AFGHANISTAN FOCUS: House Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) wants President Bush to shift resources from Iraq to Afghanistan. In a sharply worded letter to the White House, Skelton tells Bush “we must once again make Afghanistan our number one priority.” Noting the rise in attacks in Afghanistan’s eastern region and spreading Taliban insurgency across the border in Pakistan, Skelton says the U.S. “must reprioritize and shift needed resources from Iraq to Afghanistan.” Skelton says NATO allies must also do more but “the U.S.
PARIS – European space industry leaders are preparing a hedge scheme, to be submitted at the European Space Agency (ESA) ministerial summit in November, that would protect launch provider Arianespace with a hedge against future erosion of the U.S. dollar.
ACTIVE PROTECTION: A component of the U.S. Army’s Future Combat Systems (FCS) Manned Ground Vehicle (MGV) hit avoidance system, the Active Protection System (APS), will be run through an end-to-end test in July, according to Maj. Lewis Phillips, assistant product manager for hit avoidance. Two specific countermeasures comprise APS – short- and long-range. The short-range system will be tested this July, and the long-range countermeasure is on track for development and system testing in fiscal 2010.
Outbound U.S. Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne says the service may have to “reshape and revise” the request for proposals (RFP) for a new refueling tanker competition, and one new criterion may be a flyoff of the dueling designs.
THAAD LAUNCH: The Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) program will fly an intercept test against a separating missile target June 25 at the Pacific Missile Range Facility in Kauai, Hawaii. U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA) chief, U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. Trey Obering, says that MDA’s current system configuration, which did not exist as recently as 2004, was accomplished “because we were given special authorities and flexibility that wasn’t general across the department.” He adds that his was a “great model for the future.
EXPLORER: NASA has selected two science proposals to be the agency’s next Explorer Program Mission of Opportunity investigations. The first will provide a U.S. science instrument for the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s New exploration X-Ray Telescope (NeXT) that will study black holes and other extreme environments in the universe. The other investigation will fly an atmospheric remote sensing instrument package aboard a yet-to-be-determined future commercial satellite. The investigation initially will be funded at approximately $250,000 for a concept study.
A400M ROLLOUT: Airbus Military Aircraft will roll out the first A400M airlifter on June 26. Airbus still hopes to fly the aircraft by September, although it admits the deadline “is getting increasingly tight.” Engineers want the aircraft’s TP400 turboprop to accumulate some 50 hours on a C-130 Hercules testbed before clearing the first flight. The engine began a 30-hour ground run test campaign earlier this month.
INDIAN ENGINE: India soon is expected to release a request for proposals to develop its indigenous Kaveri aircraft engine. General Electric had earlier decided not to participate in the co-development of the engine, but Pratt & Whitney tells Aerospace DAILY that while it has not received any communication about the effort, “it is always interested in developing new partnerships.” Delays in getting the Kaveri project off the ground led India in 2004 to purchase F404-GE-IN20 engines to power at least the first 20 of its Light Combat Aircraft.
TILT & FIRE: With flight testing of BAE Systems’ Remote Guardian all-quadrant defensive gun system on the Bell Boeing V-22 tiltrotor already underway, the company is eyeing other potential platforms for the weapon, including the Boeing CH-47 and Sikorsky CH-53 helicopters. “They need the same capability,” says Sean Bond, president of BAE’s Platform Solutions division. With a 360-degree field of fire, the remotely operated weapon is being tested on a U.S. Air Force special-operations CV-22, but the U.S. Marine Corps has also ordered a small number to equip its MV-22s.
The Senate Commerce, Justice, Science (CJS) Appropriations subcommittee approved a fiscal 2009 CJS spending bill June 19 that includes $17.8 billion for NASA and more than $4 billion for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
UCAS THREAT: Northrop Grumman says its X-47B naval unmanned combat air system (UCAS) demonstrator “is on plan, on schedule, and on cost,” adding that “more than $1 billion has been invested in this program after many stops and starts during J-UCAS” - the U.S Air Force and Navy Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems program cancelled in 2006. Northrop is defending UCAS amidst U.S. Navy threats to remove funding for the program from its fiscal 2010 budget plans.
