Peter B. Teets has been elected to the board of trustees. Teets retired as president and chief operating officer of Lockheed Martin Corp. and is a former undersecretary of the Air Force and director of the National Reconnaissance Office.
LE BOURGET, France - AgustaWestland has made a public commitment that there will be no further job cuts at its Westland facility in Yeovil, United Kingdom. At the same time, the company has once more pointed a finger at the British Ministry of Defence for not placing promised contracts and therefore putting jobs at risk, according to Aviation Week's ShowNews.
NEW DELHI - India and Ukraine have signed a memorandum of understanding calling for cooperation in outer space research for civil purposes. The decision follows President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam's visit to the Ukrainian space agency. G. Madhvan Nair, chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation, accompanied Kalam on the trip. The two space agencies are to develop an action plan by October. Ukraine also has sought collaboration with India on developing a 150- to 200-seat transport aircraft.
The United States is unlikely to regain its prominence in the global commercial expendable launch market given continued flat launch demand and the introduction of potential new competitors such as Japan, according to a new study by Futron Corp.
LE BOURGET, France - Northrop Grumman Corp., prime contractor for the U.S. Navy's E-2D Advanced Hawkeye, has begun talks with foreign industry about possibly including them in building the airborne early-warning (AEW) system.
The U.S. Naval Air Systems Command on June 10 awarded units of Lockheed Martin and L-3 Communications contracts for work on P-3 and EP-3 aircraft. Lockheed Martin Aircraft and Logistics Centers, Greenville, S.C., was awarded a $121.4 million award for phased depot maintenance, structural inspections, kits and modification and installation programs. L-3 Communications Integrated Systems, Greenville, Texas, was awarded $104.2 million for the same work.
The U.S. Navy has awarded a task order with the National Center for Defense Robotics (NCDR) to produce two Dragon Runner unmanned ground vehicles for delivery to the Robotic Systems Joint Program Office. The NCDR has in turn subcontracted with Pittsburgh-based Automatika Inc. to build and deliver the evaluation Dragon Runners, which are intended for potential use by the U.S. Army, NCDR and Automatika announced June 13 in a joint statement.
The Nordam Group, which repairs aircraft and provides maintenance, repair and overhaul services to commercial and U.S. military aircraft, said June 13 that it is moving its European headquarters from the Netherlands to Toulouse, France. Nordam Group announced the move at the Paris Air Show, under way at Le Bourget. The company, headquartered in Tulsa, Okla., plans to be in the new Toulouse offices by late 2005.
LE BOURGET, France - The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program office expects the U.S. Air Force to update its purchase plans for the stealthy jet by year's end, according to a program official. Air Force Brig. Gen. Charles Davis, deputy program executive officer for JSF, said June 13 that he expects the Air Force figure of 1,763 aircraft to change because the number amounts to a one-for-one replacement of the F-16 and A-10, a ratio the Air Force no longer believes it needs.
The International Space Station program is recalculating the amount of time it can support a stranded shuttle crew in the event of an emergency, due to the continued failure of the Elektron oxygen generation system and the current failure rate of the station's oxygen-generating candles.
LE BOURGET, France - The surprise elimination of the Eurofighter Typhoon from Singapore's fighter contest has focused more attention on the Dassault Rafale, the remaining European contender. The Rafale and the Boeing F-15 remain in the competition (DAILY, April 22). The contest has turned into a grudge match, because the last time that the Rafale was up against the F-15 - in Korea - Dassault and the French government were convinced it was only U.S. government pressure that swung the contest against them.
The sea basing capability being developed for the Marine Corps will allow the service to deploy 15,000 Marines anywhere in the world in 10 to 12 days as soon as 2015, according to the commandant of the Marine Corps. "And when you are able to respond that fast, it is going to change the calculus of the battlefield," Gen. Michael W. Hagee said in an interview with the Pentagon Channel, the Defense Department's television outlet.
