TOKYO — A lot of attention is paid to Japan’s F-X and F-XX fighter programs, but of more lasting importance is its work in shaping an air arm that can support allied military operations in places like Iraq or the Indian Ocean, or humanitarian aid and disaster relief virtually anywhere. In an exclusive interview with Aviation Week, Col. Tanotsu Kidono, head of the Japanese Air Self Defense Force (JASDF) air staff’s Defense Plans, Policies and Programs Division, discussed tankers, transports and patrol aircraft.
U.S. defense contractors continue to post healthy sales and profits, even as they warily eye an uncertain future thanks to the economic downturn and proposed cutbacks in the U.S. defense budget. L-3 Communications beat analysts’ expectations with a 6 percent rise in second-quarter sales over last year to $3.9 billion. Net income fell $50 million to $225 million. The company revised its full-year earnings guidance up to between $7.25 and $7.35 earnings per share, on net sales of between $15.5 billion and $15.7 billion.
Boeing has completed the first flight of the first F/A-18F for the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), after its July 8 unveiling. The flight lasted more than an hour and took place from Lambert International Airport, Mo., near Boeing’s St. Louis facilities. Boeing says the aircraft will be delivered before August, which the company says is three months early (Aerospace DAILY, July 9). The next milestone looms in March when the first Super Hornet is due at RAAF Amberley. All 24 of the aircraft are due to be handed over before the end of 2011.
Boeing’s Integrated Defense Systems (IDS) unit revenues were up in the second quarter, but the unit’s performance was overshadowed by issues at the company’s Commercial Airplanes division. IDS beat analysts’ expectations with revenues of $8.7 billion for the second quarter, up 9 percent over the same period in 2008. Boeing Military Aircraft saw second-quarter revenue up 3 percent to $3.4 billion, with margins up 11.7 percent compared with 2008. The P-8A had its first flight, and the Fiscal 2009 Supplemental authorized funding for eight U.S. Air Force C-17s.
LOUD STARS: The Donald Rumsfeld-led Defense Department did not violate U.S. anti-propaganda law in its outreach to retired military officers (RMOs) to support George W. Bush administration policies, U.S. Government Accountability Office auditors have ruled. But the retired officers’ industrial affiliations remain an unanswered concern. “Clearly, DOD attempted to favorably influence public opinion with respect to the administration’s war policies in Iraq and Afghanistan through the RMOs,” auditors said in a decision released July 21.
HICKAM AFB, Hawaii — The need for stealth in the Pacific and Asia isn’t limited to manned fighters; stealthy, unmanned reconnaissance and strike aircraft are also on the wish list.
Astronomers are eagerly awaiting a chance to try out Europe’s Herschel infrared telescope, the largest ever sent to space, after test observations with all three instruments proved promising.
CHAIRMAN OUSTED: Military microwave components supplier Herley Industries replaced Myron Levy as chairman and CEO and announced a new focus on bolstering revenues and profits. David Lieberman, a New York lawyer and longtime board member, becomes chairman. Richard Poirier, general manager of the company’s New England operations, will become CEO. Levy had worked for Herley since 1988 and was promoted to the top job after the company was indicted for trying to defraud the government on military contracts.
Spacewalkers Dave Wolf and Chris Cassidy managed to replace only two of the oldest batteries on the International Space Station (ISS), instead of the four planned, after a malfunction with the carbon dioxide scrubber on Cassidy’s spacesuit forced an early halt to the third extravehicular activity (EVA) of the STS-127 mission July 22.
Space ShuttleFlights and ISS Assembly Sequence Space ShuttleFlights and ISS Assembly Sequence Launch Target Assembly Flight Launch Vehicle Element(s) July 24, 2009 34P ISS Progress 34 • Logistics and resupply Aug.
Extending the service life of F/A-18C/D Hornets to close a U.S. Navy fighter gap could still lead to a tactical air shortage because of the amount of time the Hornets will be out of service pending their upgrade, naval aviation analysts said July 21.
