NUCLEAR NAVY: U.S. Naval Sea Systems Command has awarded Bechtel Plant Machinery Inc. a $349 million cost plus fixed fee contract for Naval nuclear propulsion components. Work will be performed in Pittsburgh, Pa., (77 percent) and Schenectady, N.Y., (23 percent). Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The service is mum on completion dates or any other info concerning nuclear propulsion contracts.
CUTTING LESSONS: The U.S. Coast Guard’s second National Security Cutter (NSC), identified as the Waesche, is 69 percent complete and should begin sea trials next summer. The third NSC marked a “significant” construction milestone of its own last week with a start-fabrication ceremony — typically celebrated after the first 100 tons of steel are cut for a ship. The armed service claimed NSC 3 is more complete than NSC 2 was at this stage due to lessons learned in ship sequencing for the embattled class.
RE-ENGINED COMPANY: Pratt & Whitney, a United Technologies company, will reorganize a few sectors under a new unit “to drive strategic alignment and improved responsiveness.” The new organization, Commercial Engines & Global Services, includes the company’s Commercial Engines, Global Service Partners and Global Material Solutions units. Todd Kallman will be its president.
Europe’s senior defence procurement officials are expected to meet behind closed doors later this week in Brussels, Belgium, to discuss their strategy to maintain key areas of competence within Europe. Alexander Weis, director of the European Defence Agency (EDA), told Aviation Week at a conference there that “we have identified helicopters and UAVs as being the first areas to look at.” The conference was titled “Which concrete solutions to strengthen the European Defence Technological and Industrial Base (DTIB).”
Some analysts counter-intuitively contend that a Democratic White House might be better news to the F-22 Raptor program than a Republican administration. While Washington’s decision about building 20 more F-22s — for as many as 203 total — has been punted to the next presidential administration, some believe that an Obama administration would be obligated to spend on defense projects for at least the first two years to prove itself strong on defense and support jobs.
The U.S. Navy is beginning production of its newest weapon to target and destroy enemy air defenses, the Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile (AARGM), which is built cooperatively with the Italian Air Force. Low-rate initial production was approved Sept. 30 and fielding of the Alliant Techsystems (ATK) weapon will begin in late 2010, according to Navy officials.
Members of the congressionally appointed Allard Commission are likely to approach the next presidential administration to discuss their panel’s far-reaching recommendations on how to overhaul U.S. national security space, according to commission member and retired U.S. Army Gen. Edward Anderson.
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The first two men to follow their fathers into orbit met on board the International Space Station this morning, following the safe docking of their Soyuz TMA-13/17S vehicle at the nadir side of Russia’s Zarya module. Expedition 17 Commander Sergey Volkov, son of Soyuz cosmonaut Alexander Volkov, greeted Richard Garriott, the son of Skylab and shuttle astronaut Owen Garriott, when the hatches separating the two craft were opened at about 6 a.m. EDT.
PARIS — The French government will go ahead with a roadmap for reorienting and streamlining its defense program, despite the potential effect of the financial crisis and heavy criticism from military and political leaders worried about its consequences.
Delays continue for the U.S. Air Force’s $15 billion combat, search and rescue (CSAR-X) helicopter replacement program. Contractors confirm that Air Force briefings scheduled for early October have been postponed as the service focuses more intently on its internal review of the troubled acquisition, which was slapped down twice by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) and is now the subject of a Pentagon Inspector General (IG) investigation.
LEAN TIMES: The course for fiscal 2009 for the U.S. Navy Fleet Readiness Center Southwest (FRCSW) “looks pretty stable” and should not really feel the effects of the current global market instability, says Capt. Mike Kelly, commanding officer of the San Diego base. FRCSW essentially is a steady-state operation without giant excursions, and it has the budget it needs for now, he tells Aviation Week. But expectations for fiscal 2010 are more fraught with uncertainty, Kelly explained Oct. 10.
