Aerospace & Defense Roundup: Oct. 26

AMRAAM

Wichita aerostructures giant Spirit AeroSystems has struck a 45% cash discount with Bombardier for the latter’s Short Brothers capacity in Northern Ireland, as well as Bombardier Aerospace North Africa and most of a Dallas MRO site. Credit: Bombardier

A large, classified development program based in Palmdale, California, gave Lockheed Martin’s finances an extra boost in the third quarter. What could it be? The U.S. Defense Department’s classified budget request in fiscal 2021 adds up to $71.4 billion, according to analysis by Aerospace DAILY. To put that into perspective, basically one dollar in every 10 spent by the Pentagon goes to a classified account. In the research and development category alone, the Pentagon’s branches, agencies and offices are seeking to spend more than $26 billion. Credit: Palmdale city government

Eurofighter

Bennu

A 15th batch of Starlink satellites reached orbit on Oct. 24, marking SpaceX’s second launch within a week to build up an initial, 1,450-member broadband communications network. Credit: SpaceX

Adding to a flurry of arms export activity in recent weeks, the Trump administration notified Congress of a proposed sale of 400 Boeing RGM-84L-4 Harpoon Block II anti-ship missiles to Taiwan. Credit: Boeing via YouTube

Osiris-Rex

Leonardo has demonstrated a manned-unmanned teaming (MUM-T) using its AW159 Wildcat utility helicopter. UAV control up to a level of interoperability of four (LOI 4) was integrated into the aircraft’s avionics to support the trials as part of the British Army’s Warfighting Experiment on the Salisbury Plain in September, with Leonardo detailing the trials in October. Credit: Philippine Navy

Lockheed Martin has shifted its small satellite launch plans from mainland Northern Scotland to a site in the Shetland Islands. The company originally planned its Pathfinder launches to take place from the Sutherland Space Hub in the north of mainland Scotland after being awarded $31 million in grants in July 2018 to support launch from the A’Mhoine peninsula site. But a due diligence process has resulted in the move to the Shetland Space Center on the island of Unst, the UK Space Agency announced Oct. 22. Credit: Artist's concept: Shetland Space Center

U.S. Space Force logo.

The Defense Department is facing another delay to F-35 Joint Simulation Environment (JSE) testing, which is one of the remaining hurdles the stealthy fighter must clear to complete operational testing. Credit: U.S. Air Force

New research offers unambiguous evidence of widely distributed water on the Moon’s surface, including in more accessible sunlit regions. The findings help affirm the presence of a potential resource that could be extracted and processed into liquid hydrogen and oxygen rocket propellants as well as life support resources for future human space explorers. Credit: NASA

British unmanned technologies firm Blue Bear Systems has demonstrated the swarming of 20 unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) of different types in a beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS) flight. Credit: Blue Bear Systems