MDA TRANSITION: The Missile Defense Agency is entering a new era of leadership. Air Force Lt. Gen. Ronald Kadish, who has led the agency for the past five years, turned over the reins July 2 to Air Force Lt. Gen.-Select Henry "Trey" Obering, who is being elevated from MDA deputy director to director. Kadish does not officially retire until Sept. 1, but he plans to be on leave until then (see related story on Page 6). Army Maj. Gen.
The U.S. Army is procuring multiband super high frequency (SHF) Phoenix satellite terminals, part of a new family of military satellite ground terminals, according to Maj. Gen. Dennis Moran, director of Army information operations, space, and networks.
RAPTOR ENGINES: Pratt & Whitney will produce F119-PW-100 engines for the F/A-22 Raptor under a $431 million supplemental contract from the U.S. Air Force, the company said. The supplement covers 42 installed engines for 2006 deliveries, spare engines, spare parts, and support services. The supplement was added to a $168 million existing contract issued in 2003. The contract's overall value is about $600 million.
RAM ASSEMBLIES: Raytheon Co. has awarded a $1.3 million contract to LaBarge Inc. to produce cable assemblies for the Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM) Guided Missile Weapon System, LaBarge said. LaBarge's cables will be used in RAM's launcher. RAM is designed to defend ships against cruise missiles and other threats. It is produced cooperatively by Germany and the United States.
REMOVABLE ARMOR: To fill a badly needed requirement in Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF), in about six weeks the Department of Defense plans to award a contract for removable ground vehicle armor, says Capt. Jeff Landis, a Marine Corps spokesman. According to Lt. Gen. Robert Magnus, Marine Corps deputy commandant for programs and resources, the service is looking at several contractors who manufacture the "bolt on/bolt off" ground vehicle armor.
COMBAT TRAINER: Cubic Defense Applications has been awarded a $4.3 million contract by the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence to provide the British army with its first instrumented urban combat trainer, the company said. The Low Level Urban Skills Trainer (LUST) will be provided at various training villages throughout the U.K. The trainer equips all soldiers and weapons with electronic transponders and tags to accurately track the location of all elements involved in urban warfare. David Williams, director of U.K.
July 7 - 8 -- Precision Strike Summer PEO Forum, "Balancing Precision Strike for the Joint Force Commander Across Asymmetric Battlefields," Huntsville Marriott Grand Ballroom, Huntsville, Ala. For information go to www.precisionstrike.org. July 11 - 14 - AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE 40th Joint Propulsion Conference, Broward County Convention Center, Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Call (703) 264-7500, fax (703) 264-7657 or go to www.aiaa.org.
NASA BILL: Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-N.Y.), chairman of the House Science Committee, plans to introduce a NASA authorization bill in the House after the Independence Day recess, according to spokesman Joe Pouliot. Pouliot says Boehlert's office is not ready to discuss specifics of the bill until after the break. NASA has asked for $16.2 billion for 2005, $866 million more than the agency's 2004 budget.
CYLINDER BLOCKS: General Dynamics Land Systems has been awarded a source delivery order for Bradley Fighting Vehicle transmission cylinder blocks, the company announced June 29. The order was awarded by the U.S. Army Tank-automotive and Armaments Command and is part of a five-year, $25 million firm fixed price contract. Work will be completed by December 2010 if all options are exercised. A cylinder block pumps fluid to all key transmission components, enabling the shifting of gears.
The U.S. Coast Guard has not completed its plan for reconfiguring the aviation assets in the Deepwater program, Cmdr. Kathleen M. Donohoe said July 1. Deepwater is the Coast Guard's $20 billion recapitalization program to replace aging cutters, patrol boats, helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. In May, Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thomas Collins said the current Deepwater solution has limitations on lift capability (Daily, May 6) and the mix of aircraft will need to be changed.
DEMO ENGINE: Pratt & Whitney recently completed the final large military demonstrator engine for the Integrated High Performance Turbine Engine Technology program, the company said. The experimental test engine, XTE67/1, was developed to demonstrate reduced maintenance and production costs and improved weight and thrust performance. Pratt & Whitney will begin testing the engine in July.
