HUGHES' new HS 702 telecommunications satellite will be the first payload launched by the Boeing-led Sea Launch venture from its modified oil rig in the mid-Pacific, the two companies announced yesterday. The satellite will become Hughes' Galaxy XI, pending approval by the FCC. The body-stabilized platform can carry as many as 90 transponders, and offers twice the electrical power and present satellites, Hughes said. Hughes has agreed to pay a reported $1 billion for 10 launches aboard the Ukrainian Zenit booster that is the Sea Launch vehicle (DAILY, Dec.
Joanne E. Braeunle has been named manager, planning and administration. Robert Thomas Delaney, former director, international program development at Itek Optical Systems, Lowell, Mass., was named business development manager, Image Acquisition Systems (IAS).
U.S. jetliner deliveries picked up the pace in the second quarter, rising to 70 aircraft from 50 in the previous quarter, but that's still five aircraft short of second-quarter deliveries a year ago, according to data published by the Aerospace Industries Association yesterday.
Steven M. Cox, who most recently served as managing director of the Earth Resources Observation Satellite (EROS) program in Annapolis, Md., has been named vice president of sales and marketing.
ORBITAL SCIENCES CORP. reported revenues of $116,512,000 in the second quarter of 1996, a 42% jump from the second quarter of 1995. The bulk of the money - $97.5 million - came from the company's space infrastructure business, including launch vehicles, satellites, sensors and electronics and ground systems. With the Pegasus XL finally flying after a rocky start, the company won space-sector contracts worth $300 million during the quarter.
HUGHES AIRCRAFT CO.'S Radar and Communications Systems unit, Los Angeles, received a $5.1 million contract for one F/A-18 AN/APG-73 radar bench for the Finnish Air Force under the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program. The Defense Dept. said Aug. 1 that the contract was awarded by the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Div., Lakehurst, N.J.
Special Operations Forces will be one of the U.S. Air Force's most applicable tools in future conflicts, USAF planners said yesterday. Initial results of an analysis to be presented to USAF four-star generals in October are that "people wanted to use Special Operations Forces in all FOEs," or future operating environments, according to Lt. Col. Craig McFarlane, a member of an AF team charged with long-range planning. He said SOF were particularly favored for use in non-traditional scenarios like peace enforcement and countering non-state terrorism.
MCDONNELL DOUGLAS Training Systems, St.Louis, will provide two Air Force Mission Support System base stations and associated software, maintenance and support for the C-17 Aircrew Training System. The work will be carried out under a $5.4 million contract announced by the Dept. of Defense on July 31. The contract was awarded by the AF's Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio.
X-33 COMPONENT CONTRACTS awarded recently include $30 million to Aerojet for a gaseous hydrogen reaction control system, which will also use exhaust gas from the gasification process to generate electrical power for the reusable launch vehicle. Alliant Techsystems will produce three graphite epoxy liquid hydrogen tanks, each measuring 17 by 35 feet, for the X-33. Lockheed Martin, prime contractor on the X-33, awarded the contract to Alliant, while Rocketdyne subcontracted the reaction control system to Aerojet.
ALLIEDSIGNAL INC., Teterboro, N.J., got a $7.9 million U.S. Air Force contract to repair varying quantities of 668 components of the Avionics Intermediate Shop for the F-15 aircraft. San Antonio Air Logistics Center, Kelly AFB, Tex., awarded the contract, according to a July 1 announcement from the Dept. of Defense.
DIAGNOSTIC/RETRIEVAL SYSTEMS INC., Parsippany, N.J., said its DRS Precision Echo subsidiary will provide additional quantities of WRR-818 Cockpit Video Recording Systems (CVRS) for the U.S. Navy's F/A-18C/D and F/A-18E/F aircraft. The company received a contract of about $1 million for the work from Naval Air Systems Command. The award results from the exercise of an option on an existing, multiple-year contract, which DRS won in December 1994. So far, the company said, about $7 million has been released on the program, including this latest award.
