U.S. airlines voiced opposition to Loran as a backup to the Global Positioning System and endorsed establishment of a dedicated National Airspace System program office in which FAA and industry "could work together full time" on a modernization plan. Air Transport Association President Carol Hallett, addressing the Air Traffic Control Association Jan. 28 in Arlington, Va., said Loran "does not make sense" as a GPS backup because the airlines already have VOR-DME, "which is totally reliable." Loran is favored by FAA and the general aviation industry.
TRW Inc., Space & Technology Division, Redondo Beach, Calif., is being awarded a $21,250,000 increment of a $42,500,000 modification to a $131,500,000 cost-plus-award-fee completion contract to add field testing at the U.S. Army High Energy Laser Systems Test Facility, to an existing contract under which a Tactical High Energy Laser (THEL) Advanced Concept Technology Demonstrator is being designed and developed.
While the Pentagon's budget request goes to Congress, a former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was calling for radical reform of the process, hoping the change would lead to greater joint operability among the services.
Chile is a candidate to pick up Thailand's planned purchase of U.S. F/A-18C/D fighters if Thailand can't go through with the deal, congressional and industry sources said. The monetary crisis in Thailand is forcing Thailand to consider abandoning the buy. Thailand already has paid $72 million on the $392 million purchase of eight F/A-18C/Ds. A $100 million payment is due in March.
McDonnell Douglas Corp., St. Louis, Mo., is being awarded a $165,878,981 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for the system integration effort for the upgrading of all type, model, and series of the F/A-18 weapons system hardware and software through the seven phases of a system's life cycle. Work will be performed in St. Louis, Mo., and is expected to be completed by January 2001. Contract funds in the amount of $200,000 will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured.
Iberia, the flag airline of Spain, said it would announce "the largest aircraft order in the history of European civil aviation" today in Madrid. It declined to give details, but said the deal would involve "more than 50 aircraft." Spanish press reports said Iberia will order 70 aircraft, including 40 medium-range narrow bodies of the Boeing 737 or Airbus A320 family.
A NATIONAL RECONNAISSANCE OFFICE satellite, probably for data relay, was launched Thursday aboard a Lockheed Martin Atlas IIA vehicle flying from complex 36, Pad A at Cape Canaveral Air Station, Fla. The Hughes-built satellite was placed in a highly elliptical 56-degree orbit following the launch, which came at 1:37 p.m. EST.
H&R Co. (a joint venture of Hughes Aircraft Co. and Raytheon Co.), El Segundo, Calif., is being awarded an $11,928,000 increment as part of an estimated $292,000,000 (if all options are exercised) cost reimbursement, cost-plus-incentive-fee, cost-plus-award-fee, and cost-plus-fixed-fee completion contract for the Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System (JLENS) Demonstration Program, which has three primary objectives.
Lockheed Martin Missiles and Space Co., Sunnyvale, Calif., is being awarded a $39,400,000 face value increase to a cost-plus-award-fee contract to adjust the Space Based Infrared System High Program to match the funding profile. this modification extends delivery dates for the Highly- Elliptical Orbit Payload by three months, and the Geosynchronous Space Vehicles 1, 2, and 3 and Ground Increment 2 by four months. Contract is expected to be completed November 2006. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year.
AEROSPATIALE has set a target of mid-1998 for completion of a plan to spin off its Airbus division into a subsidiary to facilitate the restructuring of Airbus Industrie, according to an Aerospatiale spokeswoman. Airbus plans to shed its current organization in favor of a more competitive status. "Since Airbus is doing so well, it has to be managed differently," but many of the details are still being discussed, the spokeswoman said. Airbus operations of partners British Aerospace and DASA already operate as subsidiaries.
Tec-Masters Inc., Huntsville, Ala., is being awarded a $2,200,000 increment as part of a $27,777,329 cost-plus-award-fee/level-of-effort contract for Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) Simulation and Hardware-in-the- Loop development. The estimated cumulative total value of this contract will be $43,024,557 if all options are exercised. Work will be performed in Huntsville, Ala., and is expected to be completed by Sept. 30, 2002. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This is a sole source contract initiated on Aug. 22, 1997.
The Export-Import Bank approved long-term guarantees to support a $134 million export by Boeing of three airliners to two Chinese regional airlines. Yunnan Airlines is receiving two 737-300s with CFMI engines valued at $60 million, and Shanghai Airlines is getting a 767-300 and a spare Pratt&Whitney engine for $74 million. Both transactions are asset- based financing with the aircraft serving as collateral. The airlines will own the aircraft at the end of a 12-year lease period.
