The U.S. Navy hopes to use its major 2012 Rim of the Pacific (Rimpac) exercise as a showcase for its alternative energy programs. Alternative fuels, including nuclear power, will be used in an operational demonstration starting this week, fueling helicopters and jets from the deck of an aircraft carrier, and refueling a cruiser and two destroyers during an underway replenishment. The demonstration also will incorporate prototype energy-efficient technologies designed to enhance the combat capability of Navy warships.
HOUSTON — NanoRacks, LLC, plans to improve astronaut training for its MixStix science canisters, to avoid a repeat of an activation failure involving 15 student experiments launched to the International Space Station in May.
The U.S. Navy intends to significantly increase the percentage of simulation training for its personnel — especially in aviation — in the coming years. For the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, for example, the Navy plans to increase simulated training to 32% of overall training by 2020 compared to the current 18%, according to a report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). For the EA-18G Growlers, the Navy plans to increase that percentage to 34% from the current 20% in the coming eight years, the GAO says.
Two U.S. senators are continuing the drive to pressure Congress to avoid sequestration cuts to the defense budget, arguing that lawmakers are playing chicken, or Russian roulette, with the budget and national security.
Small firm D-Star Engineering has received what appears to be the first contract, for $4.8 million, awarded under the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (IARPA) Great Horned Owl (GHO) program to develop a new class of quiet, small unmanned aircraft.
PARIS — British military demand for Skynet satellite bandwidth is expected to decline with troop drawdowns in Iraq and Afghanistan, prompting Paradigm Services, a division of EADS-Astrium, to expand its commercial offering to include civil service monitoring and data collection for government and private sector customers.
Robert Stevens, chairman and CEO of Lockheed Martin, estimates that the largest U.S. defense company could lay off 10,000 workers if $1 trillion in across-the-board federal budget cuts begin taking place as anticipated on Jan. 2, 2013. The company employs 123,000. Stevens qualified the layoff estimate as crude, but told lawmakers during a House Armed Services Committee hearing that 10,000 was the “best number I can offer.” More than 80% of Lockheed’s business is tied to the federal government — 61% of which is purely defense.
Missions requiring Special Forces work or construction needs are stressing Navy resources, but of particular consideration so is the increasing need for ships to handle BMD operations.
SINGAPORE — Pakistan is interested in acquiring some of the Australian air force’s Lockheed Martin C-130H aircraft. The Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) has 12 C-130Hs that are all due to be phased out in December as part of the Australian government’s program to cut its defense budget.
Lockheed Martin has completed its first series of captive-carry seeker tests in preparation for the first all-up-round flight test of the Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM).
The contracts provide $412 million to ULA for three Delta II launches and $82 million to SpaceX for a Falcon 9 mission, all from Vandenberg AFB, Calif., in 2014-16.
The reduction to the federal budget is set to take place unless Congress agrees to reduce the federal deficit by $1.2 trillion or passes a law replacing one already on the books.
HOT AIR: This weekend NASA will test a large, inflatable heat shield aboard a suborbital rocket launched from the agency’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The Inflatable Reentry Vehicle Experiment (IRVE-3) payload will travel through Earth’s atmosphere at Mach 5, or 3,800-7,600 mph, via a three-stage, suborbital Black Brant XI launch vehicle. After its flight, IRVE-3 will fall into the Atlantic Ocean about 350 mi. down range from Wallops. The flight is expected to take about 20 min. from launch to splashdown.
One of the biggest obstacles in pinpointing pirates in the coastal domain is trying to locate them in congested littorals and differentiate their vessels from the rest of the clutter in that environment.
SINGAPORE — Asia-Pacific nations have ordered ScanEagle UAVs from Boeing subsidiary Insitu as they seek to boost their reconnaissance and surveillance capabilities. Singapore’s navy has ordered the small UAVs, says Andrew Duggan, Pacific managing director for Insitu, adding that he could not disclose the number or their intended purpose.
Alicante, Spain — Spain might be sailing toward a financial hurricane, but the country’s new submarines are forging ahead below the turmoil. The focus of the Undersea Defense Technology show here this year was the host nation’s S-80 submarine. In the nearby Mediterranean city of Cartagena lies an assembly line of these vessels, with all four in various stages of completion at the Navantia shipyard.
While the U.S. is reconsidering a provision that requires its ready-reserve fleet (RRF) ships be managed by contractors that meet strict U.S. citizenship standards, that requirement does not violate other federal open competition contracting laws, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) says. The GAO finding came in a June agency decision denying a Maersk shipping line protest of contract offerings that included the provision.
TEL AVIV — Israel Aerospace Industries’ (IAI) new CEO, Joseph Weiss, will be sorting out four important international contracts as his first order of business, ranging from aircraft to satellite efforts. The first contract involves developing airport robotics — in particular the Taxibot aircraft tug — with Airbus. A second with Spacecom Satellite Communications is to produce the AMOS-6 communications spacecraft and ground station.
