CASELLE, Italy As production on the C-27J continues at Alenia Aeronautica’s plant here, the company is already eyeing potential upgrades to improve the tactical airlifter’s performance. U.S. C-27J No. 4 will be delivered to the Pentagon in March. It will be the final aircraft included among the first four C-27Js headed to Iraq in the fall.
A&D Programs Conference November 2-4, 2009 Phoenix, AZ A&D Finance Conference December 2-3, 2009 New York, NY Defense Technology & Requirements Conference February 17-18, 2010 Washington, D.C. AVIATION WEEK Laureates Awards March 17, 2010 Washington, D.C. Mark your calendars for AVIATION WEEK’s A&D Event Series! www.aviationweek.com/events
The Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) has completed the first phase of Highly Accelerated Life Testing (HALT) and the second phase of System Functional Demonstration (SFD) commissioning, the U.S. Navy announced Sept. 28. HALT testing gauges the EMALS launch motor’s ability to operate in simulated at-sea environmental conditions onboard the carrier. HALT also supplies the system’s engineers with data necessary to verify EMALS’ peak performance, even in extreme conditions.
WestWind Technologies is opening a new 65,000-square-foot building Sept. 29 at Huntsville International Airport in Alabama, for which the company plans to pursue modification and integration work on C-130s, as well as for fixed-wing commercial aircraft. The facility primarily will service the company’s existing rotorcraft customers, but it is large enough to accommodate two C-130-sized aircraft, representative Barbara Nash says.
AIR FORCE Integral Systems Inc. of Columbia, Md., was awarded a $77,662,446 contract which will implement the restructure of the rapid attack, identification, detection and reporting system block-10 program from a six fixed and three deployable site configuration to a five transportable system construct. At this time, $27,740,754 has been obligated. SMC/SYSW/PK of El Segundo, Calif., is the contracting activity (FA8819-05-C-0018).
As the U.S. Army begins to map out its modernization strategy for 2010, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) is recommending the service address challenges including funding levels, demand from the field and a joint future lift program.
ARMY Critical Solutions International Inc., Dallas, Texas, was awarded on Sept. 21, 2009, a $259,877,400 firm-fixed-priced-contract for 150 vehicle mounted mine detectors without mine detonation trailer set. The work is to be performed in Gauteng, South Africa, with an estimated completion date of December 2012. One bid was solicited with one bid received. TACOM-Warren, AMSCC-TAC-ADCB, Warren, Mich., is the contracting activity (W56HZV-08-D-0001). NAVY
HART BEAT: A system for commanding multiple unmanned aircraft, managing airspace, and geo-registering and disseminating the downlinked video to meet individual requests for imagery from multiple users is to be transitioned to the theater next year after successful demonstrations under the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Heterogeneous Airborne Reconnaissance Team (HART) program. Developed by Northrop Grumman, HART allows the tasking of multiple different unmanned aircraft without modification of the air vehicle or its ground station.
TOUGH BREAKS: The global market for anti-ship missiles is worth $7 billion through 2018 and will involve the production of nearly 12,000 weapons, according to Forecast International. MBDA, Europe’s leading missile maker, could make more money than Boeing, around $724 million, analysts predict. A tight budget and other problems have prompted the U.S. Navy to drop plans to purchase the Harpoon III anti-ship missile, and while the blow is significant to the marketplace, it’s not fatal. The anti-ship missile market is in transition, according to Forecast.
JF-17 BIDDING: Pakistan seems to be canvassing Western suppliers anew for avionics and weapon systems to equip its version of the Sino-Pakistani JF-17 Thunder combat aircraft. Initial bids for the JF-17 were sought several years ago, but the plane’s developers apparently believe more capabilities are needed for the aircraft, which entered production in Pakistan in July. According to French reports, several Western suppliers have been solicited, including South Africa’s ATE and Astrac, a joint venture of Thales and Sagem. Neither company would comment on the reports.
