GETTING SCHOOLED: Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University is opening new teaching locations in Iraq at Camp Victory and Balad Airbase. Balad, the central logistical hub for allied forces in Iraq, is the busiest air base operated by the U.S. Defense Department and is the second busiest airport in the world (following London’s Heathrow), according to the university. Balad serves about 15,000 service members, of which around 6,000 are Air Force. No aviation programs were being offered at Iraq-based U.S. military education centers. Embry-Riddle said it holds an exclusive U.S.
FAILURE PROBE: The mishap investigation board probing the loss of NASA’s Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO) formally began its work March 3, according to NASA. The five-member panel is led by Rick Obenschain, deputy director at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. OCO never reached orbit during its Feb. 24 launch attempt, due to the apparent failure of the Taurus XL rocket’s fairing to properly separate (Aerospace DAILY, Feb. 25).
With the end of his reign in sight, Pentagon acquisition czar John Young sent out a report card on major Defense Department programs to Defense Secretary Robert Gates and other defense officials showing that many key programs have been flawed in their earliest stages. “The AT&L (acquisition, technology and logistics) team pulled Selected Acquisition Report (SAR) data on 42 programs,” Young said in a Jan. 30 e-mail to AT&L officials detailing material contained in a memo to Gates.
ORLANDO, Fla. – U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz says he is more focused on maintaining cost and schedule discipline for a future stealthy bomber than on fielding it by 2018, as demanded by others in the Pentagon.
The top admiral in charge of the U.S. Coast Guard is making a case that the armed service has made substantial progress in recent years and remains strong. “We are becoming more flexible, agile and responsive to change, with all our effort focused on mission execution,” Coast Guard Commandant Thad Allen said in a public address March 3.
EXTENDING ODIN: The Swedish National Space Board has decided to extend operation of Sweden’s Odin research satellite at least until the end of 2009. Although the astronomy mission of the eight-year-old spacecraft has basically ended, the value of its atmospheric research measurements continues to increase.
SINGAPORE SCANEAGLE: Boeing’s ScanEagle unmanned aerial system completed a ship-based trial with the Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN) March 2. The trial included both an RSN LST (Landing Ship, Tank) and a frigate. ScanEagle was launched and recovered from the ships’ helicopter decks flying day missions using an electro-optical camera payload and night missions using an infrared camera payload.
A Proton K Block DM-2 rocket launch and a new Proton M contract have Proton prime contractor Khrunichev and launch provider International Launch Services (ILS) off to a solid start in 2009. The Proton K launch, at 7:10 a.m. Moscow time on Feb. 28, orbited a Raduga-1 military communications satellite. Russian space officials said the 2-metric-ton spacecraft separated without incident. Also known as the Globus-1, Raduga-1 was developed by Reshetnev ISS to provide communications for the Russian government and strategic armed forces.
The U.S. military’s search continues for a compact, nonlethal, nonexplosive weapon that destroys electronics, while many questions still swirl around the 39-month anti-electronics demonstration program at the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M.
Australia has dropped plans to buy the Northrop Grumman RQ-4 Global Hawk for maritime surveillance, citing program delays that would have created a workload clash with the proposed introduction of Boeing P-8 Poseidons in the middle of the next decade.
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Chinese engineers are evaluating data from a controlled impact of the moon by the Chang’e-1 orbiter March 1 to help their planning for a soft landing there in 2012. The Chinese news agency Xinhua reported the 2,350-kilogram (5,180-pound) orbiter crashed just south of the lunar equator at 52.36 degrees East Longitude, 16 months after its launch on a Long March 3A rocket.
AIR FORCE The Air Force is modifying a firm fixed price contract with Lockheed Martin Corp. of Fort Worth, Texas for $797,132,785. The contract action will provide 14 F-16C and 16 F-16D Block 50 aircraft for the government of Turkey. At this time, $682,158,785 of Foreign Military Sales funds have been obligated. 312 AESG/SYKA, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio is the contracting activity (FA8615-07-C-6034, PZ0005). ARMY
Textron will sell its actuation systems unit HR Textron to Woodward Governor for $365 million in cash as it seeks to shore up capital in the face of steep losses in its commercial finance business. The sale is expected to generate $265 million in net after-tax cash when it closes in the second quarter. HR Textron, which produces flight-control actuators, engine-control servovalves and fuel-system components, had sales of $260 million in 2008.
MOSCOW – Russian Vice Adm. Anatoly Shlemov, the head of defense contracts for Russia’s United Shipbuilding Corp., says Russian designers are developing a new nuclear aircraft carrier. “Scientists and designers already started works on future carrier development... We are drawing up specifications, requests for proposal, [holding] technical meetings. So far it is determined that the carrier will have a nuclear powerplant and would be 50-60 thousand metric tons displacement,” Shlemov was quoted as saying by Russian wire agencies.
PLANCK MEETS HERSCHEL: Spacecraft named for two more European scientists are in place for an April 16 launch to the L2 Sun-Earth Lagrange Point, with the arrival Feb. 18 of ESA’s Planck observatory at the European launch center near Kourou, French Guiana. Named for Max Planck, the German physicist who helped found quantum theory, the 1,900-kilogram (4,200-pound) spacecraft will use a six-step cooling system and a 1.5-meter primary mirror to measure variations in the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation left over after the Big Bang.
MEDEVAC PATHFINDER: Lockheed Martin recently wrapped up a six-month test program of its Pathfinder night vision sensor system on a U.S. Army HH-60L medevac helicopter, in coordination with the Army Aviation Applied Technology Directorate. Pathfinder is an adaptation of the Apache Pilot Night Vision Sensor system adapted for use on cargo and utility aircraft. According to Lockheed, the six-month Pathfinder test program resulted in 75 flight hours and a Technology Readiness Level of 7.
COMMANDING ROBOTS: The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Aurora Flight Sciences are partnered on an effort for NASA to develop a software system for commanding diverse teams of mobile robots engaged in planetary exploration. Future robots exploring planets such as Mars will have to be able to coordinate with each other autonomously, since communications delays will preclude continuous, direct supervision from Earth.
The U.S. military is starting to assist Mexico’s fight against narcotics cartels with training and intelligence, surveillance & reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates says. Appearing March 1 on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Gates said the two countries were able to start setting aside “some of the old biases” against cooperation between the two countries’ militaries.
The Pentagon continues to fumble efforts to develop its next-generation command-and-control systems, said Charles McQueary, DOD’s director of operational test and evaluation (DOT&E), in his recent annual report. “Software-intensive systems such as next-generation command-and-control systems and enterprise resource programs consistently encounter significant problems that delay successful fielding because they fail to perform as expected in the final stages of testing,” the report says.
