NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is a day away from finishing its thoroughgoing checkout period, and soon will begin driving in search of a good rock to touch with its robotic arm and analyze. Performance of the rover’s Canadian-built alpha particle X-ray spectrometer (APXS) has checked out on a sample target of polished basalt from Earth that is mounted on the rover’s deck. Plans call for Curiosity to set off Friday in search of a piece of Mars basalt to reach out and touch with the APXS sensor on the end of the rover’s robotic arm.
The high-profile military exercise Austere Challenge 12 – initially scheduled for April but postponed as Israel and the U.S. mulled Iran and their own relations – is now rescheduled for October. Although there seems to be a considerable reduction of U.S. military manpower taking part in the exercise in Israel, “Austere Challenge-12 remains the largest-ever ballistic missile defense exercise between our nations and a significant increase from the previous event in 2009,” said Air Force Lt. Col. Jack Miller, a Pentagon spokesman.
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While the Pentagon has made great strides lately in developing its UAV programs, the Defense Department needs to boost its training and simulation efforts, says a recent Defense Science Board (DSB) report. “There is no high-fidelity training environment for UAV pilots and sensor operators today,” DSB says in its “Final Report on the Role of Autonomy in Department of Defense Systems,” released in July. “There is no computer-based training system for Predator crews to operate in conjunction with real-world weapons tactics training,” DSB says.
BACK OFF: Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) has asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to back off public statements calling on President Obama to set clear conditions on when he would use the U.S. military to respond to Iranian nuclear activity. That’s an issue that Obama and GOP nominee Mitt Romney continue to disagree on. But Boxer is backing up the White House, pointing to U.S. aid for a counter-mortar system as evidence of the nation’s support for Israel.
At the Military Aviation Museum in the heart of tactical aviation country in Virginia Beach, Va., Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney told a Virginia television station Sept. 8 that if he were elected president, he’d add more fifth-generation F-22 Raptor jets. But not even all of the F-22’s allies on Capitol Hill immediately agreed that is the right course to take.
Three elements could change the march toward a conflict with Iran over its nuclear weapons program – the fall of the Syrian regime of Bashar Assad, Iran’s big supporter, and decisions by Russia and China to not pour advanced weapons into the region and to pressure Tehran to stop its indigenous development of weapons of mass destruction.
TRAINER ACCORD: Israel’s defense ministry has reached a $603 million agreement on a multiyear maintenance and support framework for the M346 jet trainer. TOR Advanced Training, a joint venture of Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and Elbit Systems, was established by Israel’s two largest defense contractors specifically for this task. Under the agreement, Elbit Systems will establish a logistical support and maintenance infrastructure over the next three years to support the operations at a cost of $110 million.
U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City Division (NSWC PCD) engineers in Florida are finding that finger skirt design improvements and a composite/aluminum hybrid lift-fan design are feasible for use on U.S. and allied Navy air cushion vehicles (ACV), service officials say. The new technologies are being developed to support the Office of Naval Research (ONR)’s Transformable Craft ‘T-Craft.’
Berlin – Details are expected to emerge this week of a joint venture between EADS and Boeing to capture work for Germany’s next-generation heavy-lift helicopter program. EADS is displaying its joint concept with Boeing , including diagrams of a proposed tandem-rotor design and a full-scale cross section of the proposed cabin for the aircraft. It looks much like an enlarged CH-47 Chinook, built by Boeing . It is likely that Boeing’s contribution to this design would be providing the tandem-rotor technology and dynamics of the aircraft.
The congressional compromise to keep the government running from the end of the fiscal year until next March stipulates that a weather satellite program should remain on schedule and blocks the Air Force from its plan to retire aircraft. The bill supports the Obama administration’s request for $88.5 billion in war funding.
When it comes to survival of the fittest in the most extreme conditions, few military groups can match the reputation of the U.S. Navy Seals. One of the most important tools in a Seal’s survival kit is a handheld GPS device, according to “The U.S. Navy Seal Survival Handbook,” recently released for review. “The GPS is just so convenient,” Don Mann, a former Seal team member, trainer and book co-author, tells Aviation Week. “In many people’s minds, the map and compass [are] obsolete.”
