Aerospace Daily & Defense Report

SpaceDev's "Dream Chaser" suborbital spacecraft could serve as a hypersonic testbed for NASA, according to company founder and CEO Jim Benson. The piloted Dream Chaser is derived from an existing X-Plane concept and has an altitude goal of about 100 miles (DAILY, Sept. 21). It would be launched vertically by a single hybrid rocket motor the company is developing for the SpaceDev Streaker, a family of small launch vehicles intended to deliver small satellites to orbit.

San Diego-based Titan Corp. has elected David Danjczek as corporate vice president for compliance and ethics, the company announced Sept. 28. Lockheed Martin had planned to acquire Titan, but called off the deal in June after it was delayed by Justice Department and Securities and Exchange Commission probes into alleged violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act by company consultants (DAILY, June 28). Titan reported a second-quarter loss of $66.6 million for the second quarter of 2004 due to expenses from the investigations (DAILY, Aug. 5).

The U.S. Army's Low Cost Interceptor (LCI) program has scheduled its first flight-test for the summer of 2005. During the short hot launch (SHOTL) test, the interceptor's motor will burn for a few seconds, propelling the vehicle a few kilometers.

The U.S. Missile Defense Agency is slowing efforts to promote international participation in its cash-constrained Kinetic Energy Interceptor (KEI) program. Instead of awarding development contracts in fiscal 2005, as previously planned, MDA now intends to provide funding for multiple concept studies in FY '06, a Defense Department official said Sept. 27 in a written response to questions. After the eight-to-12-month studies are completed in FY '07, one of the concepts will be chosen for development.

An airborne local-area network (LAN) that will allow leaders to access information from their home stations while they are anywhere in the world has been successfully flight-tested, the U.S. Air Force said Sept. 24.

September 20, 2004 ARMY

ITT Industries Aerospace/Communications won a $7.3 million contract from the Department of Defense Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS) program office to make JTRS interoperable between the United States and Britain, ITT said Sept. 27. Under terms of the contract, ITT will develop and deliver 13 modes of the Bowman VHF waveform - five modes of which demonstrate interoperability with a British advanced digital radio - to be installed on U.S. JTRS radios.

A National Academies panel is urging NASA to slow the development of one of the two proposed space telescopes in its Terrestrial Planet Finder (TPF) mission to ensure that results from previous planet-finding efforts can be incorporated into its design. NASA originally had planned to choose between two competing TPF architectures and launch a single observatory (DAILY, June 20, 2002). This plan changed, however, following the announcement of President Bush's new vision for space exploration in January.

Naval Sea Systems Command's Undersea Technology directorate (SEA 073) is on track to conduct the Silent Hammer exercise next month, according to Navy officials. The exercise is scheduled to take place Oct. 5-14 off the coast of San Diego. Silent Hammer will involve the simulated launch of an unmanned aerial vehicle from a submarine (DAILY, July 12). It is also intended to show how networked special operations forces can fill gaps in intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and time-sensitive strikes.

The European Space Agency's SMART-1 spacecraft has celebrated one year in space and is preparing to enter a lunar orbit in mid-November, ESA said Sept. 27. SMART-1, Europe's first lunar probe, was launched Sept. 27, 2003 by Arianespace, on a booster that also carried the e-Bird and INSAT-3E communications satellites (DAILY, Sept. 30, 2003). The spacecraft's first mission phase, to test technologies including solar-electric propulsion and miniaturized payloads, has been completed, ESA said.

More aerospace and defense suppliers are using lean manufacturing processes to reduce costs and increase business, said Bill Lewandowski, vice president of supplier management for the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA). "More than 90 percent of the top 50 percent of suppliers have lean programs, and 50 percent of all aerospace and defense subcontractors use lean," Lewandowski told The DAILY Sept. 27.

GOES-R WORK: Lockheed Martin will perform design and risk-reduction work for NASA's Solar Imaging Suite (SIS), scheduled to fly on the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites R series (GOES-R), the company said Sept. 27. The work will be done under a $6 million, 18-month contract. SIS instruments are to study solar activity and the effects of the sun on the Earth. The launch of the first GOES-R satellite is scheduled for 2012.

