DRS ELECTRONIC SYSTEMS, Gaithersburg, Md., won a $2.4 million U.S. Navy contract for additional Combat Display Emulators for land-based applications, according to parent DRS Technologies Inc.
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center has started a series of hot-fire tests on components of the linear aerospike engine that will power Lockheed Martin's X-33 single-stage-to-orbit prototype. Engineers at the Marshall Propulsion Laboratory are using pressure, thermal, acoustic and optical sensors to characterize performance of three hydrogen-cooled aerospike thrusters firing across a four-foot-long copper alloy ramp. Later they will also test ignition and gas generator systems for the X-33 aerospike, NASA said yesterday.
COMSAT CORP., Bethesda, Md., filed suit against former CEO Bruce L. Crockett alleging a conspiracy linking him with Herbert Denton, Providence Capital Inc. and Wyser-Pratte Inc., who have threatened Comsat with a proxy contest, Comsat said. The suit charges Crockett, Denton and other defendants with violating the Communications Satellite Act of 1962 and a 1996 termination agreement in which Crockett allegedly agreed not to disparage, compete with or disclose confidential information about Comsat to third parties. The company seeks $20 million in damages.
ENVIRONMENTAL TECTONICS CORP., Southampton, Pa., presented the first financial support check to the Air Force Institute of Technology, Wright- Patterson AFB, Ohio, for the engineering modeling of a controller for a large centrifuge flight simulator.
PRECISION STANDARD INC.'s Pemco Engineers Div. and Parker Hannifin Corp. have entered into an agreement to manufacture elevator control system components for commercial transport aircraft.
FAA ORDERED emergency inspections and a halt in flights to the U.S. from overseas of Boeing 777 airliners powered by Rolls-Royce Trent 800 engines until new parts can be installed in the engines. The actions were taken after the U.K. Civil Aviation Authority said it had received 10 reports of oil loss and one report of a bearing retainer failure in the Trent's intermediate pressure compressor. FAA said redesigned parts must be installed before Extended Range Twin-Engine Operations (ETOPS) can be started again. There are no Trent-powered 777s in the U.S.
NASA's Mars Global Surveyor will use its solar arrays to aerobrake into a circular orbit around the Red Planet this fall, despite a mechanical breakdown that has left one of the 11-foot arrays unlatched and tilted 20.5 degrees short of full deployment.
KRUG INTERNATIONAL CORP., Houston, has engaged Quarterdeck Investment Partners Inc. to assist in evaluating business options for Krug's Life Sciences division. The division provides research and support services for space related operations has signed contracts with NASA this year totaling $103.7 million to provide services over the next five years.
KELLSTROM INDUSTRIES INC., Sunrise, Fla., increased its borrowing capacity 57% to $55 million while lowering its interest rate to 1/4% under prime under a lending agreement with Barnett Bank N.A. and National Bank of Canada. This replaces a number of credit lines under a Kellstrom's previous agreement with Barnett and an unnamed California lender.
LOCKHEED MARTIN will sell machinery previously used to build Titan rockets at its Littleton, Colo., facility. An auction will be held May 20-21 by Norman Levy Associates Inc. The inventory includes a Giddings&Lewis CNC Horizontal skin mill and other standard items such as machining and turning centers, presses and brakes.
COMSAT CORP. said C.J. Silas resigned as chairman and board member for health reasons, and that Edwin Colodny was elected to serve as chairman. Silas recently had open-heart surgery. Colodny, a Comsat director since 1992, was chairman of US Airways Group, where he remains a director.
The U.S. Air Force is planning a series of block upgrades to the Predator unmanned aerial vehicle to alleviate differences between the system's performance and the AF's draft operational requirements document. The draft ORD "shows greater capability requirements than the Predator provides today," program director AF Lt. Col. Bill Goetz told The DAILY Monday. If Predator were tested against the draft ORD it would fail, he acknowledged.
The Pentagon is hedging against any delays in the Joint Strike Fighter program and shortfalls in F-16 aircraft and, therefore, has told the U.S. Air Force to identify a number of older F-16s it could quickly reactivate.
McDonnell Douglas will return its workhorse Delta II to service tomorrow with launch of the first five Iridium low Earth orbit communications satellites, relying on non-destructive testing of the rocket's solid-fuel boosters to avoid a repeat of the Jan. 17 explosion that grounded the vehicle.
The White House last spring made it an urgent priority to help Israel develop a Tactical High Energy Laser (THEL) to defend against terrorist Katyusha rockets fired from Lebanon, but one year and $89 million later, deployment isn't even close. The U.S. Army "really has no idea when [THEL] could be operational," John Wachs, a THEL program engineer at the Army's Space and Strategic Defense Command's weapons directorate, told reporters here on Monday. Without funding shortages, it may technically be possible by 1999, he said.
Virtual Retinal Display developer Microvision won a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract from the U.S. Air Force to begin working on a full-color, high-definition, head-mounted display (HMD) to help train pilots. The service's Armstrong Lab at Brooks AFB, Tex., will administer the first phase of the contract aimed at demonstrating the feasibility of a lightweight HMD for displaying full color images to pilots training in simulators. But it's not limited to the Air Force.
The Senate Appropriations Committee yesterday approved a fiscal 1997 supplemental funding bill rescinding $1.799 billion in fiscal 1997 and prior year expenditures, including $69 million intended to begin multi-year procurement of the Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS), which it said needs further operational testing.
The U.S. Navy this week rebaselined its Joint Strike Fighter procurement plan, cutting about 50 aircraft from the number it previously planned to acquire, Navy officials said here yesterday. Rear Adm. J.M. "Carlos" Johnson, the Navy's deputy director for air warfare, told a meeting of the American Helicopter Society that the Navy plans to buy about 250 JSFs. It previously planned to buy 300 (DAILY, March 26, 1996).
The National Reconnaissance Office plans to award multiple contracts in the fall of 1998 for a new constellation of imagery satellites, the first of which would be launched early in the next decade, NRO Director Keith R. Hall said yesterday. He said in his Pentagon office during his first session with reporters since being confirmed last month that six industry teams are competing for the job. They can't be identified yet, an NRO spokeswoman said, because "we haven't gotten through the classification process" with all of them.
The Pentagon has released a market survey for a tactical unmanned aerial vehicle that reflects an emphasis on systems with proven performance. The survey is being released because of concern about performance of the Alliant Techsystems Outrider UAV, in the midst of a two-year Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration.
ITT CORP. beat General Dynamics for the U.S. Army's Single Channel Ground and Airborne Radio System (SINCGARS) buyout program, the Pentagon announced Friday. In the past, the Army has split SINCGARS production between the two manufacturers. ITT Aerospace Communications, Fort Wayne, Ind., won an initial $190 million contract that could reach a value of $510 million. ITT will deliver 35,000 SINCGARS radios, with options for 50,000 more over the next two years. Work under the contract should be completed by April 25, 2002.
The Air Force's fiscal year 1998 budget request, as in the past, contains by far the largest share of the Defense Dept.'s classified acquisition funding, according to a Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment report. "Classified programs account for $6.2 billion, or 41%, of the Air Force's procurement funding request and $4.8 billion, or 33%, of its research and development request," according to CSBA's "Classified Programs in the FY 1998 Defense Budget Request."
Japan and the Republic of Korea have officially requested information from the U.S. government on the McDonnell Douglas AH- 64D Longbow Apache attack helicopters, but discussions about an immediate sale of the equipment have so far not taken place, officials said here Thursday.
