GAINING CLEARANCE: The chairman and ranking Republican of the Senate government management subcommittee are pushing a bill “to eliminate delays in the security clearance process that have been a barrier to getting people to work on some of the nations most complex missions, in the government and private sector alike.” Spearheaded by Sens. Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) and George Voinovich (R-Ohio), the so-called Security Clearance Modernization and Reporting Act (S.
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) engineers plan to continue diagnosis of what appears to be a seized up wheel on the already stranded Mars rover Spirit. The new problems with the right hand side rear wheel emerged during operations to try and free Spirit from soft soil where it has been trapped since late April when it broke through an unseen crust covering an old impact crater in an area dubbed “Troy” (Aerospace DAILY, Nov. 13).
MONEY BACK: The same approach adopted by some U.S. states to help keep their roadsides free of litter may help hold down the level of orbital debris around the Earth. One of the ideas broached at a three-day conference on the problem sponsored by NASA and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is requiring satellite operators to pay a deposit before launching a new spacecraft. “If a satellite owner-operator or third party then removed the satellite from orbit, it gets the deposit back,” says Brian Weeden, technical advisor to the Secure World Foundation.
Continuing problems with a vernier thruster on its Delta II launch vehicle have delayed the start of NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Surveyor Explorer (WISE) mission until Monday, Dec. 14. Workers at Vandenberg AFB, Calif., were to replace a suspect component Dec. 11 in the thruster mechanism, which isn’t properly moving the steering jet, to clear the way for a new launch date at 9:09 a.m. EST Monday. Originally set for launch on Dec. 9, the mission has been delayed both by weather at the California site and by the thruster anomaly.
BEIJING China launched its seventh Yaogan remote sensing satellite on Dec. 9, barely a year after putting the fourth of the series into orbit. “It will be mainly used for scientific experiment, land resources survey, crop yield estimates and disaster prevention and reduction,” says the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, without mentioning potential military uses.
FLAG WAIVING: The Pentagon is waiving U.S. legal limitations on more defense items produced in the U.K. They include air circuit breakers, welded shipboard anchor and mooring chains with a diameter of four inches or less, gyrocompasses, electronic navigation chart systems, steering controls, pumps, propulsion and machinery control systems, and totally enclosed lifeboats. Such waivers are legally encouraged with favored allies like Britain, with which the U.S. has had a defense trade memorandum of understanding (MOU) since 1975.
FULL STEAM: The world market for military naval vessels and equipment is forecast at more than $200 billion over the next 10 years, according to a report by IQPC. The market includes surface combatants, submarines and underwater warfare systems, as well as weapons, sensors and C4I equipment. The largest growth will be in offshore patrol vessels, but there are also many destroyer, frigate and corvette programs under way or planned, the report says. U.S.
As the U.S. Marine Corps V-22 Osprey fleet expands, the program office asserts it is steadily tackling readiness and reliability issues that have plagued the tiltrotor aircraft, while continuing to grow the effort.
ARLINGTON, Va. — By March 10, 2010, the U.S. Air Force will have determined the scope of its next-generation UAV program, or MQ-X, according to Air Force Col. Eric Mathewson, director of the service’s UAV task force.
NASA plans to begin opening the telescope cavity door on its Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (Sofia) aircraft in-flight for the first time later this month following the successful completion of a functional check sortie from Dryden Aircraft Operations Facility in Palmdale, Calif., on Dec. 9.
The U.K. government has decided to create a dedicated space agency. Space activities had previously been coordinated by the British National Space Center (BNSC), with responsibility for budgets and policy spread among a half dozen departments, two research councils, the technology strategy board and the weather office. The new agency, announced Dec. 10 by Science and Innovation Minister Lord Paul Drayson, who is in charge of space, will replace the BNSC and bring together all the different bodies involved in space for the first time.
PARIS — France has contracted with Thales Communications and Thales Alenia Space to accelerate delivery of new medium and very high rate protected ground stations for its Syracuse III secure military communications satellite system, and to modernize an overseas communications facility for the system.
NEW YORK — Improved confidence in the performance of the U.S. Missile Defense Agency’s (MDA) new midcourse tracking anti-ballistic missile satellites is allowing Navy officials to curtail ambitious requirements for their next-generation cruiser program. This will allow for development of a less expensive system, which is more likely to garner support as the Pentagon is stretched to continue funding wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
RECEIVERS RECEIVED: Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. has delivered 18 GPS receivers to Sierra Nevada Corp. for integration in Orbcomm’s 18-spacecraft Second-Generation mobile satellite system, which provides asset tracking and other communications services. The receivers, which provide time, position and velocity data, will be used for onboard orbit determination. Sierra Nevada is prime contractor for Orbcomm 2, which is to be orbited starting late next year.
ARLINGTON, Va. — As a first step in fleshing out a new operational concept, the U.S. Army is fielding a so-called “tool kit” of small UAVs to a single brigade based in Afghanistan. The service is responding to requests from the field for Ravens to fly higher and longer, and to have the flexibility to fly a smaller platform if necessary. As the Army works its way through the official acquisition process, it is testing the concept in the field first.
MORE UTILITY: The U.S. Army has awarded EADS a $247 million, five-year contract for its Lakota Light Utility Helicopter (LUH). The contract funds Fiscal 2010 production of 45 UH-72A Lakotas to be delivered through June 2011, bringing the total Army order to 178. To date, 93 Lakotas have been delivered to the Army. A total of 345 are expected to be acquired through 2015 for Army and National Guard operations.
The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said he would like to formally seek his chamber’s ratification of export reform treaties with the U.K. and Australia, and that it would behoove the Obama administration to wrap up some lingering questions on the groundbreaking deals as soon as possible. “This has really kind of dragged on and is something we need to resolve, one way or another,” Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) said Dec. 10 to State and Justice Department officials in a hearing over the 2007 treaties. “This is overdue, in my judgment.”
Positive reports are streaming in from U.S. Marines flying newly remanufactured AH-1Z Cobra and UH-1Y Huey helicopters, but the program office is not losing focus on its substantial legacy fleet.
WASHINGTON and NEW YORK — The House and Senate have agreed on a plan to begin immediately funding a land-based Aegis missile defense test bed in Hawaii, and the U.S. Navy has stepped up to manage the mission. The so-called Aegis Ashore program was conceptualized to provide a land-based ballistic missile defense system for the protection of Europe from Iranian weapons. With a goal of flight testing the land-based SM-3 missile in Fiscal 2012 and fielding in Europe three years later, the program appears to be on the fast track.
The U.S. Coast Guard is slowly narrowing the gap between the time it spends on homeland security and other missions, according to data gathered by the Department of Homeland Security Inspector General (DHS IG).
