APACHE AIRFRAMES: The U.S. Army has decided its upgraded Block III AH-64D Apaches will have new airframes. The original plan was to remanufacture the helicopters a second time, the first being when they were modernized from AH-64As to Ds, but the wear and tear on Apaches in Irag forced the Army to take another look. “The DA [Department of the Army] has directed us to do new airframes based on the high op tempo of the current aircraft,” says Lt. Col. Robert Johnston, Apache Longbow product manager.
RETAINING TALENT: Lockheed Martin will get an additional $39.5 million to set up an employee-retention program at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility, where the company builds the big space shuttle external tanks that carry cryogenic propellants during the ascent to space. Under the modification, which brings the total value of Lockheed Martin’s external tank contract to $2.967 billion since October 2000, the company will provide incentives to eligible personnel to ensure they continue on the job until the final 10 tanks needed are built and flown.
The U.S. Air Force’s Air Education and Training Command (AETC) suspended all T-38C Talon jet trainer flights on May 1 after a second fatal crash in as many weeks. Two pilots were killed on the morning of May 1 when their aircraft assigned to the 80th Flying Training Wing at Sheppard Air Force Base crashed. Names of the victims of the latest accident have not been released. The other crash occurred during takeoff of a T-38 at Columbus Air Force Base, Miss., on April 23.
ETHICS REPORT: The Woolf Committee report into BAE Systems ethical business practices is due for publication May 6 – the day before the company’s annual general meeting in the U.K. The aerospace and defense company set up the committee in response to a slew of allegations surrounding arms sales, centered on the Al Yamamah program with Saudi Arabia. The fallout from the allegations continues, with the Serious Fraud Office to appeal a court ruling that it acted unlawfully in ending an investigation into the claims.
PREDATOR PLANS: Michael Kostelnik, a former NASA official and retired Air Force general who now heads the Homeland Security Department’s air and marine unit, says his agency, Customs and Border Protection (CBP), has a long-range plan to acquire a fleet of 20 General Atomics Predator B UAVs. In addition to patrolling the U.S. borders with Mexico and Canada, CBP Air and Marine plans to patrol the waters of the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific for drug runners, according to Kostelnik.
The tri-agency committee that oversees the civil/military National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) has agreed to restore the Total Solar Irradiance Sensor (TSIS) to the first NPOESS spacecraft.
MORE HELOS: Two aircraft are being added to the U.S. Army’s Bell ARH-70 Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter (ARH) system development and demonstration program, which has been restructured after delays and cost increases. The fifth and sixth test aircraft will be delivered in May and September, respectively, says Col Keith Robinson, armed scout helicopters program manager. A Defense Acquisition Board (DAB) meeting scheduled for July 2 to approve ARH low-rate initial production has been pushed back to June 2009.
AMPHIBIOUS CLASS: The first of the U.S. Navy’s LPD 17-class amphibious transport dock ships, the USS San Antonio, will deploy with the USS Iwo Jima (LHD 7) Expeditionary Strike Group later this year. The LPD 17 class, of which three ships have been commissioned, achieved Initial Operating Capability May 2. At least six more ships of this class will be joining the fleet over the next several years. LPD 18 and 19 already have been commissioned and are undergoing unit level training.
BLACK HAWK: Sikorsky’s first UH-60M Upgrade helicopter is complete and is expected to fly by July. Two M Upgrade aircraft are being built for flight testing of this latest version of the Black Hawk, which features the Rockwell Collins CAAS integrated cockpit, Hamilton Sundstrand fly-by-wire system, digitally controlled General Electric T700-701D engines, and a lightweight composite tailcone built by GKN Aerospace. Planned production of 1,227 UH-60Ms for the US Army will switch to the Upgrade version after around 300 baseline models have been produced, says Col.
The White House is unveiling more details of its $70 billion fiscal 2009 supplemental spending request, designed to hold over combat and other foreign operations until a new administration is in place.
Citing recent Russian claims of Arctic seabed sovereignty, the U.S. Coast Guard commandant is urging Congress to ratify the U.N. Law of the Sea Treaty. Adm. Thad Allen believes successful management of the waters and resources in the Arctic would best be achieved by adhering to the international agreement, which was hammered out around the early 1980s. The treaty also would help manage ship traffic in the Bering Strait, which the four-star admiral says “could be the next big choke point.”