HICKAM AFB, Hawaii — The U.S. Air Force hasn’t given up on an airborne electronic attack capability. It has, in fact, morphed into a major issue for Pacific Air Forces planners as they have begun to look at mounting digital counterstrikes while under cyber and electronic attack. The problem is becoming even more complicated as networks and weapons systems expand and overlap to open new and unexpected avenues for penetration that must be located and defended.
Raytheon has completed a series of captive-carriage flight-tests of the seeker design that will be included in its developmental Small Diameter Bomb II (SDB II). The tests included 21 flights in just more than two weeks; they were completed in mid-June, according to J.R. Smith, SDB II business development director for Raytheon.
GREEN ROCKET: Flometrics has flown a rocket using bio-derived JP-8 jet fuel produced from renewable crop oils. The rocket was launched from the Mojave Desert, reaching an altitude of about 20,000 feet. San Diego-based Flometrics had previously flown the rocket on standard petroleum-based Jet-A and RP-1 fuels, and conducted a static test using commercial BD-100 biodiesel. The renewable JP-8 was produced by the Energy & Environmental Research Center at the University of North Dakota and tested by the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory, which co-sponsored the launch.
CHINA LAKE, Calif. — New methods of gathering and sharing intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) data and getting information directly to the soldier in the field are entering a final demonstration phase in California before going into service with coalition forces in Afghanistan and elsewhere.
Lockheed Martin said July 21 that the cancellations of the VH-71 presidential helicopter and the TMOS ground control portion of the Transformational Satellite (TSAT) program are reducing its backlogs, but the company expects no earnings impact from the reduction. Lockheed received a $2 billion TMOS (TSAT Mission Operations System) contract in 2006 to provide ground control systems for the now-scrapped TSAT military communications satellite constellation.
National Security Adviser James Jones is conducting a government-wide review of U.S. space policy at the request of President Barack Obama, as former Lockheed Martin CEO Norm Augustine heads into the final set of public hearings on the review he is conducting of human spaceflight options.
The U.S. Army will work with portable fuel cell producer UltraCell Corp. on the development and production of the company’s Reformed Methanol Fuel Cells (RMFCs). UltraCell will build 30 fuel cell systems based on its XX25 RMFC technology for the Army’s Research, Development and Engineering Command’s (RDECOM) Agile Integration Demo and Experimentation (AIDE).
BACN PLATFORM: The U.S. Air Force has signed a letter contract with Northrop Grumman to lease three Bombardier BD-700 Global Express business jets as platforms for the Battlefield Airborne Communications Node (BACN). This includes one demonstrator aircraft already deployed operationally since December. Northrop was awarded an 18-month, $276 million contract in June to install the communications payload on two additional jets as a short-term solution while it equips two RQ-4B Block 20 Global Hawk unmanned aircraft to be fielded in fiscal 2011.
NASA Missions NASA Missions Kennedy Space Center/Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla. (KSC/CCAFS)Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. (VAFB), Reagan Test Site (RTS)Wallops Flight Facility/Goddard Space Flight Center (WFF) Date / 2009 Mission Vehicle Launch Site Aug.
President Barack Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates won a major legislative victory in the Senate July 21, when that chamber sided with their efforts to end the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor program as planned, instead of earmarking money for more fighters.
MISSION EMISSIONS: The U.S. Army, acting in compliance with President Bush’s January 2007 Executive Order 13423 which mandated that government agencies more closely track their carbon emissions, is rolling out a greenhouse gas reporting and management system to 12 installations around the United States. Initially proven at Fort Carson, Colo., the Web-based greenhouse gas tracking and reporting software, made by Enviance, Inc., allows for real-time greenhouse gas emission tracking and management.
The U.S. Navy’s Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) will face close scrutiny as it heads toward full-scale testing, according to the House Armed Services seapower and expeditionary forces subcommittee.
