MOVING ON: Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, says HASC Staff Director Robert Rangel will be moving in early June to the Pentagon to work for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Bob Simmons, currently deputy staff director for oversight, will become HASC staff director. Hunter praises both Rangel and Simmons, a former chief executive officer with 24 years of experience in the defense and aerospace industry, who joined the committee staff in 2003.
The House Armed Services Committee has warned the Pentagon that it is concerned about the cost growth and acceleration of several major acquisition programs, such as the Navy's presidential helicopter program and the Army's Future Combat Systems.
PRV RFP: The U.S. Air Force has released a draft request for proposals (RFP) for its Personnel Recovery Vehicle (PRV) program and says it remains on track to release a final RFP in July. Proposals will be due in September, and a contract award is slated for February 2006. The Bell-Boeing PRV-22 tiltrotor aircraft, the Lockheed Martin-AgustaWestland-Bell Helicopter Textron US101 helicopter and Sikorsky's H-92 helicopter are expected to compete, and Boeing is considering offering its CH-47 Chinook helicopter.
A May 18 DAILY article incorrectly said that Boeing's Unmanned Little Bird helicopter will be deployed to Iraq next year. Although Boeing believes the Army is interested in using the system as a communications relay platform for ground troops in the field, deployment would depend on the continued success in the testing program, the company said. If approved, the earliest such a deployment could take place would be February 2006.
COUGARS MULTIPLY: The U.S. Navy said May 18 that Force Protection Industries Inc. was awarded a $16.6 million delivery order for 17 Cougar Joint Explosive Ordnance Disposal Rapid Response Vehicles, associated manuals and spares for the Marine Corps. A maximum of 122 vehicles can be ordered under the base contract. The latest order follows an Army request for 120 Cougars recently after the service watched Marines try them out in Iraq (DAILY, May 17).
Strict U.S. export regulations on sensitive aerospace technology are a serious obstacle to the development of the worldwide space tourism industry, according to Scaled Composites founder Burt Rutan.
WCMD: Lockheed Martin will produce 1,655 Wind Corrected Munitions Dispenser (WCMD) tail kits and 100 WCMD-Extended Range wing kits for the U.S. Air Force, the company said May 19. The work will be done under a $52.9 million contract, which signals the start of production for the WCMD-ER system.
The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is fueling significant interest among foreign countries that do not take part in the current development program but might be declared eligible to buy the jet, according to the U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA).
Orbit International Corp. said it has received orders worth more than $630,000 for the development of new software applications and enhancements to its Control Display Unit (CDU), which will be used on U.S. Army vehicles. The production award, from Honeywell International Defense and Space Electronic Systems, will give the Army's ground system vehicles additional battlefield information, the Hauppage, N.Y.-based company said May 19.
EADS Defence Electronics will supply the Missile Launch Detection System (MILDS), or AN/AAR-60, for the Australian military's Black Hawk and CH-47 Chinook helicopters, the company said May 18. The work will be done under a contract worth more than 10 million euros ($13 million), EADS said. The MILDS will be integrated with the helicopters' self-protection suites under the "Echidna" project.
Proponents of naval shipbuilding and increased fleet size are feeling bolstered by amendment victories this week in the House Armed Services Committee's fiscal 2006 defense authorization bill, and they are cautiously optimistic that their initiatives can survive all the way through conference with the Senate. Reps. Jo Ann Davis (R-Va.) and Gene Taylor (D-Miss.) spoke to reporters in Washington May 19 at an event sponsored by King Publishing Group. They maintained that Congress is starting to realize that it has been neglecting shipbuilding needs.
Finmeccanica, Italy's largest defense contractor, has created a new Defence Electronics division, making it Europe's second-largest company in the field, it said May 18. The new division will have revenues of more than 3 billion euros ($3.9 billion) and will employ 19,000 people, Finmeccanica said.
The U.S. Navy said it would christen the lead ship of the new T-AKE class of replenishment ships the USNS Lewis and Clark on May 21, during a launching at National Steel and Shipbuilding Co. in San Diego. The USNS Lewis and Clark is the lead ship in the new 11-ship T-AKE Class. T-AKE is a new combat logistics force vessel for transferring cargo such as ammunition, food, limited quantities of fuel, repair parts, ship store items and expendable supplies and material to ships and other naval warfare forces at sea.
A maximum range test of the SLAM-ER missile - more than 170 miles - demonstrates the missile's ability to meet or exceed Navy requirements, Boeing Co. said May 19. The test was conducted about two weeks ago, said Chris Haddox, a Boeing spokesman. The Standoff Land Attack Missile-Expanded Response flew farther than a SLAM-ER has ever flown, scoring a direct hit on a mobile ship target, Boeing said.
The U.S. Defense Department has appointed a Navy official to a new position designed to improve oversight of the Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS). Dennis Bauman, the Navy's program executive officer for command, control, communications, computers, intelligence and space, is now also serving as DOD's joint program executive officer for JTRS.
The equipment that U.S. military personnel are using in Iraq and Afghanistan is getting two to eight times its peacetime use in just one year, the Defense Department has reported to Congress. The report, "Ground Force Equipment Repair, Replacement and Recapitalization Requirements Resulting from Sustained Combat Operations," went to Capitol Hill last week.
NASA and the Florida Space Research Institute (FSRI) announced a new Centennial Challenges prize competition on May 19, which would award $250,000 to the first team that can extract breathable oxygen from simulated lunar soil. The prize for the MoonROx (Moon Regolith Oxygen) competition expires June 1, 2008, said NASA and FSRI, a statewide center for space research.
The House Armed Services Committee has authorized $49.1 billion in supplemental funding in fiscal 2006 for military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and antiterrorism efforts elsewhere. The move, which came May 18 as the committee marked up the FY '06 defense authorization bill, followed the Senate Armed Services Committee, which May 13 authorized $50 billion. With U.S. involvement in Iraq facing its third anniversary next March, and no withdrawal formally planned yet, many lawmakers have said the costs of military operations are increasingly known.
NASA is studying the phaseout of the Air Force's Titan IV rocket and other programs as it forms its plan for retiring the space shuttle and introducing the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) - a plan being anxiously awaited by shuttle contractors worried about retaining their work force and expertise during the transition.
