BERLIN – MiG General Director Antaloy Belov is confident his company will sell the Russian air force a modernization package for its full fleet of MiG-29s and land big orders for new fighters both from the air force and export customers. Belov declines to say how many new aircraft the Russian air force will buy, but thinks it will be a mix of MiG-29s and the company’s newest model, the MiG-35, to meet differing operating requirements. He forecasts 300-350 new aircraft sales worldwide for MiG over the next decade.
SCALPEL, PLEASE: Lockheed Martin successfully conducted the first Scalpel weapon system release in a recent flight-test at the Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division China Lake test range in California. Three inert Scalpel weapons were captive-carried and released from two AV-8B Harriers. The weapons were released from various altitudes and distances from their targets to demonstrate range and accuracy. Scalpel is a small weapon system that offers precision engagement while minimizing the potential for collateral damage in close air support and urban environments.
The Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) program is gearing up for an intercept test against a separating missile target next month at the Pacific Missile Range Facility in Kauai, Hawaii. Since 2005, eight of 14 total planned THAAD flight-tests have been conducted, according to Col. Bill Lamb, U.S. Army THAAD project manager. The four prior targets used in the current flight-test program were all unitary targets, although an earlier incarnation of the program in the late ’90s included a successful test against a separating target, Lamb said.
NASA is pushing toward an on-time launch of the space shuttle Discovery May 31, with no constraints in sight. Liftoff of Discovery on the STS-124 mission to deliver the main pressurized section of Japan’s Kibo laboratory to the International Space Station (ISS) is set for 5:02 p.m. EDT. Officials said May 29 that no serious technical issues were being tracked, and the weather at Kennedy Space Center (KSC) posed only a 20 percent chance of halting the countdown before liftoff.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Despite U.S. Army vehicles becoming heavier with armor in response to the ever-present threat of improvised explosive devices (IED), the answer may lie on a much smaller scale: nanotechnology. At a Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Institute of Soldier Nanotechnologies (ISN)-Army Industry Collaboration conference here May 28, the focus was on the little things, literally, that will curb the threat of IEDs and better protect soldiers.
BERLIN – Participating as a partner country in the International Aerospace Exhibition and Conferences for the first time, India is being wooed by the Europeans for its large defense procurement projects. India’s biggest defense purchase is its 126-aircraft Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) program, which is evaluating proposals.
THAAD BATTERY: The U.S. Army activated the first battery of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system during a May 28 ceremony at Ft. Bliss, Texas. The battery will receive three THAAD launchers, a THAAD Fire Control and a THAAD radar as part of the initial fielding. Full-system fielding is scheduled to begin in 2009, according to THAAD prime contractor Lockheed Martin.
China plans to use its newest, most advanced weather satellite to forecast conditions for the upcoming Olympic Games in Beijing, and the dual-use spacecraft also will benefit the Chinese military. A Long March 4C rocket carried the Fengyun-3 (FY-3) spacecraft from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in northern Shanxi Province on May 27, and it entered its polar orbit 27 minutes later, according to the Xinhua news agency.
Pentagon provocateur Winslow Wheeler, Straus Military Reform Project director, is calling for an independent program review panel that listens to, but does not comprise representatives of, the U.S. military services.
INTERNATIONAL TRAINERS: The Boeing Company and Alenia Aermacchi, a company of Finmeccanica, announced May 26 an agreement to cooperate on marketing, sales, training and product support activities in international markets for the M-346 next-generation Advanced and Lead-in-Fighter Trainer and the M-311 basic-advanced trainer designed and manufactured by Alenia Aermacchi. Under the agreement, Boeing will be responsible for several aspects of the program’s logistics support and training.
PASADENA, Calif. – NASA is preparing to unstow the robotic arm on the Phoenix Mars Lander after restoring full communications via the Mars Odyssey orbiter. The instructions for what is the next critical phase of the exploration project were to be sent May 28 to Phoenix via the Mars Odyssey spacecraft after the agency decided to make it the principal relay vehicle following the unexpected shutdown of the UHF radio on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) May 27 (Aerospace DAILY, May 28).
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CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – The U.S. Army Research Lab (ARL) is working with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Institute of Soldier Nanotechnologies (ISN) to get inside soldiers’ heads – or rather, inside their helmets – to come up with headgear that incorporates the ramifications of traumatic brain injury (TBI) into the design.
DOD has asked Congress for permission to shift $9.7 billion in funding to cover shortfalls in the U.S. Army and Special Operations Command (SOCOM) accounts in the absence of new supplemental funds.
U.S. Air Force Space Command (AFSPC) is again pushing for a program to replace its aging UH-1N helicopters, saying that its current aircraft are too slow to handle the modern nuclear weapons support mission.
Northrop Grumman’s MQ-8B Fire Scout is being considered as a replacement for the U.S. Coast Guard’s scrapped vertical take off unmanned aerial vehicle (VUAV), but officials say the unmanned rotorcraft’s radar needs to be upgraded. “Fire Scout is probably the lead runner out there, but the Coast Guard has not made a decision yet,” Rear Adm. Gary Blore, the service’s acquisition chief, told reporters May 27.
CSAR-X BIDS: Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Sikorsky have submitted their latest revised proposals for the U.S. Air Force Combat, Search and Rescue (CSAR-X) helicopter program, responding to Amendment 6 to the request for proposals. Boeing won the first round of the $15 billion procurement, but the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) twice upheld protests of the award by the losers, prompting the recompetition. A new contract is expected this fall. (For more on the CSAR-X, see pp. 1, 5-7).
SPACE SOFTWARE: Lockheed Martin has delivered the first of two major blocks of flight software designed to provide command and control of the Space Based Infrared System (SBIRS) geosynchronous orbit (GEO) spacecraft, the company announced May 27. According to Lockheed Martin, the new software will enable more robust command and data handling, fault management and safe-hold capabilities on the GEO satellite.
NAVY BAE Systems Land & Armaments LP, Ground Systems Division, York, Pa., is being awarded a $35,211,759 firm-fixed-priced modification to previously awarded delivery order #0005 under contract (M67854-07-D-5025) for integrated logistic support sustainment to support Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles. The work will be performed in York, Pa., and is expected to be completed by January 2009. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Marine Corps Systems Command, Quantico, Va., is the contracting activity.
EQ-36: Lockheed Martin’s Enhanced AN/TPQ-36 counter-fire acquisition (EQ-36) radar made it through critical design review (CDR), the company announced May 27. The program is now cleared to move into an initial production phase for five radar systems. The U.S. Army’s new EQ-36 radar will provide the capability to detect, classify, track and determine the location of enemy indirect fire such as mortars, artillery and rockets in either 90-degree or 360-degree modes, according to Lockheed Martin.
Saab has begun flight-testing the Gripen Demo prototype for the next-generation Gripen multirole fighter. The upgraded aircraft completed a 30-minute first flight from Linkoping, Sweden, on May 27, flown by test pilots Mikael Seidl and Magnus Ljungdahl. A test platform for the Gripen NG being offered to Denmark, Norway and other customers, the Gripen Demo has a more powerful General Electric F414G engine, increased internal fuel capacity, higher maximum takeoff weight and additional weapon pylons.
Editor’s Note: These are the last in an exclusive series of articles exploring how the U.S. Air Force came to initially choose Boeing’s HH-47 for its Combat Search and Rescue helicopter replacement (CSAR-X), and the ramifications of that choice for the service, the industry competitors and the warfighter (Aerospace DAILY, May 22, 23, 27).
