MINI SUPPLEMENTAL: Democrats in the House have announced a four-month, $50 billion off-budget supplemental measure for Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere - a far cry from Bush's yearlong $196 billion request - including a possible veto-bait provision mandating a troop drawdown in Iraq within a year. The rest of the federal government would remain funded by a continuing resolution extended until Dec. 14 under a provision tacked onto the regular fiscal 2008 defense spending bill. That measure was approved 400-15 by the House Nov. 8 and the Senate was expected to follow suit.
The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) has denied Harris Corp.'s protest of a downselect competition award to Raytheon by Space and Naval Warfare System Command (SPAWAR) in June 2006. The competition was for the U.S. Navy's Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) Multiband Terminal (NMT). Harris challenged the evaluation of proposals and the resulting source selection.
NASA officials told House lawmakers on Capitol Hill Nov. 8 that the agency's effort to find potentially dangerous asteroids must be expanded if it is to meet the deadlines set out in NASA's 2005 authorizing legislation.
Lockheed Martin said Nov. 6 it received a $304 million undefinitized contract action from the U.S. government for four C-130J Super Hercules airlifters, plus initial spares and training, for Norway through the Foreign Military Sales program. The deal funds half of the program and will allow Lockheed to begin long-lead acquisition of production materials. A final contract agreement is expected to be signed early next year.
BAE MRAPs: BAE Systems has received two new delivery orders from the U.S. Marine Corps for 600 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles, a contract totaling $322 million. The company already is contracted to build three of the five MRAP variants, and now must deliver 1,462 Category I vehicles and 1,176 Category II vehicles. The first delivery order, worth $278.4 million, includes the delivery of 511 MRAPs. The second delivery order, worth $44.3 million, calls for the delivery of the balance of 89 vehicles.
The U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA) completed a successful test of the U.S. ballistic missile defense (BMD) system late Nov. 6 with simultaneous engagements of two ballistic missile targets. The "hit-to-kill" intercept flight-test occurred off the coast of Hawaii in conjunction with the U.S. Navy. This was the first time an operationally realistic test involved two unitary "nonseparating" targets, meaning that the target's warheads did not separate from their booster rockets. Two missiles
A Wall Street analyst thinks a Nov. 2 Federal Communications Commission (FCC) order requiring additional information from XM Radio and Sirius with respect to their proposed merger is unlikely to derail the deal, despite an earlier decision by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to prolong its investigation.
V-22 FIRE: The U.S. Marine Corps is investigating the cause of a nacelle fire in an MV-22 during a training mission Nov. 6. The aircraft was forced to land, and the aircrew was able to activate the onboard fire suppression systems, though damage to the aircraft was described as significant. No injuries were reported. The aircraft made its emergency landing in a designated zone at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, N.C. The aircraft was an A model, not one of the B models now executing their first foreign deployment to Iraq.
Defense aircraft were big winners in the congressional agreement over regular fiscal 2008 defense appropriations, according to the report accompanying the bill, and they could benefit further from supplemental funding expected later. House and Senate appropriators Nov. 6 hammered out an agreement that, except for embattled Army and Air Force helicopter programs, provided robust funding for fighters, warhorse helicopters, transport and unmanned aircraft.
Imminent legislation due out of Congress could be the first major steps in rolling back acquisition reform achievements from the 1990s, warns one of the architects of that era who is now deputy undersecretary of defense for industrial policy.
BEIJING - China's Chang'e-1 lunar probe accurately entered its working polar orbit around the moon Nov. 7, marking the end of its journey and the achievement of the challenging space navigation goals of the project. Now orbiting the moon at 127 minute intervals and 200 kilometers (120 miles) altitude, Chang'e-1 will go ahead with at least a year of lunar observations that will be prolonged by 200 kilograms (440 pounds) of fuel it saved thanks to unexpectedly precise navigation during its journey from Earth.
STS-120 commander U.S. Air Force Col. (ret.) Pam Melroy, assisted by co-pilot Marine Col. George Zamka, landed space shuttle Discovery into a stiff headwind at 1:01 p.m. EST Nov. 7 on Runway 33 at Kennedy Space Center, Fla. Astronaut Stephanie Wilson was the center seat flight engineer for the landing, which had a higher-than-usual workload for Melroy and greater speed monitoring tasks by the co-pilot and engineer due to the winds.
AdaCore, a leading supplier of tools used by aerospace and defense contractors to develop programs in the Ada software language, says Ada is not going away even though Java and C++ are often used nowadays as the Pentagon embraces commercial software. Even so, DOD has specified Ada on many weapon systems and its aerospace and defense suppliers have written hundreds of millions of lines of code in that language over the past 25 years, says Robert Dewar, president and CEO of AdaCore Inc.
The U.S. Air Force will continue to implement plans to reduce its manpower to 316,000 airmen, says Lt. Gen. Roger Brady, the service's deputy chief of staff for personnel. Brady says the force number decreases are needed to pay for procurement of fighters, jets and cargo aircraft and to recapitalize an increasingly aging materiel force. "Can we still do this? Well, yes we can," Brady told a small audience at a Capitol Hill breakfast Nov. 7. "Given where we are, it is what we've got to do."
The recent grounding of the U.S. Air Force stalwart F-15 fleet is raising a service call for the Pentagon to commit to more F-22s - a maneuver, analysts say, that also could help hedge against other combat jet development programs. The issue, though, is whether the Pentagon will kill the cap for Raptors - and whether the Bush Administration will take notice of the graying Air Force fleet. More likely, analysts say, the focus will remain on stretching out the current fleet's life.
A nearly five-month strike by about 500 union workers for United Space Alliance (USA) is over at Kennedy Space Center, making those workers available for launch processing of the Atlantis STS-122 vehicle. The strike, by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers Local 2061, was a bitter one. The union posted pickets at gates leading into KSC and daily posted the names of union workers who did not honor the picket lines.
BAE Systems declared Nov. 5 that it has received an $18.5 million, 30-month contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop a new class of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) systems and capabilities. DARPA's Autonomous Real-Time Ground Ubiquitous Surveillance Imaging System is eyed for the Defense Department's unmanned and manned surveillance platforms.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would get $60 million through fiscal 2010 to prepare for the threat of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) coming to the U.S. under the National Bomb Prevention Act, introduced by Sens. Joseph Lieberman (Conn.-I) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) Nov. 1.
Space shuttle Discovery's fiery re-entry across the central U.S. may be visible in Southern states even thought it will be daylight, says Bryan Lunney, shuttle re-entry flight director. The re-entry burn to Kennedy Space Center for the first landing opportunity will occur over the central Pacific Ocean on orbit 238 at 12 p.m. EST, with a landing at Kennedy at 1 p.m. EST.
NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., will advance key technologies to meet NASA's critical needs through four projects recently chosen by the agency for funding under its NASA Innovative Partnerships Program Seed Fund. The fund addresses technology barriers with cost-shared joint development programs, NASA says.