COMBAT SYSTEM: A new electronic tracking range managed by Naval Air System Command’s Aviation Training Systems Program Office will help two air carrier wings hone their flying skills prior to their upcoming deployments. The Tactical Combat Training System (TCTS) can be configured into several versions, including a portable system that can be sent nearly anywhere. The TCTS uses electronics to track and score training exercises performed by carrier battle groups and Navy squadrons, obviating the need for large, land-based training ranges.
Responding to combatant commanders’ “urgent need,” Pentagon acquisition czar John Young says the Defense Department will need to recapitalize 68 HC/MC-130 aircraft, and he has instructed the Air Force to pull together an acquisition strategy by December.
The $542.5 billion fiscal 2009 defense authorization bill from the Senate Armed Services Committee includes $497 million in funding authority to buy more F-22 Raptors in the future or to shut the manufacturing line down. Despite the high priority the U.S. Air Force places on cargo lift, the authorization measure doesn’t recommend funding any additional C-17 cargo aircraft.
The United States provided some nonparticipatory support and certainly winked at the Israeli air strike that disabled an alleged Syrian nuclear facility last year, but more interestingly, the strike also appeared to reflect techniques used earlier this decade by U.S. forces in Iraq. “What occurred isn’t inconsistent with what happened in Iraq twice before,” says a senior U.S. Air Force official with long experience in the world of clandestine operations.
The International Space Station (ISS) Expedition 17 crew will leave their Soyuz lifeboat docked where it is while a Russian State Commission investigates why the two previous Soyuz vehicles malfunctioned on re-entry, and other ISS operations could be affected as well. Original plans called for a May 7 relocation of the Soyuz TMA-12 vehicle that transported Expedition 17 commander Sergei Volkov, flight engineer Oleg Kononenko and South Korean spaceflight participant Yi So-Yeon to the station.
FUTURE LYNX: The Light Helicopter Engine Company (LHTEC), a joint-venture between Honeywell and Rolls-Royce, announced the delivery of the first CTS800-4 turboshaft engine to AgustaWestland for its Future Lynx helicopter program. The U.K. Ministry of Defense has ordered 70 Future Lynx tactical and maritime helicopters from AgustaWestland to meet the requirements of the Army Air Corps and the Royal Navy. The helicopter is due to be delivered in 2011, and will replace the current fleet of Lynx helicopters.
Two years after initiating a buy of 16 CH-47 F-model Chinook helicopters, the Canadian military is asking to procure six D-model aircraft from the U.S. Army. At the request of the Canadian government, an independent panel recently studied what resources it would take for Canada to sustain its commitment in Afghanistan until 2011. The six D-model Chinooks will provide what the panel called an “interim medium-lift capability” for Canadian forces.
CLUSTERING SUPPORT: Representatives from more than half of the world’s nations will gather in Dublin, Ireland, on May 19 to hammer out final details of a treaty banning the use and export of all or most cluster bombs – and antiwar activists in the United States are criticizing the Bush administration for not sending anyone. Meanwhile, the Quaker-based Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL) is calling on supporters to lobby further to increase the number of co-sponsors of congressional legislation that would effectively ban the weapons from the U.S. arsenal.
ROLE REVERSAL: The Senate Armed Services Committee’s (SASC) fiscal 2009 defense authorization provides an additional $350 million to the U.S. Air Force’s Transformational Satellite (TSAT) program. SASC staff explained May 1 that the plus-up goes to address delays caused by planned Defense Department budget cuts. Pentagon officials this year moved to cut TSAT by about $4 billion through 2013.
Yi So-yeon, South Korea’s first astronaut, has been hospitalized with a minor back injury she suffered during the ballistic re-entry of the Russian Soyuz capsule that brought her home from a visit to the International Space Station (ISS).
After 12 years of service, NASA has decommissioned its Polar spacecraft, launched Feb. 24, 1996 from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. to study the solar wind’s interplay with the Earth’s atmosphere. Built by Lockheed Martin and managed by Goddard Space Flight Center, Polar was launched by a Delta II into a highly elliptical orbit (apogee of 9 Earth radii, perigee of 1.8). Its official mission lifespan was just two years.
RUGGED LAPTOP: General Dynamics announced April 30 the successful integration of Cisco software onto its ruggedized laptop, part of a communications suite for soldiers accessing the U.S. Army’s Warfighter Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T). Cisco’s Unified Communications Manager software was installed on the General Dynamics Itronix GoBook XR-1 computer, allowing soldiers in the field to access services such as telephony, e-mail, voice and text messaging on a small notebook computer. The computer may be stand-alone, mounted in vehicles or stored in transit cases.