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicated new calendar listing.) June 23 - 25 — 2nd Annual Network Centric Homeland Security Conference, “Interagency Coordination on the Operational Level,” Hilton Alexandria, Old Town, Va. For more information go to www.networkcentrichomelandsecurity.com
The data continuity in ocean surface mapping that U.S. and French scientists have sustained since 1992 is set to continue following the 12:46 a.m. PST June 20 liftoff of Jason-2 on a Delta II from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. In orbit checkout is underway for the 1,113-pound Thales Alenia spacecraft, which was lofted into an orbit about 10 miles below its predecessor, the still operating Jason-1, launched in 2001. While Jason-1 continues to operate, Jason-2 will track its readings; when Jason-1 dies, Jason-2 will succeed it.
ROLL OUT: U.S. Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Richard Cody will be first to fly the Apache Block III aircraft at Boeing’s roll-out party in Mesa, Ariz., July 9. The Block III aircraft incorporates upgrades including composite rotor blades, T700-701D engines and other general system improvements, unmanned aerial vehicle connectivity, a fused sensor package and Future Combat Systems compatibility (Aerospace DAILY, July 25, 2007).
The Phoenix Mars lander has confirmed that water ice critical to the mission’s life habitat studies lies under only 4 centimeters of soil all around the spacecraft. The finding has been confirmed using the stereoscopic imager. The initial adjoining “DoDo” and “Goldilocks” trenches dug with the lander’s robotic arm have a distinctive white band that lies just 2-4 centimeters (0.8-1.6 inches) under the soil. When the dig was completed, chunks of the white material also fell into the trench.
TRANSPORT SUPPORT: Diehl Aerospace, Liebherr, Safran, Thales and Zodiac will form a joint venture to provide through-life support for military aircraft. The venture, to be known as OEM Defense Services, will be earmarked in particular for European cooperative programs like the A400M, Tiger attack helicopter and NH90 transport/frigate rotorcraft and outsourcing applications. Diehl, Liebherr, Thales and Zodiac already are involved in a commercial after-market support venture, OEM Services, aimed at primarily at the A380 widebody transport.
UMBILICAL CORDS: A-10 aircraft equipped with Precision Engagement (PE) kits will be upgraded with Gore Umbilical Assemblies, in a fifth contract award for the company since 2005. MIL-STD-1760 umbilicals incorporate ITT’s Field Replaceable Connector Assembly (FRCS) to provide better performance and more reliable store releases. The assemblies are designed to withstand harsh fighter aircraft environments and have a proven flex-life in excess of 100,000 flexes, according to Gore.
The Bush administration and the House of Representatives appear to be headed for a clash over NASA’s fiscal 2009 authorization bill, due largely to the bill’s addition of three space shuttle flights to the baseline flight manifest. The full House passed the authorization (H.R. 6063) by a vote of 409-15 on June 18. The legislation authorizes $20.21 billion for NASA – $2.6 billion above the Bush administration’s request – including $1 billon to accelerate the development of the Orion and Ares vehicles. (See chart p. 7)
Because of a lack of internal oversight, U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) cannot guarantee the true net worth value of some $4.5 billion in equipment the command has purchased, a recent Pentagon Inspector General (IG) report says.
NPOESS WOES: Congressional auditors say that the beleaguered U.S. civil/military National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) could see its price tag rise another $1 billion, to $13.5 billion.
An international team of researchers has discovered a new mineral in a sample of comet dust collected in the stratosphere by NASA’s high-flying ER-2 aircraft. Dubbed Brownleeite after Donald E. Brownlee, a professor of astronomy at the University of Washington, Seattle, who pioneered the study of interplanetary dust particles (IDPs), the material is a manganese silicide.
The U.S. Government Accountability Office’s (GAO) decision to side with much of Boeing’s protest and ask the U.S. Air Force to recompete the KC-X aerial refueling tanker program has touched a congressional nerve and appears increasingly likely to push lawmakers to weigh in – an outcome that was more doubtful before the surprise decision.
Romania plans to select a new multirole fighter this year, but expects the procurement of 48 aircraft to replace its aging MiG-21 Lancers to fill the gap until the Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter becomes available. “The F-35 JSF is under consideration as a long-term solution,” says the Romanian ministry of defense, adding that it is “seeking solutions to cover the gap of 10 to 15 years until the first F-35 aircraft may be operational.”
