Aerospace Daily & Defense Report

General Dynamics Network Systems won a $3.8 million delivery order to upgrade and expand the telecommunications voice networks at the Army's Fort Richardson, Fort Wainwright and Fort Greely, Alaska, under the Long Term Life Cycle Support contract, the company said Nov. 2. Under this order, General Dynamics will engineer, furnish, install, and test voice-switching upgrades, including telephone switch expansions, a telephone management system and installation of Enhanced 911 service.

Two major U.S. Air Force commands are deciding how to coordinate upcoming studies on future long-range strike systems, according to an official.

During the next decade, the U.S. Air Force will need new programs to improve aircraft survivability and track friendly forces, the Government Electronics and Information Technology Association (GEIA) predicts in its 40th annual 10-year defense forecast. New, multispectral sensor systems and other precision targeting sensors will be key, as will enhanced ability to assess battle damage in the wake of combat missions, the report says.

SINCGARS radios can be used for combat identification, judging by recent demonstrations and tests by the U.S. Army, Joint Forces Command Joint Interoperability Test Command, ITT Industries said Nov. 1.

Cubic Corp.'s defense segment will support the U.S. Army's National Simulation Center (NSC) at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, under a contract that could be worth up to $95 million over five years. The contract increases the scope of the company's two previous NSC contracts, awarded in 1995 and 2000, the company said. Under those contracts, Cubic helped the Army develop requirements for computer-based training simulations.

Lockheed Martin will use third-generation (3G) commercial cellular technology to build the Mobile User Objective System (MUOS), the company announced Nov. 2. MUOS is to replace the Navy's Ultra High Frequency Follow-on (UFO) communication satellites, providing narrowband communications for mobile troops across the services. It will consist of a constellation of satellites in geostationary orbit. Lockheed Martin won the $2.11 billion prime contract for MUOS in September, and the program's total value is estimated at $6.4 billion (DAILY, Sept. 27).

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) will be "ubiquitous" in the future and stratospheric airships will stay aloft for years at a time as communications platforms, according to a speaker at the 49th annual Air Traffic Control Association Conference on Nov. 2 in Washington.

NO DATE: No date has been set for the preliminary design review (PDR) of the Space Based Surveillance System's Pathfinder spacecraft, a Boeing official said Nov. 2. Boeing announced Nov. 1 that the integrated baseline review for the first SBSS satellite has been completed. The PDR had been planned for October (DAILY, Oct. 4), but in the wake of a congressional budget cut, Boeing is working with the Air Force on a new schedule, a company spokesman said.

QinetiQ of the United Kingdom has designed a towed array system configured for use by submarines, the company said Nov. 1.

Oto Melara's "Super Rapid," the U.S. Navy's first missile-firing gun system, has been delivered to the United States from Italy, the company said Nov. 1. The Super Rapid is a modular, 76mm gun system able to fire regular ammunition and to launch guided missiles, the La Spezia, Italy-based company said, and can shoot down cruise missiles.

The Boeing Co. has been tapped to design and test the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), a large bomb designed to penetrate and destroy hardened and deeply buried targets. The Defense Department announced late Nov. 1 that the Air Force Research Laboratory has awarded a $20 million, multi-year contract to Boeing for the MOP program, which is funded by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA). The initial increment of $500,000 is for work that is to be completed by February 2005.

SHADOW: AAI Corp. will continue logistical support of the Shadow UAV system under a $7 million contract increment, the DOD said Nov. 2.

Finland's Patria and Sweden's GSE Partners have set up a small joint venture to maintain turboshaft engines for customers in the Nordic countries and Europe, the companies said Nov. 1. The new company, Engine Service Partners AB, is based in Arboga, Sweden, and is offering tailored life-cycle support for Rolls-Royce Model 250 and Gnome engines.

The European Space Agency, EUMETSAT and Alcatel Space signed a contract for a fourth Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) spacecraft, ESA said Nov. 2. France's Alcatel Space is the prime contractor for MSG-4, which is expected to be delivered in 2007 under the 135 million euro ($172.8 million) contract. ESA is managing the satellite construction contract, and EUMETSAT - the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites - will finance, launch and operate the satellite.

RESULTS: Commercial space company Spacehab of Houston will release its fiscal year 2005 first-quarter results on Nov. 9, the company said. Spacehab reported a net loss of $2.3 million for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2004 (DAILY, Sept. 9), and recently said that NASA has refused to pay its $87.7 million claim for the loss of the Research Double Module, which was lost when the shuttle Columbia was destroyed. NASA has said it owes Spacehab only $8 million (DAILY, Oct. 8).

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has until Jan. 28 to make a recommendation on the bid protest filed by Space Imaging of Thornton, Colo., following the company's loss of the $500 million NextView contract to rival Orbimage of Dulles, Va.

HERCULES DELIVERED: Lockheed Martin has delivered the first KC-130J Super Hercules aircraft ordered under a joint U.S. Air Force/Marine Corps multiyear acquisition program, the company said Nov. 2. The aircraft will be delivered to Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron 252 at the Cherry Point, N.C., Marine Corps Air Station.

An agreement between Lockheed Martin and Metal Storm Ltd. is intended to establish the feasibility of a Metal Storm torpedo defense concept that calls for many bullets to hit a target at the same time with the same muzzle velocity, according to a Metal Storm official. Metal Storm's approach allows multiple rounds, stacked in line in multiple barrels, to be launched at very high rates in a pattern that can't be achieved any other way, said Russ Zink, the company's senior vice president for business development.

BAE Systems of London has chosen Mountain View, Calif.-based Actel Corp.'s Axcelerator field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) as part of its Archerfish naval mine disposal system, Actel Corp. said Nov. 1. The Archerfish system can be deployed from a ship or a helicopter. The launch platform lowers a pod that releases a small, one-shot mine disposal vehicle that contains a warhead. The vehicle is guided with sonar and a remote camera as it looks for sea mines. When a mine is found, the weapon is exploded and the mine is destroyed, Actel Corp. said.

NASA is pressing ahead with an accelerated plan for its Terrestrial Planet Finder (TPF) mission, despite a warning from the National Academies that the agency may be moving too quickly for TPF's design to take full advantage of lessons learned from previous planet-finding missions.

Boeing has established a new organization, Analysis, Modeling & Simulation (AMS), to coordinate activities in those areas across its Integrated Defense Systems sector, the company said Nov. 1. "Boeing recognizes that, with the increasing complexity of network centric operations and system-of-systems engineering, modeling, simulation and analysis will play an increasingly important role in helping us understand and meet the requirements of our customers," John Tracy, vice president of engineering for IDS, said in a statement.

International Space Station (ISS) mission controllers have approved the Elektron oxygen generation system to operate around the clock rather than only when the astronauts are awake, NASA announced Oct. 29.