To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicated new calendar listing.) Dec. 8 - 10 — Military Vehicle Maintenance Summit, “Closing the Loop for the Entire Family of Military Vehicles.” For more information go to www.idga.org/us/vehiclemaintenance Dec. 8 - 10 — 8th Annual NGMD ‘08 - Next Generation Materials for Defense, Hilton Arlington, Arlington, Va. For more information go to www.idga.org/us/NGMD
ARMING UP: Pakistan is emerging as the launch export customer for Brazil’s MAR-1 anti-radiation missile (ARM) — though which aircraft the missile is to be integrated on remains to be determined. Brazilian press reports quoted Defense Minister Nelson Jobim as confirming that agreement had provisionally been reached in April for a deal worth $108 million. The sale of 100 missiles appears to have been approved by the Brazilian government at the start of December. Development of the MAR-1 medium-range ARM has likely been underway for at least a decade.
NASA managers have scheduled the STS-125 mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope on May 12, 2009, in the belief that they will be able to flight-qualify a critical spare part in time to meet that date.
BRITISH UNION: The Defense Manufacturers Association on Dec. 3 followed its prospective British lobby group partner in approving a membership ballot on the proposed merger with the Society of British Aerospace Companies (SBAC). The SBAC gave the go-ahead for a ballot of its members at the end of November. The ballots are expected to be acted on early in 2009. Some trade groups around Washington similarly have been merging as industry looks to bolster its voice in governments facing economic and budgetary pressures (Aerospace DAILY, Dec. 27, 2007).
Heavy turbulence thwarted the second attempt to fly the first General Atomics Predator B unmanned air vehicle (UAV) to Grand Forks Air Force Base, N.D., Dec. 5 for duty patrolling the U.S.-Canadian border. The 64-foot wingspan UAV turned back before noon because of rough air about 300 miles north of Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) Air & Marine’s UAV base in Sierra Vista, Ariz., said Juan Munoz Torres, a CBP spokesman. Better weather conditions were forecast for a third attempt on Dec. 6, he said.
ELECTRONIC ATTACK: The U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) has launched a competition to demonstrate a multi-shot, multi-target aerial high-power microwave (HPM) platform capable of degrading or destroying enemy electronics. Proposals for the 36-month, $40-million Counter-Electronics HPM Advanced Missile Project (CHAMP) technology demonstration are due by Jan 15. The winner will supply five unmanned air vehicles for ground and flight testing.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are prompting simulator manufacturers to exploit a range of technological advances to give U.S. and Canadian army helicopter pilots the capability to train and rehearse missions as realistically as possible. With the U.S. military being forced to rely more heavily on simulation for training, helicopter simulation is a growing area of business for Rockwell Collins Simulation & Training Solutions in Binghamton, N.Y., and Canada’s CAE.
ARIANE CHOSEN: Arianespace has been selected to launch ViaSat-1, a 6 metric-ton 100 Mbps broadband satellite to be orbited in the first half of 2011 to bring affordable Internet access to underserved users throughout North America. The Paris-based launch provider has nabbed 11 contracts so far in 2008, within one of the figure anticipated by Chairman/CEO Jean-Yves Le Gall earlier this year.
ROLLING ON: Rolls-Royce has announced the appointment of Anil Shrikhande as president of all Rolls-Royce operations and activities in India and South Asia. “The appointment reinforces the company’s commitment to India as an important center for sourcing, technology services and product development and also reflects India’s importance as a long-term market for all its four businesses – civil aerospace, defense aerospace, marine and energy,” Rolls-Royce said in a statement. Before joining Rolls-Royce, Shrikhande held a number of executive positions at Boeing.
CALLED UP: Canada is to send eight of its Bell CH-146 Griffon utility helicopters to Afghanistan to escort six Boeing CH-47D Chinooks being acquired from the U.S. Army. The Griffons will be equipped with a new electro-optical/infrared sensor and enhanced door gun, and will be stripped of nonessential equipment to improve hot-and-high performance. The Griffons, Chinooks and leased IAI Heron unmanned air vehicle are to be operational with the Joint Task Force Afghanistan - Air Wing by February 2009.
Acquisition professionals are facing continued challenges in work force and oversight in 2009, while battling decreased public and professional confidence in the acquisition work force, according to the latest report commissioned by the Professional Services Council (PSC) trade group.
