RELUCTANCE: The U.K. House of Commons defense committee says the reluctance of other NATO countries to commit more ground troops to Afghanistan, particularly in the south, is undermining the credibility of the NATO effort there, and wants the defense ministry to show it can persuade neighboring nations to take up the slack. The committee also found that NATO nations have met the organization's call for more helicopters, but provision of appropriate models and sufficiently trained air and ground crews remain a problem.
CANADIAN C-17s: The first of four C-17 Globemaster III cargo aircraft for the Canadian Defense Forces took flight for the first time July 23 in anticipation of its scheduled Aug. 8 delivery, manufacturer Boeing announced. The airlifter took off from Long Beach, Calif., at 3:36 p.m. Pacific time and flew for three hours and 45 minutes. The seven-person crew put the aircraft through a series of functional checks, flying west over the Pacific Ocean before returning.
Having secured a £7.7 billion ($15.8 billion) increase in its defense budget over the next three years, Britain's Ministry of Defense will now place orders for two 65,000-ton aircraft carriers, according to U.K. Defense Secretary Des Browne. The two ships, HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales, will enter service in 2014 and 2016, respectively. They will be the largest ever to sail in the Royal Navy and will be based in Portsmouth, Browne said July 25.
Associate Administrator for Space Operations William Gerstenmaier says NASA has taken extra steps to ensure that the ongoing strike by roughly 570 space shuttle workers at Kennedy Space Center is having no impact on safety. "We've made sure that we are processing the vehicles in a safe manner," he told Congress July 24. NASA has provided more insight and oversight during "critical activities" in shuttle processing, particularly for operations inside the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), and brought in more safety inspectors, he said.
EARNINGS: Lockheed Martin reported second quarter net income of $778 million, a 34 percent increase from a year earlier that soundly beat Wall Street's expectations. Quarterly sales were up 7 percent to $10.7 billion. The company also raised its earnings guidance for the year by 7 percent. Northrop Grumman announced a more modest 7 percent increase in second quarter income to $460 million. Its sales rose 4 percent to $7.9 billion. Next up: Boeing and General Dynamics, which are scheduled to announce their quarterly earnings July 25.
Tommy Holloway, chair of the International Space Station (ISS) Safety Task Force and former ISS manager for NASA, told House lawmakers July 24 that he doubts the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program can make up for a "substantial part" of the projected ISS logistics shortfall in the crucial first few years after the space shuttle's 2010 retirement.
The Defense Department needs to better justify the purchase of brand-name equipment for a satellite systems program, the Pentagon Inspector General (IG) says. In general, DOD meets federal acquisition guidelines for the satellite equipment purchases, the IG says in the July 23 report.
NASA BUDGET: The Bush administration criticized House appropriators' fiscal 2008 plus-ups of NASA's aeronautics, education and science requests in a statement July 24, saying that the increases would create "unsustainable outyear funding requirements." The appropriators added a total of $313.1 million to the administration's $17.31 billion topline request in their version of the agency's spending bill. The White House also is concerned about the appropriators' cut of $85 million from the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS) program.
TREATY LAW: Russia's announced suspension of its cooperation under the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) is likely to spur further debate on treaty law, according to the American Society of International Law (ASIL). With U.S. withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and North Korea exiting the Non-Proliferation Treaty, lawyers are increasingly debating how and whether the countries can jettison previously agreed-upon international responsibilities. In particular, Russia's suspension raises questions about what Western powers still have to do.
TRUCK LASER: The U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command said July 20 it awarded Boeing a potentially $50 million deal for a truck-mounted laser weapon system that destroys rockets, artillery shells and mortar rounds. Under the High Energy Laser Technology Demonstrator (HEL TD) Phase I $7 million contract, Boeing will develop and complete a preliminary design of a rugged beam control system on a Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck.
WELIN DAVITS: The U.S. Navy is awarding Welin Lambie of the United Kingdom a $6.3 million time and materials, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for engineering and technical services to repair, overhaul and maintain U.S. Navy FFG-, LHA-, LSD-class and Coast Guard WHEC-, WMEC-, WAGB-, WLB- and WLBB-class boat davits made by the company. The contract also provides for services to investigate and resolve systemic problems, training and installation support services, and for technical documentation.
The onus is on the British National Space Centre Headquarters (BNSC) to develop and brand a comprehensive space strategy that will take the country into 2010, according to a recent report issued by the British House of Commons' Science and Technology Committee The U.K. invested two-thirds of its 207 million-plus pound (US $426 million) budget for fiscal 2005-2006 in the European Space Agency (ESA). The report requests an ESA center be set up in the U.K., with a small budget devoted solely to the activities of the BNSC.
The Airborne Laser (ABL) still has a number of major unresolved issues that Congress must consider, a recent Congressional Research Service (CRS) report says. Technical, funding, treaty and basing issues still surround ABL, according to the July 9 report. Also, MDA is exploring alternatives to ABL for the Boost Phase Intercept (BPI) mission.
Northrop Grumman expects its acquisition of Scaled Composites to clear its regulatory hurdles and close some time in August, according to Northrop spokesman Dan McClain. "Burt Rutan and the whole executive team is staying on, and we intend to continue to operate Scaled Composites in its current operating mode as a separate entity within" Northrop Grumman Integrated Systems, McClain said
The two Orbital Express satellites were decommissioned this past weekend, bringing down the curtain on the pioneering joint mission to demonstrate on-orbit satellite servicing. Ball Aerospace's NextSat, which served as the "client" spacecraft, was shut down July 21 and Boeing Phantom Works' ASTRO (Autonomous Space Transport Robotic Operations) servicer was shut down July 22.
International Space Station (ISS) Expedition 15 crewmembers Clay Anderson and Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin successfully completed a 7-hour, 41-minute spacewalk July 23 that included the removal and jettisoning of a refrigerator-sized ammonia reservoir.
MORE MINEHUNTERS: A U.S. Naval Sea Systems Command award for $23.2 million to Raytheon for AN/AQS-20A mine-hunting sonar engineering services and support brings the total value of the 2005 contract to $139 million so far, the company said July 23. The Navy's new Remote Mine Hunting System, a semi-submersible ship-based vehicle, is testing the AN/AQS-20A sonar and will use it for the first time operationally during a deployment this fall with the guided missile destroyer USS Bainbridge.
T-AKE ORDER: General Dynamics was awarded a $100 million contract modification from the U.S. Naval Sea Systems Command for long-lead materials, like ship engines, for the construction of a 10th T-AKE dry cargo-ammunition ship, according to the Pentagon and the company. A contract that funds construction of the ship is expected to be awarded by January, and construction of T-AKE 10 is expected to begin in the first quarter of 2009. Delivery to the Navy's Military Sealift Command (MSC) is slated for the first quarter of 2011.
