KUWAITI PATRIOT: Raytheon Co. said it received an $18 million operation and maintenance support contract from the U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command to provide Kuwait with Patriot system technical assistance. Raytheon will provide support to Kuwaiti operational and maintenance personnel at fire unit locations and also at the depot in Kuwait. This program is a four-year follow-on Foreign Military Sale award. Raytheon has provided Patriot support in Kuwait since 1996.
HELO DEMAND GROWING: Scott Crislip, president of Rolls-Royce's helicopter and small gas turbine division, says during the next 10 years demand for turbine-powered helicopters will reach 15,038 aircraft worth $144 billion. Of that amount, engine sales will account for $15 billion. Crislip expects deliveries of 8,943 military and 6,095 commercial rotorcraft worth $120 billion and $24 billion, respectively. The majority of commercial helicopters delivered are forecast to be light- and twin-engine intermediate models.
The Australian government has issued a Defense Industrial Policy to ensure long-term support of its industry while also still cutting procurement costs. The document will be followed by a series of further studies in the coming months that will spell out in greater detail what industries are to be protected and what the military's long-term needs are.
Dramatic cost growths with Littoral Combat Ship hulls appear likely to spur "significant" changes in how the U.S. Navy contracts for its shipbuilding, according to top service officials.
The U.S. Navy and Marine Corp.'s top acquisition official said Feb. 28 that all options remain under consideration for the troubled Littoral Combat Ship and Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle programs. She also blamed seemingly systemic procurement problems on poor cost modeling and oversight, as well as overt industry and service enthusiasm for complex acquisitions.
Expanding the size of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps could force the Air Force to expand its ground support units, Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne told Congress Feb. 28. At a hearing on the Air Force's $110.77 billion budget request for fiscal 2008, Wynne said he was concerned that the planned Army and Marine Corps expansion could pose problems for his service. "If you increase ground forces, you're increasing (air)lift demands," he said.
Europe's next planetary mission -- with a big role for Japan -- will be the long-planned BepiColombo project to explore Mercury. The European Space Agency's Science Program Committee has formally "adopted" the project, kicking off its industrial phase under prime contractor Astrium GmbH to support a launch in 2013.
Impacts from micrometeoroids and orbital debris represent a "high safety risk" to the International Space Station (ISS) and its crew, according to a report from a congressionally mandated task force. While the ISS is a "robust and sound program" in terms of safety, the risk of a micrometeoroid or orbital debris (MMOD) impact penetrating the outpost during the decade after its completion is 55 percent, with a 9 percent chance of a catastrophic hit, according to the ISS Independent Safety Task Force (IISTF).
PHALANX PBL: Raytheon Co. said Feb. 28 it has been awarded a five-year, $169.9 million performance-based logistics contract to manage the spare parts for the U.S. Navy's Phalanx Close-In Weapon System. Provisions of the contract - in which Raytheon works with United Parcel Service Supply Chain Solutions, which guarantees delivery of spares to drop points within an agreed-to timeframe - apply to both the U.S. and 24 international navies that have Phalanx. Last fall, Raytheon was awarded a $369.1 million modification for systems and associated spares for the U.S.
KOUROU, FRENCH GUIANA -- European and Russian officials this week finalized a data exchange agreement related to moving the Soyuz launch vehicle to the European space port at Kourou, French Guiana. Work on the launch site has been going on for several years, but engineers have had to use workarounds in some technical areas in the absence of the data exchange protocol. Negotiating the details were often tricky due to Russian concerns about loss of technical know-how, according to program officials.
DANISH JSF: Denmark has signed on to the next phase of the Joint Strike Fighter, Pentagon officials announced Feb. 28. The signing ceremony took place in Copenhagen on Feb 27. Danish Defense Minister Soren Gade added his signature to the production, sustainment, and follow-on development agreement already signed by the United States, The Netherlands, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, Turkey, Norway and Italy.
Japan plans to start replacing its optical-reconnaissance satellites in 2009 after launching the second of its two radar-reconnaissance satellites into a 400-600 kilometer polar orbit on Feb. 24. The Tanegashima Island launch on an H-IIA rocket completes a four-spacecraft reconnaissance system planned eight years ago.
Pentagon planners will re-examine whether the Defense Department needs more C-17 cargo aircraft, rather than shutting down the production line, due to President Bush's call to grow the Army and Marine Corps by 92,000 troops, Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England told leading Senate defense appropriators Feb. 28. "We will take a look at it based on the increased size of the force," England said.
BRITISH SNIPERS: Lockheed Martin Corp. said Feb. 26 that it won the first "head-to-head" competition in the United Kingdom for an advanced targeting pod for fighter jets, citing a Defense Ministry contract for Sniper pods for Harrier GR9 aircraft. "The U.K. MOD selected Sniper ATP for its proven combat capabilities and low-risk integration benefits," declared Hugh Woods, program manager of Sniper ATP UK at Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control. Sniper deliveries will begin in March, with a full capability deployment in June.
NASA Administrator Michael Griffin told Senate lawmakers Feb. 28 that the first launch of the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) with astronauts aboard is likely to slip to early 2015 as a result of the budget cut contained in the recently passed fiscal 2007 continuing resolution.
JUST PASSING THROUGH: Skimming toward its closest approach on Feb. 25, The Philae lander on ESA's Rosetta probe imaged Mars's Syrtis region and took a self-portrait at the same time. Four minutes later, the spacecraft passed within 1,000 kilometers of the surface in a gravity-boost swing-by that will bring it back for another Earth flyby in November. The winding route is designed to take Rosetta and its lander to the comet 67P Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 2014.
The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) has awarded Lockheed Martin a $979 million contract to further develop the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) Weapon System. The contract will cover the next phase of Aegis BMD development, which includes equipment and computer program development and incorporation of the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense Signal Processor (Aegis BSP) into the AN/SPY-1 radar. The Aegis BSP is scheduled for installment on all Aegis BMD ships beginning in 2010.
LONDON - Britain will send 1,400 more troops to southern Afghanistan, as well as additional transport helicopters and strike and transport aircraft, British Defense Secretary Des Browne said Feb. 26. The additional deployment was at NATO's request, Browne said. It will bring the number of British personnel deployed in the country to 7,700. London has been pushing other NATO partners to contribute more to Afghanistan, but has been mainly unsuccessful.
Lawmakers looking to pay for multiplying spending demands could cancel the U.S. Army's Future Combat Systems, cutting $23 billion over the next five years from the Army's projected budget authority needs, according to several options listed in a new report from the Congressional Budget Office.
Congress must fund the Defense Department's second fiscal 2007 supplemental request for $93.4 billion before May or the Pentagon will start taking significant appropriations from other defense spending with the Army as the prime loser, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told Senate appropriators Feb. 27. "If these additional funds are delayed, the military will be forced to engage in costly and counterproductive reprogramming actions starting this spring to make up the shortfall," Gates said.
NO ENGINE FAILURE: As FAA and National Transportation Safety Board representatives prepare to begin an investigation into the crash of the prototype Bell ARH-70A helicopter on Feb. 21, a Honeywell official says "at this point there is no indication whatsoever that the Honeywell turboshaft engine failed in flight, or that there was a loss of power due to any failure of the engine." The helicopter made a forced landing on a golf course in Mansfield, Texas, on its first flight. (DAILY, Feb. 23). There were no injuries to the two pilots or people on the ground.
