With some key players in Congress still opposed to a multiyear procurement contract for the F-22A Raptor, industry insiders worry that production continuity for Lockheed Martin's stealth fighter line remains uncertain. Sen. John Warner (R-Va.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, says he plans to bring up his objections to the U.S. Air Force plan for a three-year contract for a batch of 60 F-22A Raptors when House and Senate negotiators thrash out differences in their respective defense authorization bills this summer.
The U.S. Navy said July 31 that it will name its newest combat logistics force underway replenishment naval vessels the USNS Richard E. Byrd (T-AKE 4) and USNS Robert E. Peary (T-AKE 5) to honor the two famous Arctic and Antarctic explorers. The ships are being built by General Dynamics Corp.'s NASSCO unit in San Diego. Yet the announcement comes as Senate appropriators, pinched by a mandate to strip $9 billion from defense requests for domestic spending, have targeted the T-AKE class among other programs to make up the difference.
C-17 SALE: McDonnell Douglas Corp. has been awarded a $780 million foreign military sales contract to provide Australia's air force with four C-17 aircraft, the Defense Department said July 31. The aircraft will be delivered in November 2006, May 2007, January 2008, and February 2008. The contract was awarded by Headquarters 328th Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio.
GeoEye is entering a key stage of development for its next-generation commercial imagery satellites, as subcontractor General Dynamics is putting its telescope through environmental tests. Not only will the new imagery satellite have a resolution of 0.5 meters - nearly double that of the company's current satellite, the spacecraft's development and manufacturing has significant ramifications for meeting unclassified government imagery requirements.
An international coalition of helicopter operators, manufacturers and industry groups have joined forces with the FAA and other air traffic regulators from around the world to spearhead a new safety push aimed at cutting the helicopter accident rate by 80 percent over the next decade.
A Lockheed Martin Atlas V will launch the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft mission to the moon from Cape Canaveral's Launch Complex 41 in late 2008 following NASA's selection of the launcher over the Boeing Delta IV. The flight will use an Atlas V 401 configuration with no solid rocket boosters to augment the 1 million-pound thrust Russian RD-180 engine in the core vehicle, and the Centaur upper stage powered by a Pratt & Whitney RL10 engine.
The competition to supply the Turkish military with a basic aircraft trainer is down to two companies, Embraer and Korea Aerospace Industries. Turkey earlier this year issued a solicitation for the trainer program, saying it plans to buy 36 aircraft, with another 19 options. To elicit more interest, the response date was extended from early May to mid-July.
The Bush administration has not yet responded to a request by top House appropriators to boost the fiscal 2007 off-budget "bridge fund" by $10 billion to fully fund military recapitalization and reset needs, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told Capitol Hill reporters July 28.
AF CUTS: The Air Force wants to outsource noncombat jobs to contractors in order to spend more on technology and less on people. So it will cut its officer ranks by 8,000 by the end of fiscal 2007 to meet requirements set by force planners. Enlisted strength will be untouched. Planners have several tools to make the cuts, ranging from extra separation pay (to induce some officers to leave voluntarily) to outright dismissals of junior officers.
TAKING AIM: Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), co-chairman of the so-called Bipartisan Taskforce on Nonproliferation, introduced a bill July 27 that would block the Bush administration's proposed sale of 36 F-16 C/D Block 50/52 Falcon aircraft to Pakistan, along with related support equipment and weaponry. The bill would prevent the sale unless President Bush certifies to Congress that Pakistan has stopped building its recently revealed plutonium production reactor.
VISION PROBLEMS: In a sharply critical report on NASA's implementation of its vision for space exploration, the Space Frontier Foundation recommends that the agency stop all work on Block 1 of the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV), which the agency plans to use for missions to the International Space Station, and leave that task entirely to industry through the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program. "Since COTS will become the primary approach to reducing the gap in U.S.
TOURISM TAKING OFF: European companies with an interest in space tourism may get a little boost from the European Space Agency (ESA), which intends to award three of them 150,000 euro ($190,500) grants and the knowledge of its launch vehicle experts to advance their planning. Internal ESA studies have found a potential space tourism market in Europe, and the agency's upcoming industry survey is designed to encourage its development.
SETTLEMENT REVIEW: Senate defense authorizers on Aug. 1 will examine the Boeing Co.'s $615 million "global" settlement with the government for the Darleen Druyun scandal and improper possession of Lockheed Martin Corp. documents. Paul McNulty, now deputy attorney general but who prosecuted Druyun, is scheduled to testify along with Boeing chief executive W. James McNerney Jr. Boeing said recently that it would not seek a tax deduction from the payment (DAILY, July 27).
The first-of-class, namesake Virginia submarine is expected to finish post-shakedown availability (PSA) in December and its successor, the Northrop Grumman-built Texas, should do the same a year later, according to General Dynamics Corp.'s Electric Boat.
U.S. defense officials on July 21 successfully calibrated 21 low-frequency monitoring stations scattered from Texas to California and as far north as Winnipeg, Canada, designed to detect very low frequency noises that might be caused by large explosions around the globe - such as a nuclear test or explosion that would otherwise go undetected by humans, according to the U.S. Navy. Under the Infrasound Rocket Experiment, two Terrier Orion rockets each containing 50-pound explosive warheads exploded 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) above ground.
July 31 - Aug. 2 -- Night Vision Systems 2006, "Addressing Key Issues in Night Vision Requirements and Technologies," Hilton Arlington, Arlington, Va. For more information go to www.idga.org. July 31 - Aug. 3 -- 2006 Naval S&T Partnership Conference, "The Navy After Next... Powered by Naval Research," Wardman Park Hotel Marriott Hotel, Washington, D.C. For more information go to www.ndia.org.
FARNBOROUGH - Navy acquisition chief Delores Etter says that cautious optimism about Bell Helicopter Textron's UH-1Y and AH-1Z helicopter programs led to the recent awarding of a low-rate production contract to the company for additional work.
