Aircraft and ships from the U.S. and Chinese navy plan to cap off a Hawaii port visit by the Asian leader’s vessels this week with a joint search-and-rescue (SAR) exercise. The port visit and exercise underscore the commitment made by both countries to bolster their naval relationships as the U.S. refocuses on the Asia-Pacific region and China continues to flex its military maritime muscle.
SYRIAN QUESTIONS: The thorny question of U.S. military action in Syria could have wide-ranging implications for defense investors, according to Capital Alpha Partners analyst Byron Callan. “Broader opposition to U.S. military involvement in Syria could lead investors to conclude that [defense] budgets will be cut by levels mandated in the Budget Control Act,” he says of the 2011 law that introduced sequestration cuts. “Events in the coming two weeks could conclusively fracture the simplistic notion that Republicans always support higher defense spending than Democrats.
STENNIS SPACE CENTER, Miss. — Aerojet Rocketdyne expects to begin preparatory work for restarting production of all-new RS-25 engines as early as next month for future use in NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) vehicles in the 2020s.
HOUSTON — The latest suspected source of the worrisome water leak into the helmet of European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano during a July 16 spacewalk is a potentially clogged tube in the suit’s humidity removal system.
PARIS — The European Space Agency (ESA) has completed the flight model of the Near Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) instrument slated to fly aboard NASA’s next flagship astronomy mission, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). Built by EADS Astrium GmbH of Ottobrun, Germany, NIRSpec will be shipped later this month to NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., where the 200-kg (440-lb.) spectrograph will undergo additional testing prior to integration with the JWST spacecraft’s payload module.
Advanced Russian-supplied anti-ship missiles in Syria will be a force to be reckoned with, a prominent defense analyst says, and could make the U.S. rethink maritime strategy in the region. U.S. Navy officials declined to speak about anything involving operations in the tense area—and shied away especially from any military topic involving Russia—but the service’s contention throughout the years is that its ships are equipped to handle any threat they face.
TIANJIN, China — Avicopter is developing a technology demonstrator for a high-speed helicopter, adopting a compound configuration that combines coaxial rigid rotors and nose-mounted counter-rotating propellers.
Lockheed Martin has conducted the first flight test of a prototype anti-ship weapon based on its stealthy AGM-158 Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile-Extended Range (Jassm-ER). The flight was conducted on Aug. 27 under the joint Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) and Office of Naval Research (ONR) Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) program.
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicates new calendar listing.) sept. 9 - 11— Aviation Week NextGen Ahead: Air Transportation Modernization Conference, "Re-Defining NextGen," The Dupont Circle Hotel, Washington, D.C. For more information go to www.aviationweek.com/events
With the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) calling for the Pentagon to delay contract awards for the Ford-class CVN-79 aircraft carrier because of programmatic “shortfalls,” the U.S. Navy is defending the program to build the improved ships.
MINESWEEPER: The U.S. Navy successfully completed Remote Multi-Mission Vehicle (RMMV) launch handling and recovery testing at sea aboard Littoral Combat Ship USS Independence Aug. 27. The test validated design improvements in the RMMV, its recovery equipment and the ship’s twin boom extensible crane, according to the Navy. The test also demonstrated the crew’s ability to communicate with two off-board RMMVs simultaneously. The RMMV is one of the linchpins of the LCS mine countermeasures package.
While the U.S. Army and Navy are making progress on developing land- and ship-based high-energy lasers, the Air Force is struggling to define compelling operational requirements for directed-energy weapons, suggests a new report by the National Research Council (NRC).
NON-PROPRIETARY: The government push to retain data rights to the weapon systems it buys and promote open architectures to avoid overreliance on original equipment manufacturers is an undeniable trend of the future in U.S. and allied defense acquisition, claims a recently retired Pentagon official. David Van Buren, formerly U.S.
Unless Congress changes the nation’s financial course, the U.S. Navy will be forced to make some drastic cuts in aircraft and ship numbers to accommodate a loss of about $14 billion due to sequestration and other budgetary issues, says Adm. Jonathan Greenert, chief of naval operations.
The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) is recommending the U.S. Navy delay the detail design and construction contract for the Ford-class CVN-79 John F. Kennedy aircraft carrier until it sorts out some programmatic shortfalls. The Navy and Defense Department (DOD) have rejected the recommendation, which, GAO contends, is a mistake. “DOD’s current schedule for awarding this contract undermines the government’s negotiating position,” GAO says in a new report.
LOS ANGELES — Powered flight tests of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo (SS2) suborbital spaceplane resumed on Sept. 5 with a supersonic sortie over Mojave, Calif., that included the use of the tail-plane feathering re-entry system.
HOUSTON — Houston is poised to seek a commercial spaceport license from FAA to establish a runway-based complex supporting reusable launch vehicles, spacecraft assembly and flight training, as well as aerospace research and education. The proposed spaceport would occupy 439 acres of Ellington Airport property close to NASA’s Johnson Space Center.
