The Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency plans to develop technology that will allow airborne platforms with synthetic aperture radars and moving target indicators to receive information from the ground via low cost, miniaturized radio frequency tags that would provide improved targeting capability and better situational awareness. The RF Tags program would allow covert transmission of still video, ground sensor data and alert data. It would eliminate the need for long-
The U.S. Navy expects software adjustments and changes to a porous wing fairing to solve a buffeting problem that has appeared on some test flights of the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet. The fairing is seen as the solution to a wing-drop phenomenon in which asymmetric lift causes uncommanded banks. One of the issues being worked is the number of holes in the fairing, their size, and their location, according to a Navy official. Testing of various configurations is underway at NAS Patuxent River, Md.
U.K. defense exports were up 10% to 5.5 billion pounds ($9 billion) in 1997, allowing Britain to maintain its ranking as the second largest defense exporter in the world, George Robertson, secretary of state for defense, told industry leaders at the Defense Export Services Organization Symposium in London Tuesday. Robertson also said that remaining competitive in the future global defense market would depend on success of European industry consolidation.
The U.S. Navy is planning in the next couple of years to buy a terminal guidance seeker for the Joint Direct Attack Munition which will increase the weapon's accuracy from ten feet to three feet. Rear Adm. J.M. "Carlos" Johnson, chief of Navy aviation plans and requirements, said in an interview that "we think we'll have it in our hands in a very short time period." First JDAMs with the new seeker would be fielded around 2001 or 2002. Lot I JDAMs are going into the inventory now. They are guided by GPS/INS.
U.S. Air Force acquisition officials and the service's Air Combat Command has approved a plan to combine the Small Bomb System and Low Cost Autonomous Attack System (LOCAAS) into a single program designated Miniature Munition Capability. The program isn't expected to start until FY '03. Both LOCAAS and SBS will continue on separate development tracks until then. Details of the acquisition strategy are still being worked on, officials said.
A newly configured ballistic missile target was tested in a launch Monday from Fort Wingate, N.M., to White Sands Missile Range, N.M. The Modified Ballistic Reentry Vehicle (MBRV-3) was launched by a Hera Block IIB rocket, according to U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command. It described MBRV-3 as a "non-separating or unitary target" and said it flew on a "shaped ballistic trajectory." The mission covered 344.5 kilometers, reached an altitude of 98.5 km, and lasted 415 seconds.
The economic crisis that has hit Korea and other Asian nations will affect the Korean modernization program and may delay the planned acquisition of Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft and heavy submarines, as well as "an additional 45 to 50 smaller acquisitions," the commander of U.S. forces in Korea testified yesterday.
An overtightened bolt thwarted an attempt by two Mir cosmonauts to repair a precarious solar array yesterday, leaving the three-man crew stuck inside the 12-year-old orbital station until new tools can be delivered from Earth.
The government of Bahrain has signed a letter of acceptance (LOA) to buy up to 10 new F-16 fighters, a Lockheed Martin spokesman confirmed yesterday. The LOA covers eight aircraft and an amendment request for two additional F-16s. The F-16s will be powered by General Electric F110-GE-100B engines, which, according to GE, have been chosen by all Middle East countries which operate the F-16C/D. It said the countries, in addition to Bahrain, are Egypt, Greece, Israel and Turkey.
The U.S. Defense Dept. doesn't see Daryl L. Jones being dropped as the White House's nominee to become Air Force secretary despite a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation, and instead is expressing frustration about attacks against him. "There's concern that there does seem to be some sort of campaign against [Jones'] candidacy by some people who have made charges against him," Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon said yesterday.
Orbcomm Global L.P., the Orbital Sciences Corp. spinoff that has started deploying a "Little LEO" constellation of alpha-numeric data relay satellites in low Earth orbit, yesterday named Orbital co-founder Scott L. Webster chairman of its partner board and chief executive officer. Alan Parker, who has headed Orbcomm through nine years of development as president and CEO, will become president, Orbcomm Global Development, in charge of winning licenses to operate in key markets worldwide and of developing next-generation satellites and services.
