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.
LE BOURGET, France - New developments in Israel's missile arsenal normally are kept highly classified, so recent reports and official announcements about successful tests of extended-range missiles caused a stir among the world's defense community, according to Aviation Week's ShowNews.
A launch vehicle derived from a single space shuttle solid rocket booster could be ready for flight by 2010 if NASA chooses it as a means of launching the Crew Exploration Vehicle into low-Earth orbit, according to SRB manufacturer ATK Thiokol.
The Tango Bravo effort to investigate new technologies for future submarines has taken a step forward with the award of five contracts. The contracts "are aimed at removing technology barriers for reducing size and cost of future submarines," said the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which is managing the program. The Navy is providing the deputy program manager.
FIRST FLIGHT: Northrop Grumman's second RQ-4A Global Hawk maritime demonstrator successfully completed its first flight, the company said June 13. In the four-hour flight, the UAV launched autonomously from the company's production facility in Palmdale, Calif., and tested accurately for air speed, altitude and direction.
LE BOURGET, France - The Boeing Co. is exploring several potential upgrades to the C-17 Globemaster III in case the U.S. Air Force decides to continue buying the transport aircraft well into the next decade, company officials said June 13.
The Odyssey Launch Platform and the Sea Launch Commander have departed their home port in Long Beach, Calif., in preparation for the June 23 launch of the Intelsat Americas-8 spacecraft, Sea Launch announced June 13. Upon arrival at the launch site at 154 degrees West longitude, the launch team will begin a 72-hour countdown, ballast the Launch Platform to launch depth and perform final tests on the Zenit-3SL launcher and spacecraft.
MOSCOW - During high-level talks with Russia's Federal Space Agency, European Space Agency officials confirmed ESA's interest in the joint development of the Clipper reusable manned spacecraft to replace Soyuz capsules. Clipper was a central element of the negotiations attended by heads of ESA's key directorates and Russian space program leaders. The spacecraft, proposed by RSC Energia, is a partially reusable lifting body "mini shuttle" that could allow the delivery of six-person crews to and from low-Earth orbit.
A program to hunt for potentially threatening asteroids or comets down to 100 meters across probably would cost $300 million-$400 million and could use an array of space-based and ground telescopes, according to Lindley Johnson, program manager for NASA's Near Earth Observation Program.
Maritime defense - including the creation of a maritime equivalent of the North American Aerospace Defense Command - presents the greatest single opportunity to beef up domestic security, according to the Defense Department's top official for homeland defense. "When we speak of a maritime NORAD, we're not talking about just a bilateral relationship with Canada modeled on the NORAD agreement we have in the air domain," said Paul McHale, assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense.
LE BOURGET, France - In January, Eurocopter finally terminated an agreement to develop and produce the utility Mil Mi-38 helicopter jointly with Russia, as legal difficulties regarding industrial property rights could not be resolved. Although Russian developers have lost their French partner, their hopes are still high as they look for new partners, according to Aviation Week's ShowNews.
U.K. ISTAR: BAE Systems' Nashua, N.H., facility will perform $12.5 million worth of work under a larger contract between the U.K. Ministry of Defense (MOD) and BAE Systems to provide maritime intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance (ISTAR) sensors for the Royal Navy. BAE Systems' technology partner, QinetiQ Group, also will work on the sensor system proposal, called "Sextant." The seven-month advanced demonstration phase will result in a demonstration to British officials, BAE Systems announced June 13.
A BAE Systems-Raytheon team is proceeding with development of an advanced mission planning capability for the U-2 reconnaissance aircraft, and efforts to develop similar capabilities for other types of platforms are shaping up, according to a BAE Systems official. The team won a $12.9 million contract for the U-2 work on May 9, said Bob Simek, business development director for BAE Systems' National Security Solutions unit in San Diego.
LE BOURGET, France - The V-22 Osprey is doing "swimmingly well" in its operational evaluation (OPEVAL) and is expected to finish that key test phase in about a week and a half, according to a program official. "We're on the brink of completing OPEVAL," said Marine Corps Col. Bill Taylor, the deputy program manager for the U.S. Navy-led V-22 program. "We're looking forward to the results when they officially come out."
