The shuttle orbiter Atlantis is set for rollout to Launch Complex 39B as early as July 31, following its transfer from the Kennedy Space Center Orbiter Processing Facility into the Vehicle Assembly Building on July 24. Atlantis was stacked on its modified external tank and solid rocket boosters, a major milestone toward its launch to the International Space Station as early as Aug. 27.
NASA and Raytheon successfully completed a 12-day data transfer and system compatibility test for the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) Preparatory Project (NPP), the company announced July 24.
PLAY OUTSIDE: Space Adventures, which arranges commercial tourism trips to the International Space Station (ISS), claims it will be offering its clients the option of a 90-minute spacewalk during future visits to the orbital outpost. Candidates will have to spend a month in spacewalk simulations and training sessions, the company says. Whereas previous space tourists such as Dennis Tito have paid $20 million for 10-day visits to the ISS, the addition of a spacewalk will add six to eight days to the trip and another $15 million to the price, according to the company.
ATLANTIS: On July 24 space shuttle Atlantis will be moved out of the Orbiter Processing Facility and transported to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy Space Center, Fla., in anticipation of flight STS-115, scheduled to launch no earlier than Aug. 27. Inside the VAB the shuttle will be mated to its external tank and solid rocket boosters before being rolled out to the launch pad. An 11-day mission, STS-115 will resume construction of the International Space Station, installing the Port 3/4 truss segment and its two large solar arrays.
POINT AND SHOOT: Controllers overseeing the New Horizons Pluto flyby mission launched in January have demonstrated its ability to image a moving target with the probe's cameras and compensate for optical "smearing" from high-speed photo-ops. On June 11 and 13, with only six weeks of planning after the opportunity presented itself, controllers commanded the spacecraft to image a tiny asteroid known as 2002 JF56 as it zipped past at a relative speed of more than 70,000 kilometers per hour (43,495 mph).
UNMANNED ROAD MAP: The Pentagon has started drafting its new unmanned vehicle road map, with the goal of releasing it in the summer or fall of next year. Historically focused on unmanned aircraft, future documents will try to pay more attention to unmanned ground and sea systems. By 2009, when yet another iteration of the document is slated for release, the Pentagon expects to shift the focus to unmanned systems as a whole, reflecting the goal to transition to a single type of control station that could be used for all sorts of unmanned vehicles.
EXPLORATION 'BRIDGE': NASA plans to use the expertise United Space Alliance has built up running the space shuttle program to help it begin switching to the follow-on Crew Exploration Vehicle and its Ares I launcher for the remainder of the decade. Under a no-bid contract extension announced last week, the agency will award the Boeing-Lockheed Martin 50-50 joint venture a wide range of support work as it develops requirements for the shuttle replacements. "USA is the only known source with the wide range of unique skills, analytical capabilities and expertise ...
CASTLE CRUSADE: Rep. Michael Castle (R-Del.) is raising his calls to rein in "billions of dollars in unearned bonuses and incentive fees in the defense contracting industry, which are shortchanging taxpayers and endangering soldiers." Both of the House's fiscal 2007 defense policy and spending bills contain related new requirements after Castle pushed their inclusion last month (DAILY, June 26). Castle claims his measures could save at least $8 billion over four years, but his provisions first must survive conference agreements with the Senate.
Northrop Grumman Corp. and Ball Aerospace & Technologies have completed vibration and acoustic testing on the primary mirror for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to ensure it can withstand the rigors of launch, Northrop announced July 21.
Concerned about potential heat damage to Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) wings at supersonic speeds, aircraft prime contractor Lockheed Martin asked F-135 engine developer Pratt & Whitney to cut down on the amount of exhaust leaking through nozzles in the wings, Lockheed spokesman John Kent said July 21. The initial plane and engine specifications allow for a slight amount of leakage from the closed tube nozzles located on the bottom of the wings, Kent said. But Lockheed Martin engineers felt that even that could be too much.
