Airbus Military’s A400M airlifter has taken another step toward certification with the completion of 300 hr. of Function and Reliability (F&R) trials. The trials, stipulated by the European Aviation Safety Agency, (EASA) expose the aircraft to the rigors of day-to-day flying. They were successfully completed over 32 days on Dec. 7 by the company’s first production-representative aircraft – MSN6 or “Grizzly 5.” Data from the trials is now being examined by EASA and OCCAR, the European armament cooperation agency.
AIR FORCE Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co., Fort Worth, (FA8604-13-D-7951) is being awarded a $29,446,000 requirements contract for Engineering and Technical services for the F-16 and F-22 aircraft. The location of the performance is Bahrain, Chile, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Oman, Pakistan, Poland, Taiwan and Turkey. The work is expected to be completed by Dec. 31, 2014. The contracting activity is AFLCMC/PZIEB, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio. The contract involves Foreign Military Sales.
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicates new calendar listing.) Dec. 11 - 13 — Middle East Business Aviation (MEBA) 2012, Al Maktoum International Airport, Dubai World Central, UAE. For more information go to http://www.meba.aero/. Jan. 7 - 10, 2013 — 61st AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting, New Horizons Forum and Aerospace Exposition, Gaylord Texan Hotel and Convention Center, Grapevine (Dallas/Ft. Worth Region), Tex. For more information go to www.aiaa.org/asm2013/
PARIS – Infrared sensor manufacturer Sofradir will acquire the IR detector facilities of Sagem and Thales, fortifying Sofradir’s position as a player in the global infrared imaging market.
March 5-6 2013 Hilton Arlington Arlington, VA Join senior defense officials and discover where priorities and opportunities exist beyond the FY 2014 budget and hear First-hand how programs are implementing affordable and effective designs! Register now at www.aviationweek.com/events/dtar Click here to view the pdf
LONDON – BAE Systems has begun test flights of the first aircraft in the latest batch of Eurofighter Typhoon jets destined for the Royal Saudi Air Force. The aircraft – a two-seater – first flew from the company’s facilities at Warton in Lancashire at the beginning of December and is one of a small set of six twin-stick aircraft which will be delivered to Saudi Arabia next year. The six aircraft will be followed by the remaining 42 Typhoons ordered as part of Riyadh’s Al-Salam deal, which will see 72 Typhoons delivered to the country.
Golden Spike Company, a startup initiated by former NASA Associate Administrator Alan Stern, has gathered a group of aerospace companies and spaceflight experts to mount commercial human missions to the Moon. Prices for a two-person surface sortie would start at $1.4 billion, according to Stern, who sees a market in national space agencies, corporations and scientific research.
ABOARD THE USS FREEDOM — The skipper is smiling, cautiously. The first Littoral Combat Ship (LCS-1), the USS Freedom, is pushing off from a U.S. Navy pier in San Diego a few minutes before schedule, and Cmdr. Tim Wilke, the ship’s commanding officer, knows that the early departure is a big deal. “We finished everything on time,” he says. “We got under way on time. Those are the highlights.”
CYBER STEP: The divide causing cybersecurity legislation to stall in the Senate hinges on whether or not the government can direct private companies to share information about attacks. But the Senate’s version of the fiscal 2013 defense authorization bill will take a limited step in that direction. The bill includes a provision that will require defense contractors to report breaches of their network and the loss of information on sensitive programs.
The Pentagon’s warnings to North Korea not to replicate an April satellite launch this month come as U.S. defense officials are delaying the Missile Defense Agency’s (MDA) next planned flight test of the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system, which has not achieved a successful intercept since 2008.
Stratolaunch, the launch-services startup bankrolled by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, has opened discussions with Orbital Sciences Corp. about modifying one of its rockets for air-launch from the giant airplane it is building with parts from two surplus Boeing 747s. The company turned to Orbital after SpaceX concluded that making the necessary modifications to its Falcon launcher — the original choice for the concept — would not make business sense.
LONDON — The introduction into service of the MDBA Meteor air-to-air missile has moved another step closer with the first firing of the weapon from a Eurofighter Typhoon. A single Meteor was launched from the BAE Systems-operated Instrumented Production Aircraft (IPA) 6 during a sortie from the company’s facility at Warton in Lancashire on Dec. 4. The weapon was ejected from one of the aircraft’s rear semi-conformal missile stations and follows a series of trials involving unpowered missiles which demonstrated safe separation of the weapon.
The U.S. Air Force is scrapping a troubled $1 billion, seven-year effort to overhaul and modernize its management of logistics — and Senate Armed Services Committee leaders want to know who to hold accountable.
NASA needs a revamp of its strategic plan that follows from a new national consensus on what the agency’s primary mission should be, and what resources it needs to achieve it, according to new reports from the Space Foundation and the National Research Council (NRC).
SHIFTING SEATS: Sen. Jim DeMint (S.C.), who was preparing to lead Republicans on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, now plans to leave the Senate in January. That leaves the committee in need of a ranking member. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), is next in line. “There is a process for these assignments that will play out, and I look forward to discussing this development with my colleagues on the Commerce Committee,” Thune says in a statement. Thune leads the aviation subcommittee. DeMint was in line to replace Sen.
Powerful solar storms are an imperfectly understood threat to the world’s power grids, but one with the potential for economic damage so catastrophic that the estimated $100-$200 million it would cost annually to deploy an operational space-weather warning system could be trivial by comparison.
With less than a month to go before the budget penalty known as sequestration could kick in, the Obama administration has dropped another edict on the table: everyone start planning now. Administration officials maintain that the goal is unchanged: Sequestration should be avoided. It’s the directive to start detailed planning that is the big change.
