FARNBOROUGH — Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL) says Britain’s new spaceport initiative could lower the cost of launching small satellites and help stimulate the nation’s budding space economy, which the government expects to grow to £40 billion ($68 billion) by 2020.
U.S. defense officials and executives must figure out how to shepherd more industrial consolidation, bring more commercial technology into the defense sector, and embrace the notion that the business model of providing national security is becoming more global in character, according to a former No. 2 Pentagon official. William Lynn III, CEO of Finmeccanica North America and DRS Technologies, and President Barack Obama’s first deputy defense secretary, says that in the future the West’s defense industry could come to look a lot like the auto industry.
Rockwell Collins’s research into detect-and-avoid technologies for non-cooperative aerial targets, a key safety requirement for unmanned aircraft systems (UAS), received a boost with the company winning a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) contract for new radar technology.
COMMERCIAL CARGO: Orbital Sciences’ next commercial cargo launch to the International Space Station using its Antares/Cygnus system is set for July 13 at 12:52 p.m. EDT from Wallops Island, Va. The launch of Orb-2 was postponed 24 hr. because of weather-related interruptions in launch preparation. If the mission launches on schedule, the unmanned Cygnus capsule will arrive at the station July 16 carrying 3,300 lb. of supplies, including research investigations, crew provisions, hardware and science experiments.
Chicago-based Sciaky will market the large-component additive manufacturing system it has been using to provide rapid prototyping services for aerospace applications, enabling other companies to build parts as long as 19 ft. from titanium, tantalum, stainless steel or Inconel with the technique.
Honeywell company UOP’s biofuel process technology is to be used to produce renewable jet fuel and diesel at a refinery being built in Fujirah, United Arab Emirates (UAE) at a cost of over $800 million. UOP’s hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids (HEFA) pathway will be used to process about 500,000 metric tons of renewable feedstock a year, half the planned capacity of the plant, which is being built by Dubai-based Petrixo Oil & Gas.
PARIS — Four small broadband satellites built for fleet operator O3b Networks were launched July 10 atop a European variant of Russia’s Soyuz rocket from the Guyana Space Center in Kourou. Based in Britain’s Channel Islands, O3b aims to provide low-cost, high-speed Ka-band Internet access to “the other 3 billion” potential broadband consumers in equatorial countries where broadband access is rarely available.
Ships in the George Washington Carrier Strike Group (GWCSG) recently completed an undersea warfare exercise (Uswex) that combined vessel and aviation antisubmarine (ASW) platforms. Uswex was the arena that gave GWCSG, MH-60R Seahawks from the Saberhawks of Maritime Strike Squadron 77, and P-3C Orions and P-8 Poseidons from Commander, Patrol and Reconnaissance Force (Patreconfor) 7th Fleet an opportunity to improve coordination to combat a simulated opposing force, Navy officials say.
Japan has given a hint about the likely configuration of its proposed amphibious landing ships, with Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera and other officials visiting a U.S. Navy Wasp-class vessel in San Diego. Amid a general strengthening of the Japanese navy’s aviation capabilities, there seems to be significance in the decision to inspect the USS Makin Island, one of the U.S. Navy’s assault ships configured with an island superstructure and full-length flight deck.
The Vietnamese army has grounded its fleet of Mi-171 helicopters pending the result of an investigation into a fatal Mi-171 crash just outside Hanoi. The July 7 crash killed 16 people outright and seriously injured five. Two of the injured have since died in the hospital.