VISION THING: Industry, Congress and NASA continue to snipe over the direction aeronautics research is taking at the agency. Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Science space and aeronautics subcommittee, complains at a hearing on the subject that repeated shifts in NASA aeronautics strategy over the past decade have left "the appearance that the agency has no clear strategic vision" for the discipline.
Lawmakers' parochial spending priorities and tightening budgets could start affecting defense programs more widely, particularly developmental efforts, as Congress moves to finalize fiscal 2007 defense appropriations.
LUH PROTEST: MD Helicopters has filed a formal protest over EADS North America's win on the Army's Light Utility Helicopter program. Now the Government Accountability Office must review the bidding and make a ruling. The company was in financial trouble prior to the competition and hoped to win the contract for 322 helicopters to solidify its future business and, perhaps, ignite commercial market interest in its NOTAR rotorless tail technology.
The Senate Appropriations Committee has agreed to fully fund the Bush administration's $2.6 billion request for the DD(X) destroyer program, but unlike their House colleagues, the Senate panel wants the money to pay for two of the multimission surface combatants.
One aspect of U.S. space power is relatively ineffective against Hezbollah rockets fired from Lebanon into Israel, and represents the challenge that big armies face in defeating much smaller forces, experts say. Information from U.S. satellites has been passed to Israel for years, but difficulty in detecting the small Hezbollah rockets lessens the overall contribution of satellites. More than a week into the fighting, which started July 11, Israel has been unable to significantly blunt the rocket attacks.
July 24 - 26 -- Geospatial Intelligence, "Imagery Exploitation on All Fronts," Westin Arlington Gateway, Arlington, Va. For more information go to www.idga.org. 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.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has cleared SpaceX's Falcon 1 launch vehicle for its next flight, following a failure investigation that pinpointed a corroded aluminum nut as the root cause behind the March 24 loss of the first Falcon 1.
Hezbollah's constant and effective missile attacks on Israel during the recent conflict will likely cause U.S. and Israeli leaders to step up efforts to deploy a defensive directed-energy weapon like the Mobile Tactical High Energy Laser (MTHEL), says Loren Thompson, defense analyst for the Lexington Institute. "In light of what has happened recently on Israel's northern border, there is likely to be a surge of interest in MTHEL and other beam-weapon approaches to tactical defense," Thompson said July 21.
ENGINE ADDITION: The U.S. Air Force is in the midst of a 30-day review of Northrop Grumman's recommendations for an engine provider for the Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System re-engining project. According to industry sources, only Pratt & Whitney put in a bid, prompting the Air Force to extend the competition. However, GE said at the Farnborough Air Show outside London last week that it will offer "a generic CFM56," giving the Air Force the competition it wants.
LEBANON EVACUATION: Once all U.S. Navy ships are on the scene, officials say they will have the capacity to evacuate at least 6,000 U.S. citizens per day out of Lebanon. The last ship was scheduled to arrive July 23. Defense Department officials said five more Navy ships were set to arrive. The USS Iwo Jima was scheduled to begin taking part in the operation July 22, and the USS Nashville joined the evacuation effort July 20. Disabled and other special needs U.S. citizens are being air evacuated aboard CH-53E Super Stallions (DAILY, July 19).
NEW SU-35: Sukhoi Holding Co. has unveiled the mockup of its new Su-35 single-seat fighter, which is intended to bridge the gap between series production fourth-generation Su-30s and the in-development fifth-generation fighter. A cockpit technology demonstrator with fixed-base simulator capability is being displayed this week at the Farnborough Air Show outside London. The Su-35 is the first Russian fighter with an all-glass cockpit, and also incorporates hands on throttle-and-stick (HOTAS) technology and new engines with thrust-vectoring nozzles.
The Army has awarded McDonnell Douglas Helicopter Co. of Mesa, Ariz., a $41 million increment of the company's $613 million system demonstration and development I contract for the Apache AH-64D block III helicopter, the Pentagon announced July 19. The work is scheduled to be completed by June 30, 2011. The Block III Apache will be more powerful and connect the aircraft to the Defense Department's Global Information Grid (GIG), Brig. Gen. Stephen Mundt, director of Army Aviation, said during a July 18 Pentagon briefing.