KEYSTONE, Colo. - Gen. Lance W. Lord, Commander of Air Force Space Command, said cutting money from some big-ticket space programs, as recommended by the Senate Appropriations Committee, would mean taking longer to shift to a strategy of using precision effects. Programs like the Transformational Satellite Communications System (TSAT) "are the key to what we want to do," Lord told reporters June 30 at a symposium here.
SUB WORK: General Dynamics Electric Boat has been awarded a $12.8 million contract modification by the U.S. Navy to do nuclear submarine work, the company said. General Dynamics Electric Boat will provide scheduling, planning, and technical support for submarine maintenance, as well as planning yard, design agent, engineering and technical support. The contract could be worth more than $1.1 billion over five years if all options are exercised and funded. Eighty-five percent of the work will be done in Groton, Conn.
For the first time, U.S. Joint Forces Command (JFCOM) demonstrated in a recent exercise how multiple, dissimilar unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) can share imagery and command and control functions, said Frank Roberts, head of UAV initiatives for JFCOM's intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) integration division. The exercise was Forward Look III, held June 12-21 in North Carolina, the last in a series of three exercises that tested the interoperability of various UAVs.
The Defense Department has asked Congress to reallocate more than $3 billion in previously enacted funds, mainly to pay for urgent needs that have arisen in ongoing military operations.
The Cassini-Huygens probe entered orbit around Saturn June 30 via a maneuver that took the spacecraft through Saturn's rings twice while it gathered the closest measurements ever obtained of the second-largest planet in the solar system.
The U.S. Navy's Advanced SEAL Delivery System (ASDS) is a combat submersible launched from a fast-attack submarine that can deploy special operations troops near hostile shores, according to Naval Sea Systems Command officials. The ASDS is the first dry combat battery-powered submersible system designed to insert and extract special operations forces and their combat gear clandestinely from hostile territory, an official at Northrop Grumman, the prime contractor, told The DAILY.
Goodrich Corp. will provide internal rescue hoists for UH-1 and UH-60 helicopters under orders from the U.S. Army and Marine Corps, the company said July 1. Steve Loye, Goodrich's vice president of hoist and winch, said the Marines have ordered 35 new hoists and the Army has agreed to a five-year contract for the overhaul of their existing hoists.
REJECTED: The defense technology firm DRS Technologies refused an unsolicited, $42-per-share cash acquisition bid from L-3 Technologies because it "would not be in the best interest of the company's stockholders," the company said July 1. L-3 said it would drop its bid but could discuss a DRS acquisition in the future "if DRS decided to pursue a transaction."
A July 1 DAILY story headlined "Scientist: 'Space elevator' feasible because of nanotube advances" gave the incorrect impression that geosynchronous orbit (GEO) is 62,000 miles above the Earth. The space elevator would extend beyond GEO (approximately 22,236 miles) to a total altitude of 62,000 miles.
F/A-22 CONTRACT: The Air Force has awarded a $2 billion contract to Lockheed Martin to buy 22 F/A-22 Raptors in fiscal 2004, the Defense Department announced late July 1. Work on the Lot 4 aircraft is slated to be completed by October 2006 and take place at Lockheed Martin facilities in Fort Worth, Texas, and Marietta, Ga., and at Boeing facilities in Seattle, Wash., DOD said. The Air Force said in March that it had reached a verbal agreement with Lockheed Martin on the Lot 4 buy (DAILY, March 25). The Air Force has procured 51 F/A-22s in prior years.
BIODEFENSE CORP., Lexington, Mass. R. James Woolsey, former director of central intelligence and vice president of Booz Allen Hamilton, has joined the board of advisers. DRS TECHNOLOGIES, Parsippany, N.J. Thomas F. Daley has joined the company as vice president, corporate counsel. HERLEY INDUSTRIES, Lancaster, Pa. Lawrence J. Rytter has been named vice president and general manager for Herley's Lancaster operation. ITT INDUSTRIES, White Plains, N.Y.
KEYSTONE, Colo. - Recent actions by space officers "clearly showed an insufficient ability to analyze unintended consequences and assess the impact of their actions on the overall campaign plan beyond the vacuum of space," according to Lt. Gen. Norty Schwartz (USAF), director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Schwartz, addressing a symposium here June 29, gave no details, saying he couldn't be "too specific in this venue."