LOCKHEED MARTIN Tactical Aircraft Systems, Fort Worth, Tex., received a $12.3 million increase to a contract to provide seven Test Program Sets for the Improved Avionics Intermediate Shop in support of the F-16 aircraft. Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, awarded the contract, according to a June 24 announcement by the Dept. of Defense.
House and Senate defense authorizers are not satisfied with the Defense Dept.'s management of the Space and Missile Tracking System (SMTS) and urge program officials to provide Congress with a revised baseline plan.
The U.S. Air Force plans to migrate its fleet of 32 Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft to an open system architecture and has begun to set aside funds in its future year budget plans to jump-start the effort. "We bought the aircraft 25 years ago," and now "we are looking at, in the future, opening up its architecture," said Col. Dave Nagy, the Air Force's chief for information dominance. He said "there's some money that we have programmed to look at that."
Rafael of Israel and Lockheed Martin Corp. yesterday announced formation of a joint venture to sell the AGM-142 standoff missile and its derivatives. The venture - Precision Guided Systems U.S., a Limited Liability Company - will be owned equally by Lockheed Martin and Rafael. It will be based in Orlando, Fla., headquarters of Lockheed Martin Electronics and Missiles.
A request for proposals for a 105mm guided munition for the AC-130 gunship will be issued in about two weeks, according to an Aug. 8 Commerce Business Daily notice. The U.S. Army's Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center said in the notice the service "has a requirement to improve the effectiveness of the AC-130 Gunship 105mm Ammunition at extended range and achieve low collateral damage while defeating a broad spectrum of targets with a 105mm guided munition."
RUSSIA'S FAKEL Experimental Design Bureau has been authorized to work with U.S. and European firms to develop electric propulsion systems consuming as much as 30 kilowatts. Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin put the Russian Space Agency and the Ministry of Defense in charge of licensing Fakel technology, which includes the SPT-200 stationary plasma thrusters that produce 35 grams of thrust with a specific impulse of 1,600 seconds on 6 kilowatts of power.
EVANS&SUTHERLAND'S Commercial Simulation Business Unit will supply visual systems to Southwest Airlines for its new Boeing 737-700 simulator. Evans&Sutherland said it is slated to install the visual system at the new Southwest Flight Training Center at Love Field, in Dallas, which will open in the first quarter of next year.
British Aerospace Dynamics' low-observable Storm Shadow, chosen for Britain's $975 million conventionally armed stand-off missile, or CASOM, requirement, will use the 1,080-pound BROACH kinetic energy penetrator warhead developed by BAe's Royal Ordnance subsidiary, company officials reported.
Russian industry and the Ministry of Defense are at odds about the proposed bulk sale of advanced sea-launched cruise missiles to the U.S. Defense Dept. as test targets for the U.S. Navy. Designers and producers of the system are eager to get much-needed cash, while the Ministry of Defense fears that U.S. use of the missile as a target will compromise its future effectiveness for the Russian Navy.
French aviation authorities and the manufacturers of the ATR-72 turboprop that crashed Oct. 31, 1994, near Roselawn, Ind., did not ignore or suppress technical data that could have prevented the accident, according to FAA's former top aircraft certification official.
Defense authorization conferees have mandated that the Pentagon's new top-to-bottom Quadrennial Defense Review examine how far technologies that should be available by 2005 will allow defense planners to cut forces. Conferees' language directed that the review look into the effects on force structure of a range of technologies, including "precision guided munitions, stealth, night vision, digitization and communications," as well as "the changes in doctrine and operational concepts" that would result from using these technologies.
U.S. fighter pilots in Bosnia are getting first experience with a system that allows them to receive and view in-flight imagery to help locate and identify targets. The Rapid Targeting System, also known as "Gold Strike," was deployed to Bosnia in mid-June after being developed as a result of lessons learned during the Gulf War. It exploits and forwards to fighter pilots imagery gathered from a variety of different sensors, according to the Air Force's Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright Patterson AFB, Ohio.