The Boeing Company, Long Beach, Calif., is being awarded a $9,422,020 Time and Materials contract to provide for the incorporation of ten engineering changes into 33 C-17 aircraft. The changes include incorporation of Global Positioning System, Electronic Flight Control System, troop seats, upgraded software, hardware, and communication and modifications allowing two rows of cargo in the aircraft. Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, is the contracting activity (F33657-97-C-0008, P00001)
Failure by the FAA to meet a Jan. 31 deadline for submitting a report to Congress on the Wide Area Augmentation System at least temporarily halts federal funding for the program. Prime contractor Raytheon was told by the agency last week that it could continue work on the program at its own risk, or ask the government for permission to terminate it. A Raytheon spokeswoman, asked whether the company will continue to fund WAAS, said yesterday that the situation is still under review.
The Pentagon's Ballistic Missile Defense Organization, in releasing its fiscal year 1999 budget yesterday, said it anticipates a contract overrun at completion of the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) missile development contract. The overrun "is expected to be funded with existing resources," BMDO said. It gave no specifics. The FY '99 budget request provides $343 million for PAC-3 procurement and $137 million for PAC-3 engineering and manufacturing development.
Ghassem Asrar, chief scientist for the Earth Observing System at NASA headquarters, has been named associate administrator for Earth Science, NASA announced yesterday. He replaces William F. Townsend, who has served as acting associate administrator and will remain in his original job as deputy associate administrator in the Office of Earth Science. Administrator Daniel S. Goldin cited the upcoming launch this summer of the first Earth Observing System satellite as a reason for Asrar's promotion.
Joint venture links between Eurocopter and Italy's Agusta helicopter group reportedly are being sought by Jean-Francois Bigay, chairman of the Franco-German helicopter consortium.
The National Aerospace System (NAS) program is 18 months behind schedule and $3.4 million over budget, the Air Force Electronic Systems Center reported to Congress late last year.
HONEYWELL/PELORUS Satellite Landing System, the SLS-2000, was commissioned last week by the FAA at two airports, Minneapolis-St. Paul and Newark International, Honeywell reported. At the same time, the company said it became the first avionics supplier to receive supplemental type certification for the airborne portion of the system. It said Continental Airlines will be the first airline to receive operational approval from the FAA to use the system. The SLS-2000 gives aircraft precise navigation data for instrument approaches.
The Pentagon plans to discuss with Congress the issue of funding procurement of more E-8C Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar Systems (Joint STARS) as part of the FY '99 budget debate, Defense Secretary William Cohen told reporters at the Pentagon. After the Quadrennial Defense Review last year cut Joint STARS procurement from 19 planes to 13, and NATO's decision late last year not to commit to buying the ground-surveillance plane, Cohen said Saturday that "we have to go back and see what we can work out. JSTARS is very important."
Boeing has begun integration on the F-22 fighter of weapon system avionics slated for installation on the fourth engineering and manufacturing development aircraft. "This is our first major integration effort for the F-22's avionics," Joe Gerhardt, manager of the F-22 avionics Integration Laboratory design, said in a Boeing statement. The F-22 used in the first flight last year featured a downscaled avionics suite and software that focused only on flying the aircraft.
V-22 OSPREY No. 10 delivered to NAS Patuxent River, Md., on Jan. 29 by Bell Boeing. The plane, the fourth and final production-representative V-22 built under the engineering and manufacturing development program, joined the other three EMD V-22s at Pax River. After a brief modification period, No. 10 will be used for avionics system tests, formation flight demonstrations and possibly night flights, Bell Boeing said.
The U.S. Air Force today will request a fiscal 1999 budget of $76.7 billion that includes first procurement funds for the F-22 fighter, but nothing for F-15s or F-16s. "We have real growth in this Air Force budget," a budget official said Friday. The growth, about 3%, mostly went to procurement, he said. Modernization funding through the future years defense plan increases almost 15%.
Pratt&Whitney has completed work on the first core of the JSF119 engine for the Joint Strike Fighter. The core now will be shipped from the manufacturing plant in Middletown, Conn., to the company's Large Military Engines unit in West Palm Beach, Fla., to be assembled with remaining JSF parts. The engine is slated to be fully assembled and ready for test this spring.
