The special House committee investigating whether U.S. national security was compromised in Chinese launches of American satellites has until spent its time to date getting briefed on the situation, primarily from U.S. national security agencies, a committee spokesman said. The committee is still in the preliminary stages of preparing for hearings - interviewing potential witnesses and searching for documentation - and no hearings on the calendar so far, according to the spokesman.
TRW Inc. said yesterday that it has shipped the next Defense Support Program (DSP) satellite scheduled for duty, Flight 19, to Cape Canaveral, Fla., where launch preparations have begun. Launch aboard a Titan IVB rocket is scheduled this winter. TRW builds the 5,200-pound DSP spacecraft under contract to the U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center and integrates the sensor payload. The company said it is under contract to deliver a total of 23 satellites; 18 DSP satellites have been launched since 1970.
Raytheon Systems Co. has won a $10 million U.S. Air Force contract for production of a replacement video tracker/system controller for the electro-optical targeting system of the F-117A stealth aircraft. The targeting system, called the Infrared Acquisition and Designation System, is a combination infrared imaging and laser designation system for precision weapon delivery. The video tracker/system controller is a processor system that upgrades the reliability, maintainability and supportability of the targeting system.
Iraq is hiding its ballistic missiles in pieces, not as whole weapons, former U.N. weapons inspector Scott Ritter said yesterday. "The weapons are broken down into components," Ritter told reporters at a breakfast in Washington. "There are no more ballistic missiles in Iraq." Ritter quit the U.N. inspection team in Iraq because he viewed the U.S. as failing to live up to its position that it would back the inspectors.
BOEING'S Strategic Manufacturing Center, St. Louis, will support the Delta IV/Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program with non-recurring tooling design and manufacturing, the company reported. Delta IV tooling will be designed and built for use at facilities in Pueblo, Colo., and Decatur, Ala., site of vehicle construction. About 150 tool design and fabrication personnel will be assigned in St. Louis. Some follow-on field support also will be required, Boeing said. Work will run through the first quarter of 2000.
Appeals by Pentagon leaders to President Clinton Tuesday for a bigger budget in fiscal year 2000 appear to have received only a lukewarm response, prompting Robert G. Bell, Clinton's special assistant for national security, to say yesterday that a funding increase will be looked at in competition with other needs.
Despite planned military spending cuts of almost $1.6 billion by 2001-2002 and disbandment of two more Royal Air Force Tornado squadrons, New Labor's Strategic Defense Review will leave most current Ministry of Defense procurement programs virtually unscathed. An SDR keynote is emphasis on deployment mobility to increase effectiveness of Britain's shrinking armed forces in peacekeeping roles, demanding very large financial allocations for new equipment.
Rep. C.W. (Bill) Young (R-Fla.), head of the House Appropriations national security subcommittee, and Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), chairman of the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee as well as the full committee, are working on a Pentagon supplemental request of about $5 billion, congressional sources said yesterday. Sources said the supplemental would include over $1 billion in readiness increases taken from the fiscal 1999 defense appropriations bills.
CADE INDUSTRIES, Okemos, Mich., has won a $3.5 million contract to design and manufacture jet engine test equipment for the Pratt&Whitney PW6000 engine program. The turbofan has been selected as the initial engine for the 100-passenger Airbus 318.
The PAS-7 satellite became the 17th satellite in PanAmSat's global communications network with launch of an Ariane 44LP rocket from Arianespace's launch facility in Kourou, French Guiana, yesterday at 2:31 a.m. EDT, PanAmSat reported. The PAS-7, an FS 1300 satellite built by Space Systems/Loral, will be PanAmSat's second satellite for the Indian Ocean region, expanding the company's broadcast and telecommunications services for Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia.
The Pentagon Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration developing the DarkStar and Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicles is leading to systems that would have a unit cost of about $13 million, U.S. Air Force officials said. The ACTD started out with a unit cost goal of $10 million for both aircraft, including sensors, but Col. Keith Sullivan, director of the U.S. Air Force's reconnaissance mission area group, said, "I don't think we're going to see $10 million." Current estimates run to about $13 million, he said.