NEW CFO: Herley Industries' board of directors has appointed Thomas V. Gilboy vice president and chief financial officer, effective Sept. 13, the company said Sept. 27. Gilboy most recently served as the CFO of Del Global Technologies.

The Defense Information System Agency (DISA) has awarded Thales of Weston, Fla. a contract to secure unclassified circuits in the United States, Asia, and Europe for the Defense Information Systems Network (DISN), the company said Sept. 24. Thales said it was able to win the contract because its Datacryptor is easy to use, it is cost-effective, it is flexible for AC and DC power requirements, and because of its remote management capabilities.

The Society of British Aerospace Companies (SBAC) has formed a new company, Farnborough International Ltd., to run future Farnborough air shows, the society announced Sept. 24. The move will allow a dedicated team to focus on Farnborough International while allowing the SBAC to retain overall control, the SBAC said. The dates for Farnborough 2006 are: July 18-21 for trade days and July 22-23 for public days.

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said she is concerned about reports that the U.S. Navy has prepared a budget proposal that should decrease funding for shipbuilding in fiscal year 2006. Collins, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, sent a letter late last week to Navy Secretary Gordon England, saying, "I am concerned about reports that the Navy has prepared a budget proposal that would erode our current fleet force structure."

Avitronics, a South African company jointly owned by Grintek of South Africa and Saab of Sweden, has launched the Land Electronic Defence System 100 (LEDS-100) for combat vehicle self-protection, Avitronics said.

The U.S. Coast Guard awarded a $451,000 contract to VideoRay LLC of Exton, Pa., for five underwater surveillance robots to conduct underwater hull inspections. Company spokesman Erick Estrada told The DAILY that the contract would provide for five video remote devices with different accessories to enable the service to examine hull damage on vessels.

X PRIZE: Scaled Composites of Mojave, Calif., is in the final preparations for its first qualification flight to win the $10 million Ansari X Prize, scheduled for Sept. 29. At 6 a.m. Pacific time, the White Knight carrier aircraft will take off from the Civilian Aerospace Test Center at Mojave Airport carrying the SpaceShipOne spacecraft. After climbing for roughly an hour, SpaceShipOne will detach from the White Knight and fire its hybrid rocket engine to reach suborbital space at approximately 100 kilometers (62 miles) altitude.

Snecma International, a manufacturer of propulsion, equipment and services for aircraft engines, helicopters, launchers and satellites, acquired the assets of Gespac Integration, a Moroccan company that manufactures electric wiring via its Labinal subsidiary, Snecma said Sept. 27.

NASA's Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida appears to have suffered only minor damage from this past weekend's arrival of Hurricane Jeanne, although the cumulative effect of recent storms on the agency's return to flight effort has yet to be determined.

GMD INTERCEPTOR: The fifth interceptor for the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system was placed in an underground silo at Fort Greely, Alaska, Sept. 25, the U.S. Missile Defense Agency announced Sept. 27. A total of three more GMD interceptors are to be installed at two sites in 2004: Fort Greely will get its sixth interceptor by mid-October, and Vandenberg Air Force Base will receive its first two by year's end. GMD, whose prime contractor is the Boeing Co., has been slated to become operational by Oct.

The U.S. Missile Defense Agency delayed a key experiment for its Multiple Kill Vehicles (MKV) program partly because it concluded that more time is needed to develop the kill vehicle's solid-fuel divert and attitude control system (DACS), a Defense Department official said Sept. 27. "We have chosen a higher-risk, higher-payoff solid DACS that will require additional component testing to assure us that it is ready for [the experiment] and beyond," the official said.

LESS EXPENSIVE: Deploying a system of space-based interceptors to shoot down missiles in their boost phase of flight may not be as expensive as some studies have indicated, says Gregory Canavan, an adviser to the Los Alamos National Laboratory's Physics Division. The deployment of the Iridium constellation of communications satellites indicates such a system could be put in orbit for $56.5 million per ton, for a total cost of $19.6 billion for a system aimed at liquid-fueled missiles.