Aerospace Daily & Defense Report

By Tony Osborne
A consortium of Belgian, French, German, Italian and Polish companies and research institutes has been selected to begin research on electromagnetic railguns.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Michael Bruno
Japanese telecommunications operator SoftBank remains committed to AeroVironment’s high-altitude pseudo-satellites (HAPS) unmanned aircraft, the latter’s top executive said.
Space

By Maxim Pyadushkin
Last week’s Russian Defense Ministry contract with Sukhoi for 20 Su-34 Fullback fighter-bombers is an interim step until development of a modernized variant is completed, an industry source tells Aerospace DAILY.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Lee Hudson
The Senate Armed Services Committee’s version of the fiscal 2021 defense policy bill, if passed, would be a big win for the F-35, MQ-9, X-58 and the U.S. Army’s UH-60 replacement.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Tony Osborne
Czech aerospace firm Aero Vodochody has new owners following its sale by private equity firm Penta Group.
Supply Chain

By Mark Carreau
NASA has awarded Astrobotic a $199.5 million contract to deliver the Volatiles Investigation Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) to the Moon’s south pole in 2023, where it will search for water ice deposits that could be useful to future astronauts.
Commercial Space

By Lee Hudson
The Senate Armed Services Committee blocked the Pentagon’s request for a U.S. Space National Guard and did not address space acquisition in its mark of the fiscal 2021 defense policy bill because the Defense Department did not submit information requested in time for debate, according to a committee aide.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Michael Bruno
Aerostructures giant Spirit AeroSystems, the leading supplier to the Boeing 737 MAX program, is furloughing more workers after the OEM recently told it to cut o
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Tony Osborne
Former Royal Air Force Chief of Staff Sir Stephen Hillier has been endorsed by lawmakers to become chairman of the UK Civil Aviation Authority.
Safety, Ops & Regulation

By Lee Hudson
The Senate Armed Services Committee’s mark of the fiscal 2021 defense policy bill would establish a Pacific Deterrence Initiative, authorizing $1.4 billion to defend U.S. interests against China.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Graham Warwick
Slovenia’s Pipistrel has received its first type certificate for an all-electric aircraft, with the Velis Electro two-seat trainer receiving CS-LSA certification from the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Daniel Urchick
AVIATION WEEK NETWORK forecasts that over the next ten years, 282 new Western-designed military scout helicopters will be built, 25 will be
AWIN Knowledge Center

Brief news items of interest to aerospace & defense professionals.
Defense

Former Royal Air Force Chief of Staff Sir Stephen Hillier has been endorsed by lawmakers to become chairman of the UK Civil Aviation Authority
Defense

By Graham Warwick
Empirical Systems Aerospace (ESAero) is conducting fit checks with an advanced wing for NASA’s X-57 electric propulsion demonstrator as the X-plane progresses toward a first flight at Armstrong Flight Research Center at Edwards AFB in California.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Jen DiMascio
The Pentagon is likely to seek double-digit billions of dollars to reimburse defense contractors that were authorized to seek the money by the CARES Act to preserve their workforce during the COVID-19 crisis, the Pentagon’s top procurement officer told lawmakers June 10.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Mark Carreau
Expectations for a March 2021 launch of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) are fading, agency officials told a June 10 virtual meeting of the National Academies of Sciences’ Space Studies Board (SSB).
Space

By Lee Hudson
Boeing will begin flying the KC-46A Pegasus aircraft in approximately two weeks outfitted with Remote Vision System (RVS) 1.5, a revised version of the refueling tanker’s camera system that includes numerous software changes and a few hardware updates.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Mark Carreau
NASA’s Perseverance Mars 2020 rover will experience a three-day delay to its planned mid-July launch due to an issue with ground equipment at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) launch site.
Space

By Steve Trimble
The manufacturer of the MQ-9 medium-altitude unmanned aircraft system plans to enter the U.S. Air Force’s competition to select its replacement, dubbed MQ Next.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Tony Osborne
Britain’s first front-line F-35 squadron has embarked on the HMS Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier for the first in a series of workups to prepare for the first deployment of the ship to the Far East in 2021.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Graham Warwick
Wisk, the urban air mobility joint venture between Kitty Hawk and Boeing, has resumed flight testing of its Cora all-electric autonomous air taxi in the U.S. and New Zealand.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Steve Trimble
A month after warning of potentially dire budget cuts, the head of the U.S. Army’s Futures Command has softened his forecast about the fiscal impact of the global COVID-19 pandemic on top acquisition programs.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Lee Hudson
Raytheon delivered the first production unit of the Joint Precision Approach and Landing System to the USS Carl Vinson roughly one month ahead of schedule.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Steve Trimble
The U.S. Air Force has closed a system-level critical design review for the Boeing T-7A trainer and ground-based training system, the service announced on June 9.
Aircraft & Propulsion