The terrorist attacks in Mumbai last week are likely to spur copycat incidents, according to counterterrorism and south Asia experts. “Every terrorist group in the world watched those 60 hours [on TV],” says Bruce Reidel, a former National Security Council adviser who is now a Middle East and South Asia analyst at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. “You’re going to see copycats like crazy,” Reidel told Aerospace DAILY Dec. 3 after speaking at a Brookings forum on the attacks that left more than 170 dead and hundreds injured.
YOU’RE INVITED: NASA will show off its Northrop Grumman Global Hawk unmanned high-altitude, long-endurance aircraft to dignitaries and the media Jan. 15 at Dryden Flight Research Center in Edwards, Calif. The aircraft were transferred from the U.S. Air Force to NASA Dryden in 2007, the first and sixth built under the original development program sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. NASA and Northrop Grumman signed a Space Act Agreement in 2008 and are preparing the two Global Hawks for flight in the spring of 2009.
The vice chief of the U.S. Army, Gen. Peter Chiarelli, says he expects the armed service’s Future Combat Systems (FCS) to continue to come under spending scrutiny, but that the Army is working to shore up its defense of the controversial program.
LONDON – Britain is deferring integration of the Meteor radar-guided air-to-air missile (AAM) on the Typhoon fighter, with no replacement to meet the previous in-service date of 2013 yet identified. The United Kingdom is the lead nation on the rocket-ramjet powered Meteor AAM. The other three Eurofighter Typhoon partners – Germany, Italy and Spain – are participating in the Meteor development program, as are France and Sweden.
BOOSTER TEST: A Dec. 4 hot-fire test of a 7.5-year-old reusable solid rocket motor (RSRM) for NASA’s space shuttle program also produced acoustic data for the Ares I crew launch vehicle program, which is using a five-segment version of the four-segment RSRM as its first stage. ATK Launch Systems ran the two-minute test at its facility in the Utah desert, tracking 385 instrument channels to meet 55 test objectives. NASA will use the data as it modifies Launch Complex 39B at Kennedy Space Center to accommodate the new launch vehicle.
POLISH DEAL: Czech aircraft and aerostructures maker Aero Vodochody has submitted a purchase offer for PZL-Swidnik, the Polish helicopter company. The move is part of Aero Vodochody’s strategy to expand its business through strategic investments in the Czech Republic and other east-central European states. The Polish government says it’s looking to unload the 88 percent stake it holds in PZL-Swidnik. AgustaWestland holds 6 percent of the remaining shares. Aero Vodochody says it would support the Polish company’s independence and helicopter development activities.
Aircraft will be among the first equipment purchased by Mexico with funds provided by the U.S. government under the Merida Initiative to provide assistance in combating drug trafficking in the region. The initial $197 million of $400 million in fiscal 2008 funds approved by Congress for the initiative were released on Dec. 3 after the signing of a letter of agreement between the Mexican and U.S. governments.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) still hopes to regain the capability lost when it canceled the Hyperspectral Environmental Suite (HES) on its upcoming next-generation Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-R) system.
Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), a nuclear-powered rover the size of a small car, will be leaving for the Red Planet in 2011 instead of 2009, as persistent technical problems have pushed its development schedule to the breaking point.
IT’S OFFICIAL: Despite having pursued a strategy of irregular warfare (IW) for the past several years, DOD only officially codified its practices in a directive released Dec. 1. The directive outlines roles and responsibilities of each military service in the practice of IW. Pentagon spokesperson Bryan Whitman said directives take several years to issue and are an overarching guide under which official instructions and doctrinal manuals of individual services fall.
THALES STAKE: The French government and Dassault Aviation have made it clear that a bid by Dassault to acquire a 20.8 percent stake in Thales held by Alcatel-Lucent will not – at least for the foreseeable future – lead to a Thales takeover. France’s market watchdog, the AMF, ruled this week that Dassault will not have to make a tender for all remaining Thales shares, as it would normally have to do for a share purchase of this size. Such a tender would cost almost 8 billion euros ($10 billion).
JUST A TADS: Lockheed Martin has received a $16.9 million contract to begin modernization of the final portion of the U.S. Army’s Apache helicopter Modernized Target Acquisition Designation Sight (M-TADS) system. Under the three-year deal, the company will modernize the Laser Transceiver Unit in the Apache’s legacy Day Sensor Assembly (DSA) and associated electronics. The objective is to modernize the entire DSA system and increase the M-TADS/Pilot Night Vision Sensors’ ability to fully accommodate future weapons.
