Two major studies that will influence purchases of U.S. tanker and transport aircraft are weeks or months away from being finished, even though they are already past their original due dates. A review of the Defense Department's overall mobility needs most recently was expected to wrap up in May but will now continue until "sometime after midsummer," a Pentagon spokeswoman said May 5, citing the need for more analysis. The Mobility Capability Study (MCS) was delayed earlier from March to April, and then from April to May (DAILY, March 17, May 2).
By late May or early June, NASA expects to complete a review of options for the Glory climate study mission, which include developing a standalone spacecraft or flying an instrument aboard a National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) spacecraft.
RESULTS: Orbimage of Dulles, Va., is projecting 2005 revenues of $50-60 million, which would be an increase of 62-93% over 2004 revenues, combined with operating losses of $2-12 million. The company estimates that it will spend roughly $474 million on its OrbView-5 satellite through its 2007 launch, of which the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) is reimbursing $237 million. Since the award of the NextView contract, Orbimage has raised about $107.6 million in new cash equity, according to the company.
U.S. military forces have 31 five-ton gun trucks in Iraq but more are needed to save the lives of military personnel, a weapons laboratory official told the House Armed Services Committee on May 5. Steven DeTeresa of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory said $40,000 removable armor kits added to cargo trucks in Iraq already have saved some lives against improvised explosive devices (IEDs). The Vietnam-era troop transport vehicle, which sports multiple high-caliber machine guns, provides survivability and firepower that "far exceed" modern Humvees.
Aviation Technology Group Inc. has installed specially modified Williams FJ33-4-15M turbofan engines into a Javelin executive jet prototype, the company said May 5. "The team at ATG is focused on building the Javelin and hitting our milestones," Charlie Johnson, the company's chief operating officer, said in a statement.
The Government Accountability Office denied a protest from United Valve Co. of Houston, which said the Army Materiel Command improperly awarded a parts supply contract for UH-1 Huey helicopters to Chatsworth, Calif.-based Logistical Support LLC (LS). United Valve said the Army "unreasonably regarded LS as an approved source" for flutter dampeners used on Hueys. The Army awarded the company a sole-source contract for the work.
VEHICLE SERVICING: United Defense of Santa Clara, Calif., has been awarded an $8 million contract modification to service vehicles returning from Iraq, the company said May 5. The contract was awarded by the U.S. Army Tank-automotive and Armaments Command. The contract covers armored personnel carriers, self-propelled howitzers, artillery ammunition resupply vehicles, and Bradley Fighting Vehicles from the 1st Cavalry Division. The work will include vehicle inspections, replacement of damaged or worn parts, and annual upkeep. The work will be done at Fort Hood, Texas.
LCA ADVICE: A parliamentary defense consulting committee reviewed India's Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas this week, and said the Indian air force should expedite user trials to induct the aircraft early, according to the India Press Information Bureau. They also said the defense ministry should develop a marketing strategy for export sales of the aircraft.
EADS Defence & Security Systems of Amsterdam plans to buy the professional mobile radio business of Finland-based Nokia, EADS said May 4. Financial terms were not disclosed. The purchase's closing is expected before the end of 2005, pending regulatory approval, the company said. EADS would take over Nokia's PMR business, including its Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA) infrastructure and terminals.
Australia soon will pick either the Boeing Standoff Land Attack Missile-Expanded Response (SLAM-ER) or the Lockheed Martin Joint Air to Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) to equip its F/A-18 Hornet and AP-3C Orion aircraft, an Australian official said. A third candidate, Europe's Taurus, is no longer in the competition, said Air Commodore Graham Bentley, the Royal Australian Air Force attache at the Australian Embassy in Washington.
House Rep. Harold Rogers (R-Ky.) late May 4 shot a warning toward the Homeland Security Department - and the White House - by slashing $466 million off the Bush Administration's fiscal 2006 Coast Guard budget request for its Deepwater program and cutting funding back to its pre-Sept. 11 level.
Contractor teams are awaiting word from NASA on its new acquisition strategy for the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV), which newly appointed Administrator Michael Griffin seeks to accelerate to close any gap in U.S. manned spaceflight capability following the retirement of the space shuttle in 2010. The front-runners in the competition are a team led by Lockheed Martin and a team led by Northrop Grumman and Boeing. The teams expect NASA to spend the next month or two re-evaluating the program before getting back to industry with the changes.
The U.S. Navy and Army have awarded Markland Technologies Inc. two contracts worth up to $36 million, the company said May 4. The first award, worth up to $11 million, was made by the Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division. It is for system design, engineering support and systems integration for a new, unidentified land-based Marine Corps vehicle. It is the first award Markland has received from the Navy, the company said.
Despite Bush Administration requests, lawmakers negotiating the $82 billion supplemental spending measure decided to prevent the U.S. Navy from retiring the USS John F. Kennedy aircraft carrier and competing the DD(X) destroyer program.
The long-awaited launch of the first of three next-generation Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES-N) for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and NASA has been postponed from May to late June to allow technicians time to replace potentially faulty pressure vessels onboard the Delta IV rocket.
Federal government information technology (IT) spending will grow from $71 billion in fiscal 2005 to $92 billion in FY '10, driven by homeland security and defense spending as well as cyber security concerns, according to Reston, Va., consulting firm Input. "Homeland security initiatives will continue to be the primary driver behind significant growth for another one to two years," Payton Smith, Input's director of public sector market analysis, said in a statement.
NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) are set to launch the latest Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite (POES), NOAA-N, on the morning of May 11 from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. NOAA maintains a constellation of two primary polar-orbiting satellites, which provide data for NOAA's weather and climate forecasting. To be renamed NOAA-18 once in orbit, NOAA-N will replace NOAA-16 and join NOAA-17, which was launched in 2002.