FAA HAS SELECTED Raytheon and a Lockheed Martin/Northrop Grumman team to demonstrate and test a new civilian secondary radar system as part of the agency's Air Traffic Control Beacon Interrogator (ATCBI-6) competition. The teams will demonstrate their systems at the FAA's William J. Hughes Technical Center, Atlantic City, N.J., beginning this month. This operational capabilities testing phase of the competition will run through June or July. At the same time, the FAA will ask both bidders to submit technical specifications and costs.
Commercial satellite builders cannot afford to ignore the needs of the U.S. government as they develop new products, and should try to understand government requirements early in the development process, according to a top executive of Hughes Space&Communications. Robert Rankine, Hughes vice president, government marketing, last week took issue with a statement by a Motorola engineer who charged the U.S. Defense Dept. "dropped the ball" by not taking an early role in the development of "Big LEO" low Earth orbit communications constellations.
NASA's Stennis Space Center is looking for 10 to 15 industry-led teams to help define the market for commercial space-based synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data that might be generated by a future "LightSAR" spacecraft. Teams will be paid as much as $300,000 a year for three years to help the agency's Earth Observation Commercial Applications Program (EOCAP) develop a "portfolio" of commercial applications for SAR data that could lead to a SAR-based market, according to Bruce A. Davis, project element manager at Stennis.
The U.S. Air Force has begun flight testing the BLU-109 Joint Direct Attack Munition with redesigned aerodynamic strakes and plans in coming weeks to begin ground testing a new fin-lock mechanism for the weapon, according to Oskar Soler, the Air Force's JDAM program manager. The AF found late last year that the BLU-109 with the JDAM guidance kit was unstable at high angles of attack, which forced the strakes to be redesigned (DAILY, Dec. 15, 1997). The AF decided to delay buying BLU-109s by one year as a result.
The Administration is asking Congress for $20 million to subsidize an estimated $167 million in loans to Central European countries, including the three nations invited to join NATO, to help address major deficiencies in airlift, air defense radar and communications equipment.
TITAN CORP., San Diego, completed the acquisition of all 4.4 million outstanding shares of DBA Systems Inc. DBA, Melbourne, Fla., makes digital imaging products, electro-optical systems and threat simulation/training systems. DBA will become an operating company of Titan Technologies and Information Systems
A buffeting problem caused by the porous wing fairing fix to the F/A- 18E/F Super Hornet's wing-drop tendency has led program managers to decide to redesign the fairing and flight test it next week, Pentagon sources said yesterday. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jay L. Johnson said last week that the porous wing fairing is "probably the leading candidate" to eliminate the wing-drop effect, or uncommanded bank angles caused by asymmetric lift (DAILY, Feb. 26).
The U.S. Navy is putting pressure on its Joint Standoff Weapon program office to cut the cost of the AGM-154C unitary version. "The challenge to them is to come back in to me with a unitary version that is a precision weapon that costs less than $200,000," Rear Adm. J.M. "Carlos" Johnson, the Navy's chief of aviation plans and requirements, said in an interview at the Pentagon. It now costs about $300,000. The process is continuing as part of the fiscal 2000 program objective memorandum drafting process.
Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries (IHI) is accelerating production of 13,380-kilogram-thrust General Electric F110-129 engines for Mitsubishi F-2 close air support fighters flown by Japan's Air Self-Defense Force. The first 11 engines are being built and will be delivered by January 1999, and 10 more will be delivered by November of next year. An order for eight additional engines will be placed soon.
MARION COMPOSITES, Marion, Va., entered into a long-term production alliance with General Electric Aircraft Engines to make composite inlet devices for the GE F414-400 turbofan engine for the F/A-18E/F strike fighter. The devices are currently in low-rate production at GE and will move to Marion over the next year. The initial agreement, covering the first five years of the production alliance, estimates an average production of one per month in 1999, increasing to nine or more per month over the life of the contract.
Mission planners at Japan's National Space Development Agency (NASDA) believe they can perform about 20% of the experiments originally planned for the COMETS experimental broadcasting satellite left stranded when its H-2 launcher failed to place it in the proper orbit, but only if they can avoid a collision between the H-2's second stage and the satellite.
Technical glitches that caused the most recent slip in the Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) program have been fixed and the missile is in the final stages of preparation for a May intercept test, according to John H. Little, Lockheed Martin vice president and program manager for THAAD.