The House moved June 14 to approve $16.5 billion in fiscal 2006 spending for NASA, including brushing aside a Democratic attempt to divert $200 million to law enforcement grants. Rep. David Obey (D-Wis.), the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, proposed an amendment to H.R. 2862 that would have moved $100 million from Project Prometheus and another $100 million from the moon-Mars initiative to cover the Community Oriented Policing Services and other law enforcements grants that were cut in the annual spending bill.
TESTING COMPLETE: Dallas-based Vought Aircraft Industries recently completed successful testing of its first enhanced wing for the U.S. Air Force's RQ-4B Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle built by Northrop Grumman, the company said. The tests simulated forces experienced during specific "gust load" winds. The testing was part of an effort to allow the Global Hawk to carry a larger payload while maintaining platform performance specifications, the company said. Vought's work has included design development, fabrication, assembly and structural testing of the wing.
LE BOURGET, France - The diversion of scarce funds to more urgent projects will hurt the market for trainer aircraft, according to a new study by intelligence and analysis provider Forecast International. The Advanced European Jet Pilot Training (AEJPT) program is marking time, says Bill Dane, Forecast's senior aerospace analyst. No common specification has emerged from the 12 interested "Eurotraining" countries, while one of the local contenders, EADS, "appears to be losing interest in its design and ... has only built a mock-up [of the Mako] to date."
NASA formally has selected the teams led by Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman/Boeing to continue their design work on the agency's Crew Exploration Vehicle, and anticipates awarding bridge funding to both teams to support them until a downselect is made in early 2006. The teams were the only ones that submitted proposals to NASA for the CEV, which is to be used to transport astronauts to low-Earth orbit and return to the moon no later than 2020.
LE BOURGET, France - In keeping with both U.S. and International Monetary Fund recommendations, Israel has made significant progress in recent years in breaking up its state-owned monopolies and privatizing a number of government-run industries. Israel's Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz expects the industry to converge into a few big groups within five years, according to Aviation Week's ShowNews. Mofaz said deeper partnerships and mergers into larger companies will contribute to a healthier defense industry.
LE BOURGET, France - Raytheon has conducted the first test launch of the latest Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) variant over Sweden's Vidsel test range.
LE BOURGET, France - Embraer's ERJ-145 aircraft can provide cash-strapped countries a cheaper way for their militaries to acquire airborne intelligence, a company official says. Anastacio Katsanos, Brazil-based Embraer's defense programs chief, said the reconnaissance-based ERJ-145 can achieve multiforce integration and faster command cycles, allowing the greater mobility and flexibilty that armed services want, according to Aviation Week's ShowNews.
TEAMING: Boeing will provide mission systems integration for Sikorsky's HH-92 helicopter as part of the company's bid for the U.S. Air Force's Personnel Recovery Vehicle program, Sikorsky said June 13. The preliminary agreement is subject to Sikorsky and Boeing entering into a mutually satisfactory teaming agreement, Sikorsky said from the Paris Air Show.
MERIDIAN, Miss. - Lead-in training for Navy combat pilots in the T-45 Goshawk will be safer by the end of the year, Capt. Daniel L. Ouimette, commander of Training Air Wing One here, told The DAILY. By then, Boeing's Nose Wheel Steering Augmentation System, a fix for ground handling problems that T-45s have had since entering service in 1991, should be on enough aircraft for a class of students to train only in Goshawks equipped with the fix.
FLYING HOURS: By the end of April, the four-nation Eurofighter Typhoon fleet had logged a total of 2,845 operational flying hours with the partner air forces. The United Kingdom's Royal Air Force led the way with its 13 aircraft completing 1,357 hours. Germany's 10 Eurofighters had flown 552 hours, Italy's eight aircraft had flown 563 hours, and Spain's eight jets had spent 373 hours in the air. By May 30, Eurofighter had delivered 39 service aircraft, plus five instrumented production aircraft for development tasks.
