The design of the kinetic energy interceptor may be improved and development test plans tweaked to take advantage of a program slowdown forced on the Pentagon by congressional funding cuts.
AAR Aircraft Services will reopen the doors of the Indianapolis Maintenance Center closed by United Airlines as part of its bankruptcy-protection process. AAR recently entered into an agreement with the Indiana Airport Authority to lease portions of the 12-hangar, 1.6-million-sq.-ft. facility at the Indianapolis International Airport. AAR Aircraft Services President/CEO David Storch said the facility plans to begin hiring in a month and start operating by Nov. 1. Nearly 800 jobs could be added to the area by 2009, according to Indiana Governor Joseph E. Kernan.
Regarding your editorial "This Can't Wait for Another Terrorist Attack" (AW&ST May 31, p. 82), the S-3 Viking has languished as a surface surveillance and sea control asset because Soviet anti-submarine warfare (ASW) problems have slipped into history.
Congressional committees often like to claim they act in a bipartisan way, but few are as sanctimonious about it as the Senate and House intelligence committees. No more. The tradition is a casualty of political fights over Iraq, and the bickering has now made it into the House intelligence panel's annual report on intelligence funding. Democrats voted unanimously against the report, the first time in 10 years the minority has opposed the majority.
The fate of the British government's attempts to draw on private sector cash to fund big-ticket defense programs hangs in the balance, amid serious difficulties concluding a flagship deal with EADS.
Ewald Groenewald has been appointed vice president-business development for Sage Parts, Farmingdale, N.Y. He was worldwide customer service manager for FMC Technologies Inc.
France's Conseil Economique et Social, a government advisory body, recommends steps to reinforce the European Union's involvement in space matters, and to increase and enhance the contributions of EU nations to the space effort. One recommendation in a report presented last week by Alain Pompidou, son of the late French president, is to name an EU commissioner for space, a move made possible under a constitutional treaty approved on June 18.
RapidEye of Munich has concluded a loan agreement with a consortium led by the KfW Group and Commerzbank of Frankfurt and Export Development Canada, clearing the way for full-scale development for a five-satellite constellation. It is designed to provide low-cost medium-resolution geo-information services to agricultural, cartographic and military users. The loan for the 150-million euro ($180-million) project is guaranteed by the German state of Brandenburg, which is providing 37 million euros in funding.
The U.S. Air Force next month will ask top Pentagon procurement officials for a green light to embark on replacing its Minuteman III ICBMs in the hope of having a new system ready by late next decade. The service expects to field the new weapon in 2018, around the time the 500 remaining Minuteman IIIs now undergoing service-life extensions will reach the end of their life, USAF officials note. In parallel, USAF is trying to revive a concept to field a few enhanced Minuteman IIIs, called Minuteman III "Elite."
Although the U.S.' missile defense system is only weeks from being declared operational, developers still have plenty to do before even the embryonic capability is ready for prime time.
The U.S. Air Force's future ground-surveillance E-10A aircraft will feature one of the most modern radar systems, but off-board space sensors could still prove the most critical to carrying out many of the platform's missions. One of the competitors for the E-10A's battle management system, Northrop Grumman, found during simulations that fully two-thirds of all targets were identified via space information broadcast back to the aircraft. One of the E-10A's main roles will be cruise missile defense.
Clark International Airport, a former U.S. air base turned over to the Philippines government in 1992 and presently United Parcel Service's Asia hub, may soon become a $250-million maintenance hub for Airbus' 500-seat A380 if talks between the government and the manufacturer go well. Lockheed Martin, Rolls-Royce, Asian Aerospace and Singapore's Aerotech already operate out of Clark.
German travel giant TUI has raised the volume of a planned bond issue to 400 million from 250 million euros, because of higher-than-expected investor demand. The floating rate notes, due Aug. 17, 2009, were placed at 210 basis points above the three-month London Interbank Offered Rate, compared with 215-230 points initially envisioned.
The Pentagon's military space program is in turmoil once more. Cost and technical problems with the Space-Based Infrared System-High (SBIRS-High) early warning satellites are metastasizing. A renewed debate has flared over whether to curtail the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program. And Congress is voicing concern about future military space endeavors.
U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Marvin K. McNamara, who has been commanding general of the Army Developmental Test Command, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., has been named deputy director for force structure, integration and deployment at the U.S. Missile Defense Agency.
Rather than begging Congress for special treatment (AW&ST June 7, p. 66), you would serve the aerospace industry better if you pressed the case for low and stable taxes, applied uniformly and neutrally.
George H. Berry, a manager of business development for the Northrop Grumman Corp.'s Information Technology Sector, Herndon, Va., has won the Navy Superior Public Service Award, the service's second-highest civilian honor. He was cited for contributions to the Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command for the development of imagery architecture for the Navy's Surf Eagle system.
Thales is emerging as the likely winner of Britain's Watchkeeper unmanned aerial vehicle-based intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance program. Thales is competing with Northrop Grumman for the program, which is estimated to be worth up to 800 million pounds ($1.46 billion). A Defense Ministry announcement could be made mid-July, potentially as a "good-news" element of a wider statement on defense funding issues and procurement cuts.
U.S. Air Force Space Command is finishing a review of its tactics, procedures and policies to keep U.S. spacecraft safe. The examination of so-called defensive counterspace operations was requested by the USAFSC commander, Gen. Lance Lord, and is slated to conclude around October.
USAF Maj. Gen. (ret.) Ralph G. Tourino, who is Santa Maria, Calif.-based vice president for Space Support Systems for the Lockheed Martin Corp., has been named as one of the 50 Most Important Hispanics in Technology and Business by the editors of Hispanic Engineer & Information Technology magazine. Tourino's business area focuses on developing modern technology for launch range operations at Vandenberg and Cape Canaveral AFBs and other launch range locations.
The airline industry has skirted the edges of financial disaster and appears on the rebound with traffic gains and improving earnings. Discount carriers endured better than any other airline group, but more tests of their survivability lie ahead (see p. 40). Cover design by AW&ST Art Dept. with photo by Joseph Pries.
L-3 Communications has bought Avisys for $8 million in cash. Austin, Tex.-based Avisys, which is on a team led by United Airlines, is one of the contractors working on airliner infrared self-protection equipment for the Homeland Security Dept.
THE ROLE OF GROUND TESTING TO AVOID EFFECTS of atmospheric radiation has been pushed to a level of greater importance by the increasing number of commercial and emerging technology avionics. Application-specific integrated circuits (Asics) had been generally thought immune from SEE, but McLean, Va.-based Innovative Concepts Inc.'s Radiation Effects Group will report on tests using cyclotrons at Texas A&M and Indiana universities that show destructive SEE on bipolar transistors from both heavy ions and protons.
