PARIS — The Swiss government is moving ahead with the upgrade of its F/A-18Cs to fit them with Raytheon’s Advanced Targeting Forward Looking Infrared (ATFLIR) pod. The Pentagon has awarded Raytheon a $41 million contract to purchase 14 of the pods for the Swiss government. Switzerland last year acquired one pod as part of a $51 million contract that the U.S. Navy placed with Raytheon to also buy Australia’s 18 targeting pods to be used on F/A-18Fs. Delivery of the Swiss systems is to be completed by early 2011.
PLESETSK LAUNCH: On July 21, Russian Space Forces dual-launched the Kosmos 2454 military satellite and the Sterkh satellite aboard a Kosmos-3M light booster from Plesetsk Cosmodrome. Kosmos 2454 is believed to be a Parus-type navigation and communication satellite, while Sterkh is part of the KOSPASS/SARSAT satellite-aided search and rescue system.
Industry sources are pointing to serious concerns with General Dynamics’ Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) as it undergoes builder’s trials in the Gulf of Mexico. What would be the second U.S. LCS, the Independence, is a 417-foot, all-aluminum trimaran. The ship started builder’s trials July 2, three days later than anticipated due to engineering problems, and the evaluations are still under way.
PARIS — The Israeli government and Rafael have completed another round of Iron Dome test shots. The Israel Defense Force says the latest test series indicates the program remains on track to be operational in early 2010, although some officials think it could slide into midyear. Developers have been working through some vibration and other issues identified in earlier trials. Iron Dome is Israel’s latest effort to quickly field a system to protect civilian populations and military installations from rocket and short-range missile attacks.
Astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) and space shuttle Endeavour on July 21 used two of the three robotic arms available to them to pull an experiment rack from the orbiter’s payload bay and berth it on Japan’s Kibo laboratory module. On July 23 the third robotic arm will plug the three experiments into their positions on Kibo’s new exposed facility, setting the big Japanese laboratory up to conduct science in open space.
The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has now awarded two of two contracts to Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control to design a Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) for use soon by the U.S. Navy. LRASM received nine proposals, including ideas from Raytheon, Boeing and Alliant Techsystems. The agency has not commented on the merits of the winning designs. The second of the two awards was announced July 17. The first came last month (Aerospace DAILY, July 2). Both are worth about $10 million for nine months.
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Industry has briefed the U.S. Army on technology and configuration options for a future Joint Multi Role (JMR) aircraft to conduct the attack, reconnaissance, utility and cargo missions now performed by a range of helicopter types.
NEW DELHI — Gripen maker Saab of Sweden is eyeing India as a design base supporting the global marketing of its aerospace, land and naval systems. The company also says it is examining establishing manufacturing capability here. Saab has formed a partnership with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) for establishing an Aeronautical Design and Development Center (ADDC) in Bengaluru (Bangalore).
NAVY Force Protection Industries Inc., Ladson, S.C., is being awarded a $58,639,048 firm-fixed-priced delivery order #0012 under a previously awarded firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract (M67854-07-D-5031) for the purchase of support for installation of independent suspension kits. The work will be performed in Kuwait and is expected to be completed by Dec. 31, 2009. Contract funds will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Marine Corps Systems Command, Quantico, Va., is the contracting activity.
JOINT VESSEL: Construction on the first Joint High Speed Vessel for the U.S. Army, Navy and Marine Corps should follow on the heels of its production readiness review scheduled for this fall, the Defense Department said last week. The review will study design maturity, the availability of materials and components, and shipbuilder Austal USA’s readiness to successfully start fabrication. The 10-ship, Navy-run program combines earlier, competing efforts under the Army’s Theater Support Vessel and the Navy and Marine High Speed Connector.
With a congressional vote on F-22 funding imminent, Defense Secretary Robert Gates reiterated his objection to buying more of the aircraft in a Pentagon briefing July 20. “What I’ve not heard is a substantive reason for adding more aircraft in terms of our strategic needs,” he told reporters. When questioned about the loss of jobs resulting from the F-22’s cancellation, Gates said the aerospace industry will see a “substantial increase” in jobs due to the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter “if we don’t drain money away from it.”
AIR FORCE Global Ground Support, Olathe, Kan., was awarded a $15,375,084 contract to provide two preproduction units as well as 49 production vehicles, and an estimated quantity of 196 deicer vehicles. At this time no money has been obligated. 642nd CBSG/GBKBB at Robins Air Force Base, Ga. is the contracting activity (FA8533-09-D-9002).
NEW DELHI — India and the U.S. have agreed on a defense pact that is expected to boost U.S. arms sales to India. In a significant step ahead in their bilateral relationship, India and the U.S. have agreed to enter into an understanding on the long-awaited end-use monitoring (EUM) agreement, which will allow the U.S. government to monitor India’s use of U.S.-made military equipment.
NEW DELHI — India’s first moon mission – Chandrayaan-I — has lost its star tracker, raising worries that it might not last out its two-year life span even though engineers at the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) have devised a functional workaround to the problem. “With its loss we are really worried,” ISRO chairman G Madhavan Nair says.
ARMY BAE Systems Land & Armaments Limited Partnership, Minneapolis, Minn. was awarded on July 14, 2009 a $ 21,007,124 firm-fixed-price contract for the purchase of 5,325 improved vehicle emergency escape windshield kits for the High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle (HMMWV). The work is to be performed in Minneapolis, with an estimated completion date of March 30, 2010. One bid was solicited with one bid received. U.S. Army TACOM Contracting Center, Warren, Mich. is the contracting activity (W56HZV-09-C-0524).
With the military and political communities waiting for the Department of Defense to release its Quadrennial Defense Review next year, attention has been diverted from several other reviews that promise to shake things up in Washington.
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LAKOTA ABROAD: EADS North America has delivered the first two UH-72A Lakota Light Utility Helicopters to be based outside the continental U.S. to the U.S. Army for operations in Puerto Rico. These were the 66th and 67th Lakotas delivered to the Army and Army National Guard units by the company. The UH-72As are now based at San Juan’s Isla Grande Airport, operated by the Puerto Rico National Guard and equipped for general aviation support missions. To date, 128 UH-72As have been ordered by the Army, with plans to acquire 345 helicopters through 2016.
The Pentagon’s unnamed contractors placed 14th on the Defense Department’s ranking of top contractors for 2008, according to an Aerospace DAILY analysis of an independent national database of government contracting data.
Astronauts Dave Wolf and Tom Marshburn bolted three big spare parts to the International Space Station (ISS) truss July 20 in the second of five spacewalks of the STS-127 mission of the space shuttle Endeavour. With Wolf riding the station’s robotic arm, the two removed a space-to-ground antenna, a coolant pump and a motor/transmission combo for the station’s mobile transporter from the integrated cargo carrier (ICC) that held them inside Endeavour’s payload bay and mounted them on an external stowage platform.
