NOT FADE AWAY: The European Space Agency's XMM-Newton space observatory has shown that SN 1979C, a star that exploded in 1979, is as bright today in X-ray light as it was when it was discovered years ago, an unexpected finding. Researchers can use the light from the supernova as a "time machine" to "study the life of a dead star long before it exploded," says Stefan Immler of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Md., leader of a team of astronomers studying SN 1979C. An abundance of solar wind has helped keep the supernova bright, they speculate.
AIRBORNE SETS: The U.S. Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division has tapped Cartwright Electronics of Fullerton, Calif., and Micro Systems Inc. of Fort Walton Beach, Fla., to provide up to 731 AN/DSQ-50A Airborne Sets each, including sensor and telemetry downlinks. The sets are used in aerial and surface targets to evaluate capabilities of weapon systems and to train weapon system operators. The awards - representing the only two offers made for the multiple-award contract - are worth $18.7 million to Cartwright and $12.3 million to Micro Systems.
The House on July 22 backed President Bush's space exploration agenda, voting 383-15 to authorize $33.4 billion for NASA over the next two fiscal years.
GOES-N: The GOES-N team hopes to finally launch from Cape Canaveral, Fla., as early as the end of this week, following NASA's next attempt to launch Space Shuttle Discovery. If the shuttle launches July 26, as currently scheduled, GOES-N could lift off on the 29th, according to Boeing spokesman Robert Villanueva. If Discovery has to scrub again, GOES-N could fly a day earlier on the 28th. Although the Delta IV rocket carrying GOES-N will launch from a different pad than the shuttle, the two flights share certain range personnel and infrastructure.
The U.S. Air Force is moving ahead in the Air-to-Ground Radar Imaging (AGRI) program, an effort that one contractor said is aimed at further protecting soldiers by allowing aircraft to detect, track and target hostile forces in motion on the ground, and to do so from a safe distance.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has appointed Donald Kerr to direct the National Reconnaissance Office, effective Aug. 3. Kerr will take over from NRO Deputy Director Dennis Fitzgerald, who has been acting director since the retirement of Peter Teets. Unlike Teets, Kerr will not be dual-hatted as the Air Force undersecretary for space.
KEEP OUT: With an eye towards urban operations in Iraq, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is seeking proposals for a new lightweight, quickly reversible barrier technology for blocking doors, roadways and bridges. Because of the level of compactness required, DARPA expects that the system will have to be based on chemicals that are sprayed into an area and expand.
Following the recent cancellation of NASA's Mars Telecommunications Orbiter, the upcoming Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is poised to play a larger role in relaying science data from future Mars missions back to Earth, according to program officials. Originally scheduled for launch in 2009, MTO was to have been the first spacecraft sent to another planet for the express purpose of relaying communications, marking the beginning of what NASA calls an "interplanetary Internet." The mission was canceled to free money for other priorities.
Congress "can't meet" the Bush Administration's $24 billion, 25-year rebaselined budget for the Coast Guard's Deepwater recapitalization program, although congressional appropriators will consider the proposal during conference over the fiscal 2006 budget, a key House appropriator said July 21.
STRONG RESULTS: Revenues for vehicle armor supplier Armor Holdings Inc. shot up 66.1% and net income more than doubled in the second quarter of 2005, the company said July 21. Revenues were $371.6 million, compared with $223.7 million a year ago. Quarterly net income was $37.4 million, or $1.05 per share, compared with $17.8 million the year before.
FLIR Systems of Portland, Ore., posted increased revenue and earnings for the second quarter of 2005, the company said July 21. Revenue was up 10% in the quarter, reaching $131 million, compared with $119.3 million in the second quarter of 2004. Revenue for the first six months of 2005 was up 5%, to $239.3 million, over the same period last year. Net earnings for the quarter shot up 37% to $24.6 million, up from $17.9 million a year ago.
The U.S. Air Force's Joint Air to Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) flew in what appears to have been a successful test July 20, giving the program a lift after taking a beating on Capitol Hill the previous month. During the test, the missile cleanly separated from an F-16 at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., and flew about 21 minutes before detonating in a hardened test target, a government source told The DAILY July 21.
The next-generation, tactical, vertical takeoff and landing unmanned aerial vehicle (VUAV) for the U.S. Coast Guard's Deepwater recapitalization program, Bell Helicopter Textron's Eagle Eye tiltrotor UAV, will take its first flight in September, Rear Adm. Patrick Stillman told House appropriators July 21.
NEW HELOS: Venezuela's army will receive 15 new Russian helicopters in early 2006 under a program to improve its land operations. They include Mi-17 light transport, Mi-26 heavy transport and Mi-35 combat aircraft, Venezuela army Gen. Raul Isaias Baduel said in a statement July 18. A total of 33 helicopters will be delivered by the end of 2006 under the Army Aviation Commando Enhancement Project. The aircraft will be used to help guard the country's southwestern region, Baduel said.
WAR OF WORDS: The House on July 20 agreed to a call for Chinese Gen. Zhu Chenghu to be relieved of his command after the general last week said China could use nuclear weapons in response to U.S. military defense of Taiwan if a conflict arose. Those comments were "both damaging to United States-China relations and a violation of China's commitment to resolve its differences with Taiwan peacefully," says a provision sponsored by Rep. Thomas Tancredo (R-Colo.).
The U.S. Missile Defense Agency has decided to stop buying Lockheed Martin's alternative interceptor booster for the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system, the head of MDA said July 21.
NEW HELOS: Venezuela's army will receive 15 new Russian helicopters in early 2006 under a program to improve its land operations. They include Mi-17 light transport, Mi-26 heavy transport and Mi-35 combat aircraft, Venezuela army Gen. Raul Isaias Baduel said in a statement July 18. A total of 33 helicopters will be delivered by the end of 2006 under the Army Aviation Commando Enhancement Project. The aircraft will be used to help guard the country's southwestern region, Baduel said.
A Russian investigation board has concluded that the Volna rocket carrying the Cosmos-1 solar sail spacecraft failed because its first-stage engine shut down prematurely, according to an announcement from the Planetary Society. A joint effort of the society and Cosmos Studios, the $4 million Cosmos-1 spacecraft would have attempted the first controlled flight of a solar sail. The spacecraft launched from a submerged Russian submarine in the Barents Sea on June 21 (DAILY, June 23).
Longbow Limited (LBL), a joint venture of Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin, won a $13.3 million Army contract for life cycle contractor support of the Longbow Fire Control Radar. The contract was awarded to LBL for 2005 with an option of the same amount for calendar year 2006. LBL already provides depot repair, production integration support and technical support to Apache squadrons in the field under a previous contract for 2004.
Senators attempting to amend the fiscal 2006 defense authorization bill will try to eliminate funds for developing the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP), strip more than $60 million from national missile defense, and boost funding to buy up-armor Humvees for the Army and the Marine Corps.
NEW DESTROYER: The U.S. Navy will christen its newest Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer, Farragut, on July 23 in a ceremony at General Dynamics Corp.'s Bath Iron Works shipyard in Maine. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) will serve as ship's sponsor. Designated DDG 99, Farragut is the 49th of 62 Arleigh Burke-class ships. The 9,200-ton Farragut is 509.5 feet in length, has a waterline beam of 59 feet and a navigational draft of 32 feet. Four gas turbine engines will power the ship to speeds of more than 30 knots. The ship honors Adm.