LANDING AID: Temeku Technologies will design, build and deliver in April 2011 a production representative model of a multi-function display to aid landings on aircraft carriers under an $11.7 million U.S. Navy contract. The large shipboard display will combine several existing visual landing aids into one presentation with horizon reference display bar, deck status indication and pilot visual cues for the Aircraft Ship Integrated Secure and Traverse System.
GEAR CHANGE: The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Vulcan program to demonstrate constant-volume combustion (CVC) engine technology is dramatically shifting direction. Citing “compelling results” from a business-case analysis, Phases 2 and 3 of the program will shift focus from a turbojet/CVC combined-cycle engine for a high-Mach aircraft to a CVC combustor retrofit for marine gas turbines powering U.S. Navy ships.
OUT TO SEA: SES has become the latest satellite operator to enter the booming maritime mobile satellite service (MSS) market. SES said this week that it has begun offering MSS capacity to commercial fleets and yachts in the North and Baltic Seas and the northern Mediterranean through its Astra2Connect interactive broadband service. The operator also struck deals with KNS Inc. to develop new stabilized antennas for maritime use and with U.K.-based H2OSatellite to distribute the service in Europe.
PARIS NATO has rounded up the signatures for 15 countries that will participate in the Allied Ground Surveillance program, an effort to field unmanned aircraft fitted with a ground target tracking radar. A program contract is due next year. Bulgaria, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Norway, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and the United States are the project participants. Other countries can still join, NATO says. NATO lost a few participants owing to budget pressures during the last round of talks.
MOROCCAN PODS: The Royal Moroccan Air Force’s newly purchased F-16 Block 50 aircraft soon will be flying with Lockheed Martin Sniper Advanced Targeting Pods (ATPs) under a $30 million foreign military sales contract. The Sniper pods will include a video downlink that relays high-resolution, streaming video to forward-deployed forces for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and rapid target coordination via the Rover ground receiver.
TWIN TANKERS?: Could Boeing offer both the KC-767 and KC-777 against Northrop Grumman/EADS’s Airbus A330-based tanker for the U.S. Air Force’s KC-X requirement? The company says it’s reviewing the draft request for proposals released on Sep. 25 (Aerospace DAILY, Sept. 25) to “help us decide which plane to offer or whether to offer both planes.”
SATELLITE LOBBY: EchoStar, Intelsat, SES and Telesat have banded together for a U.S. commercial satellite services lobbying group led by former Sen. John Warner (R-Va.), once a powerful chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. “We call on the Defense Department, the State Department and other national security arms of our executive branch to take a new look at our country’s launch vehicle capabilities and relevant export control policies,” Warner says. “Current U.S.
The U.S. Missile Defense Agency’s Space Tracking and Surveillance System (STSS) Demo mission launched aboard a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Delta II rocket from Space Complex 17B at Cape Canaveral Sept. 25 following two days of launch scrubs.
Beyond the opening statement that the campaign in Afghanistan has been under-resourced and remains so, the new assessment of the war put together by Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, commander of the NATO International Security Assistance Force and U.S. Forces, Afghanistan, reveals a number of basic planning details.
TRYING AGAIN: Masten Space Systems plans to try again in October to qualify for prizes under the NASA-sponsored Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge prize competition. The company unsuccessfully attempted to meet the contest’s “Level 1” requirements for simulating a lunar landing on Sept. 16 in Mojave, Calif. The vehicle must lift off from a concrete pad, ascend to 50 meters, travel horizontally to land on a second pad after remaining aloft at least 90 seconds, then refuel and make the reverse trip within two and a half hours.
PAN WORKING: Lockheed Martin says the A2100-based PAN satellite it built for a classified U.S. government mission is performing “as required” following its Sept. 8 launch by a United Launch Alliance Atlas V 401 from Cape Canaveral (Aerospace DAILY, Sept. 10).
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicates new calendar listing.) Sept. 28 - 30 — Unmanned Systems Summit 2009, “The Roadmap to Remoting Combat Tasks: Advances in Autonomy, Functionality, and Adaptability,” Washington, DC Metro Area. For more information go to www.unmannedsystemsevent.com
