Feb. 2-3 — Aviation Week MRO Middle East, Dubai World Trade Center, Dubai, UAE. For more information go to www.aviationweek.com/events Feb. 4-5 — 18th Annual FAA Commercial Space Transportation Conference, National Housing Center, Washington, D.C. For more information go to www.faacst2015/com
Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman each have formed teams to plan for these so-called sixth-generation fighter competitions, though actual developments — and real funds — are not likely to surface for years.
Ankara wants six new helicopters in a troop transport configuration to operate from the new vessel, which will be based on Spanish shipbuilder Navantia’s Juan Carlos I helicopter carrier design but built by the Sedef shipyard in Istanbul.
In response to a recent Pentagon report questioning the testing, reliability and readiness of certain equipment and systems aboard the next-generation CVN 78 Ford-class aircraft carrier, the U.S. Navy says its own analysis shows the ship will prove to be a success.
The unannounced contract, signed in December, builds on the defense ministry’s ongoing Project Julius that aims to bring the U.K.’s Chinook transport helicopter fleet to the same standard with new engines, and a new cockpit avionics suite based on Thales TopDeck system.
The German-built Framing Camera on NASA’s Dawn asteroid-belt probe could deliver its first images of the dwarf planet Ceres as early as this week that have a resolution better than has been achieved with the Hubble Space Telescope.
After booking several missions on SpaceX rockets, Luxembourg-based fleet operator SES has returned to European launch consortium Arianespace to orbit its first all-electric communications satellite.
