Aerospace & Defense Roundup: Mar. 10

LiquidPiston is to study the application of its rotary diesel engine technology to hybrid-electric propulsion systems for unmanned aircraft and advanced air mobility vehicles under a contract from the U.S. Air Force’s AFWERX innovation unit. Credit: LiquidPiston

A future upgrade will add “communications relay” to the list of missions performed by U.S. Air Force Boeing C-17s and Lockheed Martin C-130Js. A request for information published on March 10 by the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center asked industry for a modernized airborne executive processor (AEP) that can support a communications gateway system. Credit: USAF

Rostec has handed over the first re-engined Tupolev Tu-160M bomber to the Russian Air Force after completing contractor flight testing, the company said on March 10. The delivery begins a series of government testing on the supersonic strategic bomber, which is now powered by Kuznetsov NK-30-2 turbofan engines, Rostec said. Credit: Rostec

The Netherlands is temporarily taking over Quick Reaction Alert (QRA) air-policing duties for Belgium following the grounding of that country’s F-16 fighter fleet. The two countries generally share QRA responsibility in each other’s airspace, as well as over Luxembourg, through the Benelux air policing initiative launched in 2017. Every four months, one of the air forces will take responsibility for policing the airspace of all three countries. Credit: Koninklijke Luchtmacht

Nanoracks has proclaimed its benchmark Bishop airlock, which was launched to the International Space Station (ISS) in December, “open for business” and ready to support science experiments, spacewalks and equipment transfers on the exterior of the orbiting science lab. The proclamation came during a March 10 air-to-ground exchange between Brock Howe, the Houston-based company’s project manager for the airlock, and NASA astronaut Shannon Walker. Walker helped bring the dome-shaped Bishop functionally to life after it was berthed to the station’s U.S. segment Tranquility module’s port side on Dec. 19. The berthing followed a Dec. 6 launch aboard a NASA-contracted SpaceX resupply mission. Credit: Nanoracks

As part of a strategy to support a continuous U.S. presence aboard the International Space Station (ISS), NASA has contracted with Axiom Space to acquire a seat aboard Russia’s Soyuz MS-18 for a NASA astronaut to launch to the orbiting science lab on April 9. The terms do not include an exchange of funds between NASA and Roscosmos, the Russian space agency. But NASA will work with Axiom, the Houston-based commercial space company, to fly a non-NASA astronaut that Axiom designates on a future U.S. commercial mission. Credit: NASA

NASA plans to try again on March 18 to fire up the four Aerojet Rocketdyne RS-25 engines on the Space Launch System (SLS) core stage for a critical integrated test ahead of the booster’s debut flight in late 2021 or early 2022. The static test fire, which will take place at NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, is designed to give the vehicle’s flight software, navigation and control systems, three flight computers and more than 50 avionics boxes a flight simulation that closely matches the booster’s first 8 min. of ascent. Credit: NASA

Scientists say they are pleased with the initial performance of SuperCam, a rock-vaporizing collection of lasers, high-tech cameras, spectrographs and microphones aboard NASA’s Perseverance Mars 2020 rover. Credit: NASA

Archer has committed to launching an urban air mobility network in Miami by 2024 which will see Southern Florida join Los Angeles as a flagship market for the startup’s planned air taxi services. In addition to developing and manufacturing a piloted four-passenger electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing (eVTOL) air taxi, Archer plans to both operate its own aircraft and sell them to outside customers. These include United Airlines, which has placed an order for 200 vehicles valued at $1 billion. Credit: Archer

The U.S. Space Force and the National Reconnaissance Office on March 9 awarded task orders worth a total of $385 million to SpaceX and United Launch Alliance (ULA) for four upcoming launches, Space and Missile Systems Center (SMC) said in a statement. Credit: United Launch Alliance