Congressional budget authorizers want to cut $97 million from the U.S. Air Force's $292 million fiscal 1999 budget request for the Airborne Laser program and also delay the purchase of the aircraft for a year, and appropriators want to cut $57 million, but "I don't think either of those are going to be the way it turns out," the head of the AF's ABL program said yesterday. "Congressional action is always the wildcard, and [ABL] a big conference issue right now," Col. Michael W. Booen told Aviation Week Group editors yesterday in Washington.
KAMAN CORP. said that Charles H. Kaman remains in the hospital but that his condition is improving. The 79-year-old Kaman, chairman and chief executive officer of the company, suffered a mild stroke late last month after successful knee replacement surgery. Until his return, business activities of the Bloomfield, Conn., company are being coordinated through Robert M. Garneau, executive vice president and chief financial officer.
A datalink for the JAS-39 Gripen was demonstrated for the first time at last week's Farnborough Air Show. Sitting in the cockpit of the back-up Gripen at the show, Saab Chief Test Pilot Berndt Weimer explained to reporters how the CelsiusTech datalink can track the Gripen's sister ship as it goes through its flight demonstration, and also flow other information into the cockpit.
While the issue of F/A-18E/F Super Hornet funding is the most visible procurement issue remaining in the fiscal 1999 defense authorization conference, congressional sources noted yesterday that there are also other unsettled procurement issues, including increases for the F-16 and C-130J aircraft. The Senate authorization provided for five C-130Js and the House provided for eight. The Administration requested one.
The U.K.'s Vinten Ltd. will supply the tactical airborne reconnaissance pod for the JAS-39 Gripen, Saab announced. The Vinten Vicon 70 Series 72C will be mounted on an under-fuselage pylon, Saab said. The specific imaging systems to be used weren't identified. Saab said only electro-optical and infrared sensors may be installed.
NEXT-GENERATION 737-600 has received type certification from Europe's Joint Aviation Authorities. Delivery of the first 737-600 to launch customer SAS is scheduled for later this month.
Russia's MiG-21 fighter of the 1970s appeared at the Farnborough Air Show as the Israeli/Romanian Lancer III upgrade, the first customer of which could be the Ethiopian air force.
Boeing Co. plans first flight next year of an unmanned, 7% scale model of a four-engine, tilt- and swept-wing, super short takeoff and landing no-tail advanced theater transport (NOTAIL) design. The NOTAIL, also known as "Super Frog," is being designed to land and takeoff within a distance of 600 feet, and deliver enough cargo to meet Army requirements, according to a Boeing official.
Atlantic Southeast Airlines has ordered 12 70-passenger Canadair CRJ-700s and will exercise options for 15 more 50-passenger CRJ-200s with a total value of about $575 million. Deliveries of the smaller aircraft will take place between February 2000 and June 2001. The 70-passenger aircraft will be delivered beginning in the fourth quarter of 2001 through the first quarter of 2003. ASA President John Beiser cited the speed and range of the 50-passenger CRJ and the operating efficiencies of the 70-seater as the determining factors in the orders.
MIDWAY AIRLINES has exercised an option to acquire seven more Canadair Regional jets valued at $148 million. The carrier also plans to allow five Fokker 100s to be returned to lessors and said it will retire an A320. The CRJ-200ERs will join Midway's fleet of six CRJs, and seven others now on order. All 20 will be in service by the end of 1999, when the fleet will consist of the CRJs and eight F100s. Mark Coleman, senior VP-marketing, said they CRJs have permitted Midway to attain "higher profit margins than were possible with Midway's Airbus and Fokker aircraft."
NASA planners are proceeding as though the first International Space Station module will be launched on Nov. 20 as planned despite the economic crisis in Russia, but the schedule could still slip again if critical Russian hardware isn't delivered over the next six weeks.
AlliedSignal announced several new contracts and achievements at the Farnborough Air Show. The company: -- Won a contract to supply new production T55-L-714A turboshaft engines for seven new CH-47D Chinook helicopters for the Greek Army. Terms were not disclosed, and deliveries will begin in the first quarter of 2000.
PLANAR ADVANCE INC., Beaverton, Ore., and dpiX won a contract from Smiths Industries of the U.K. to supply high-resolution flat panel displays for the multifunction "head down" display for the Eurofighter Typhoon. Total estimated sales of the flat panels are expected to be more than $30 million during the next 12 to 14 years. dpiX will make the Eagle-6 active-matrix liquid crystal display cell at its California facility, and Planar will integrate the drive electronics, thermal management system and ruggedize the display.
