WALLOPS OPS: NASA has authorized Orbital Sciences Corp. to begin operations at the new launch pad built for its Antares rocket at the Mid Atlantic Regional Spaceport on Wallops Island, Va., although the state-owned facility still awaits space-agency certification for launches. Orbital and NASA plan to use Antares and the unmanned Cygnus capsule for commercial cargo deliveries to the International Space Station, with a first flight tentatively scheduled before the end of the year.
Securely transporting data is proving to be a costly mission for the U.S. Navy, and a recent government report says the service needs to do a better job. “Telecommunications services,” which include data storage on tapes, compact disks and other devices, ranked 12th among all Navy expenses between 1999 and 2009 with about $8.2 billion in contracts and contract modifications, according to an exclusive Aviation Week Intelligence Network (AWIN) analysis of contracting data aggregated by the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting.
A Sept. 27 story misidentified the origin of the algorithms tested for NASA’s recent sense-and-avoid flights; they were developed by Mitre and the University of North Dakota. North Dakota State University is working on the compact ADS-B devices.
CENTER DIRECTORS: Two NASA field centers will have new directors now that former Marshall Space Flight Center Robert Lightfoot has taken over as the No. 3 manager at agency headquarters. Lightfoot, who has been acting associate administrator since March 5, will take on that job permanently. Stennis Space Center Director Patrick Scheuermann will move to Marshall as director, and his deputy at Stennis, Richard Gilbrech, becomes the director of that field center. All three changes were effective last week.
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicates new calendar listing.) Oct. 1 - 5 — 63rd International Astronautical Congress, Naples IAC 2012, Mostra D'Oltremare, Naples, Italy. For more information go to www.iafastro.org. oct. 2 - 4 — Worldwide Business Research's Conference on Future Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance, Hotel Le Plaza, Brussels. For more information go to www.futureisr.com
French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian unveiled a 2013 budget Sept. 28 that freezes defense spending at the 2012 level of €31.4 billion ($40 billion) while awaiting completion of a forthcoming defense strategy and new military program law early next year. Launched in July 2012, the new planning document “will end the gap between strategy and unrealistic spending,” the ministry stated in a news release.
The Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser CG-68USS Anzio conducted a Standard Missile-2 (SM-2) launch Sept. 21 and live-fire gunnery practice during a drone exercise supporting Unitas Atlantic 53-12, a regional drill including the U.S. and its South American allies hosted by the U.S. Fourth Fleet.
The U.S. Air Force is beginning to sift through all the exotic weapons, materials and electronics in development and prototype programs and find a place for the most promising of them as operational tools in as little as 3-5 years. The focus of the work will be to develop, in parallel, the materials, tactics and training to make the weaponry effective in combat. The effort is being designed to counter foes who are themselves fielding a new generation of weapons that include advanced jamming, stealth and cyberattack capabilities.
Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney may be winning support from hawks in his party with a call to spend 4% of GDP on defense. But Democrats including former President Bill Clinton are hammering away at the fact that the plan would increase federal spending more than $2 trillion over 10 years at a time when the rest of the government is shrinking.
The Pentagon this month awarded fuel contracts potentially worth up to $5.1 billion to 16 companies out of a field of 27 contractors that competed for the deals. All of the awards feature fixed price with economic price adjustment, indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity contracts. The contracting authority is the Defense Logistics Agency Energy of Fort Belvoir, Va.
UAS CAUCUS: As concerns about privacy and security begin to weigh on the launch of unmanned aerial systems (UAS) in civilian airspace, the Senate is forming a bipartisan UAS Caucus to help smooth the industry’s takeoff. Aviation enthusiast Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) are leading the effort to move the industry out of the civilian world and into the hands of businesses and state and local governments across the U.S.
The newly formed LCS (Littoral Combat Ship) Council will help fill in any gaps hampering fleet development and deployment, according to the organization’s charter, released this week by the U.S. Navy. One of the council’s main missions will be to ensure the deployment of LCS-1, the USS Freedom, to Singapore this coming spring.
Scientists examining data from NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover have concluded that imagery from three sites on the floor of Gale Crater represents rocks deposited there by water flowing down from the crater wall, probably billions of years ago.
FIRST FLIGHT: The first modernized Ilyushin Il-76MD-90A military heavy lifter, also known as Il-476, made its 40-min. first flight at Ulyanovsk on Sept. 22. The prototype, bearing the tail number RA-78650, was rolled out on July 5 and has already performed ground tests. According to industry sources, after several flights in Ulyanovsk the aircraft will be flown to Zhukovsky, near Moscow, to continue flight trials. It is the first aircraft of this type assembled in Russia, as all earlier Il-76 modifications have been manufactured in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.
HOUSTON — The already delayed departure of the European Space Agency’s ATV-3 cargo capsule from the International Space Station has been reset for Sept. 28 at the earliest to accommodate a potential station maneuver to steer clear of Russian satellite and Indian rocket debris. The avoidance maneuver of the station and its three-person crew was scheduled for Sept. 27 at 8:12 a.m. EDT, or about 2 1⁄2 hr. ahead of the projected closest approach of the satellite debris.
An industry team says that a protected satellite communications family of terminals has been developed at no cost to the U.S. Defense Department and is ready for production once a government agency certifies its cryptological system.
MOSCOW — Irkut Corporation has begun flight tests of the twin-seat Sukhoi Su-30SM multirole fighter. The first aircraft made its 2-hr. first flight on Sept. 21; the second fighter joined the flight tests on Sept. 25, says Irkut, a subsidiary of Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation.
TOULOUSE, France — With the proposed merger of EADS and BAE Systems facing serious opposition by the German government, which has indicated it may block the deal if its conditions are not met, EADS CEO Tom Enders is offering to negotiate further details of the transaction.
