U.K. AWARD: Selex Sensors and Airborne Systems Ltd. of Basildon, United Kingdom, has been awarded a contract worth up to $32.3 million for Ground Counter Fire Sensor Systems with spares, technical support, depot maintenance and new equipment training for the U.S. Marine Corps. The work will be done in Basildon and is expected to be completed by May 2010. The contract, announced late May 27, was awarded after a limited-competition source selection by the Marine Corps Systems Command.
The National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) is kicking off a study of near-space requested by Air Force Space Command (AFSPC) during a meeting at Boeing facilities in Colorado Springs, Colo., on June 6. The study will assess the military potential of near-space, defined as altitudes between 65,000 and 350,000 feet. The study group will be divided into panels on mission utility, the comparative value of near-space missions, integrating near-space into operations and the challenges associated with fielding near-space systems.
MICROWAVE DEALS: Herley Industries will supply microwave technology for the U.S. Navy's "Coyote" Supersonic Sea-skimming Target Missile, an Air Force air-to-air missile and high-speed commercial communications systems under contracts totaling $3.6 million. The company said it expects order booking to continue "at a healthy pace" for the rest of its fiscal 2005.
BROWNOUTS: Col. William Gavora, commander of the Army's Aviation Applied Technology Directorate (AATD), hopes that anti-brownout technology developed by AATD soon will start being installed on Army UH-60 Black Hawk and CH-47 Chinook helicopters. Brownouts - in which a hovering helicopter is enveloped in sand and dust kicked up by its rotor - and accidental collisions are the leading causes of aircraft losses in Afghanistan and Iraq.
For the most part, the final House defense authorization bill for fiscal 2006 reflects the work of the House Armed Services Committee and its subcommittees regarding weapons and acquisition programs. However, successful amendments added on the chamber floor May 25 included a reporting requirement by the Defense Department to Congress on its plan to sustain the U.S. Navy's MHC-51 class mine countermeasures ships and supporting dedicated mine countermeasures systems until the Littoral Combat Ship and next-generation mine countermeasures systems are deployed.
NEW PARTS: The U.S. Navy late May 26 said Bell Helicopter Textron Inc. of Fort Worth, Texas, is being awarded a $7.7 million contract modification for the "nonrecurring effort" to replace the remanufactured UH-1N or HH-1N structural parts with new parts used to manufacture UH-1Y helicopters. The Defense Department's former acquisition chief, Michael Wynne, last month approved new construction of UH-1Y Huey light utility helos starting in 2006 rather than have them be remanufactured from UH-1Ns currently in use (DAILY, April 25).
REPLACED: Government-owned missile manufacturer Bharat Dynamics Ltd. (BDL) has replaced its former managing director, retired Maj. Gen. P. Mohan Das, with retired Maj. Gen. R. Gossain. Das was fired "in the public interest," according to a defense ministry source, in a move related to an investigation of financial irregularities in the country's guided missile program.
Northrop Grumman Corp. is accepting the U.S. Navy's latest plan for developing and buying the DD(X) destroyer while General Dynamics Corp. has indicated that further discussion may be necessary, representatives from the companies have told The DAILY.
UAV FLIGHT HOURS: The ScanEagle unmanned aerial vehicle, developed by Boeing Co. and the Insitu Group, has surpassed 3,000 combat flight hours in Iraq in just 10 months, Boeing said May 26. The ScanEagle was deployed by the First Marine Expeditionary Force beginning in August 2004 and provides intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, the company said.
DSP-23 SHIPPED: The last of the Northrop Grumman-built, missile-launch-detecting Defense Support Program (DSP) satellites was shipped to Cape Canaveral, Fla., May 9 to process it for launch, the U.S. Air Force says. DSP-23 is scheduled to lift off in December.
The value of new orders for the defense sector of the U.S. aerospace industry for the first quarter of 2005 indicates that the current boom will continue a bit longer than expected, said David Napier, director of the Aerospace Industries Association's Aerospace Research Center.
Rep. Robert Andrews (D-N.J.) is on a mission that hobby enthusiasts young and old could thank him for: cutting some of the cost of toy military aircraft and ship models. The lawmaker successfully amended the House's fiscal 2006 defense authorization bill to require the Defense Department to prohibit defense contractors from requiring U.S. toy and hobby manufacturers, distributors or merchants to obtain licenses from, or pay fees to, the contractor for the use of military likenesses or designations on items provided under DOD contracts.
Orbital Sciences Corp. announced May 27 that it is involved in a federal investigation into U.S. government launch vehicle contracts. The company said in a brief statement that federal authorities are believed to be probing contracting procedures for "certain" launch vehicle programs and that government agents executed search warrants May 26 at Orbital's Dulles, Va., and Chandler, Ariz., facilities.
SATS DEMO: NASA, the FAA and industry partners plan to demonstrate new small-aircraft aviation technology at "SATS 2005: A Transformation of Air Travel," on June 6 at the regional airport in Danville, Va. The Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS) is intended to develop technologies to let small airplanes fly safely into community airports that don't have radar or extensive ground navigation systems, so people can fly from these airports on demand.
DE-MATING: Technicians at NASA's Kennedy Space Center will de-mate the shuttle Discovery from its external tank (ET-120) on May 31 and attach it to a new tank, ET-121, on June 7. The second tank to feature safety improvements developed in the wake of the Columbia accident, ET-121 originally was scheduled to fly with Atlantis on the second return-to-flight mission, STS-121. A new heater will be installed on ET-121 on the feedline bellows, where engineers are concerned that ice may form.
SUPER HORNETS: The Boeing Co. is open to selling additional numbers of F/A-18E/F Super Hornet fighters to the U.S. Navy and to India and Japan, a Boeing official says. "We're always working with our Navy customer ... we'll sell as many Super Hornets to the Navy as they would like to buy," Bob Farmer Jr., Boeing's director of business development for the F/A-18, said recently.
The U.S. Navy late May 26 announced it had awarded roughly $30 million in research and development (R&D) work to General Dynamics Electric Boat Division of Groton, Conn., and Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co., of Sunnyvale, Calif., for undersea warfare activity.
IN THEATER: Lockheed Martin's Short-Range Assault Weapon-Multiple Purpose Variant (SRAW-MPV) currently is being used by troops in Iraq, according to a Marine Corps spokesman. The SRAW-MPV is a variant of the Predator shoulder-fired anti-tank weapon.
South Korea will buy another round of fighter aircraft worth 5.6 trillion won ($5.6 billion) and spend 800 billion won ($799 million) on 20 other weapons programs between 2006 and 2010, the defense ministry said May 26.
June 1 - 2 -- National Small Business Conference, "Opening New Frontiers Through Effective Partnering," Los Angeles Marriott Airport, Los Angeles, Calif. For more information go to www.ndia.org. June 5 - 7 -- SATS 2005: A Transformation in Air Travel, "Demonstration of the capabilities of the Small Aircraft Transportation System project," Danville Regional Airport, Danville, Va. For more information contact September Moon Productions at 248-355-3700, email [email protected] or go to www.sats2005.com.
With renewed hope that NASA may restore funding for hypersonics, engineers at Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., are crafting a revamped proposal for the X-43C, a larger follow-on to the record-setting X-43A demonstrator that flew twice in 2004. Funding for hypersonics appeared to dry up last year as the agency's space exploration plans took center stage and various aeronautics efforts were scaled back or canceled. Engineers at Langley were ordered to stop work on the X-43C, a 16-foot-long vehicle that would have used hydrocarbon fuel.