TESTED METTLE: The U.S. Navy Department on Oct. 3 dedicated the “Zubowski Flats,” a new “realistic ground antenna test range” for counter-improvised explosive devices (IEDs) at the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Crane, Ind. Efforts will center around new technologies that jam IED signals and create better armor. The range is named in honor of Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Scott Zubowski from North Manchester, Ind., the first Marine from Indiana killed in Iraq by an IED.
Despite the dominance of fixed-wing aircraft and related expenses atop the Pentagon spending lists at the mid-year point of 2008, the U.S. Army ranked the highest among the services in contract spending, according to an Aerospace Daily analysis of data provided by the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting (NICAR).
ARMY DRS-C3 Systems Inc., Fort Walton Beach, Fla., was awarded Oct. 7, 2008, a $8,694,387 firm fixed price contract. This procurement is for 564 tube-launched optically-tracked wire guided missile launchers. Work will be performed in Fort Walton Beach, Fla., with estimated and completion date of Jul. 31, 2010. One bid was solicited and one bid was received. U.S. Army Aviation & Missile Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., is the contracting activity (W31P4Q-08-C-0145). NAVY
The Pentagon needs to develop a more coherent picture of its supplier base, according to a recent report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). “DOD’s efforts to monitor its supplier base lack a department-wide framework and consistent approach,” GAO said in its report, released earlier this month.
Another significant step for seabased unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) took place recently on the Mediterranean when a rotary-wing UAV was automatically landed on a French Navy frigate, the Montcalm. The demonstration Oct. 9 and 10 was made by French military shipyard DCNS, which worked on an automatic deck landing and take-off system, the SADA (Système d’Appontage et de Décollage Automatique) in close collaboration with Austrian company Schiebel, which developed the CAMCOPTER S-100 that was used for the demonstration.
The Standing NATO Maritime Group will begin anti-piracy operations off the Somali coast in two weeks. NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told a press conference Oct. 9 — the first day of an informal meeting of allied defense ministers in Budapest — that NATO ships would escort vessels transporting World Food Program (WFP) aid to Somalia upon request of the United Nations. He said the NATO warships also would conduct patrols off the Somali coast to deter pirates.
LONDON — The U.K. Defense Ministry is seeking potential bidders to provide support for rotary wing training for the two decades following the expiration of the present service provision in 2012. The ministry is now seeking “prospective bidders” to support the Defense Helicopter Flying School (DHFS), which handles rotary wing training for all three armed services.
AIR FORCE The Air Force is modifying a cost plus fixed fee contract with Honeywell International Incorporated of Clearwater, Fla., for $9,391,835. This action will provide “Advanced Inertial Measurement Unit” for the Advanced Ballistic Missile Technological Program. At this time $80,000 has been obligated. Det 8 AFRL/RVKV, Directorate of Contracting, Kirtland AFB, N.M., is the contracting activity (FA9453-08-C-0612, P00003).
MANIPULATED MEDIA: The Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency has aw $254 million contract to support the National Media Exploitation Center (NMEC). The deal has a six-month base period of performance and four one-year options. “Work will be performed primarily overseas,” according to the contractor. The NMEC provides “strategic document and media exploitation” to the intelligence community, law enforcement and Defense Department. Under the contract, SAIC will provide linguist translation and transcription, media and document exploitation and related support services.
Two new crew members and a wealthy space tourist are en route to the International Space Station (ISS) after a nominal launch from Baikonur Cosmodrome Oct. 12, with docking scheduled early Oct. 14.
Lockheed Martin is starting to receive the big assemblies for the first of two spacecraft it is building for the U.S. Navy’s Mobile User Objective System (MUOS) constellation that’s due for launch in the first quarter of 2010. The first major piece to arrive at the company’s Sunnyvale, Calif., facility is the integrated propulsion subsystem from Lockheed Martin’s Mississippi Space & Technology Center at the Stennis Space Center.
