NASA engineers expect much greater flexibility to test new space launch technology with the restructured X-34 flying testbed, now that the original requirement that the vehicle do double duty as a commercial smallsat launcher has been scrapped.
RESEARCH ASSOCIATES OF SYRACUSE INC., North Syracuse, N.Y., won a $1.2 million contract from the U.S. Air Force's Rome Laboratory for Airborne Tactical Elint Processor Support (ATEPS). The contract was awarded April 25.
ORTEL CORP., Alhambra, Calif., said it has been chosen by Lockheed Martin's Sanders unit to provide linear fiberoptic technology for the U.S. Navy/Air Force Integrated Defensive Electronic Countermeasures (IDECM) system. Ortel said it will provide advanced photodiode receivers for the wide frequency fiberoptic towed decoy portion of IDECM. Initial units are slated for delivery in mid-1997.
NORTHROP GRUMMAN CORP., Rolling Meadows, Ill., received a $6 million contract June 7 from the U.S. Air Force's Warner Robins Air Logistics Center to repair 75 Band 8 traveling wave tubes used in the AN/ALQ-161A electronic countermeasures system on the B-1B aircraft.
NORTHROP GRUMMAN CORP.'s Electronic Sensors and Systems Div., Baltimore, received a $3.1 million contract May 31 from the U.S. Air Force's Warner Robins Air Logistics Center for mod kits applicable to the AN/ALQ-131 jammer.
Newly elected Senate Majority Leader Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) will be leaving the Senate Armed Services Committee. Lott, who replaced Bob Dole as majority leader when Dole resigned from the Senate, also took over the vacancy created on the Senate Finance Committee by Dole's resignation. Lott's departure from Armed Services means that the chairmanship of the strategic forces subcommittee, which Lott headed, is now open.
GENERAL DYNAMICS Land Systems Div., Warren, Mich., yesterday was chosen to proceed to the demonstration/validation phase of the Advanced Amphibious Assault Vehicle (AAAV) program. It received a $216.9 million contract for the project from U.S. Marine Corps Systems Command. "During this phase up to three prototypes will be built," the Defense Dept. said, "two configured as personnel carriers and one configured as a mobile command post."
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION Secretary I. Michael Heyman yesterday appointed Donald D. Engen director of the National Air and Space Museum, effective July 1. Engen, a naval aviator who retired with the rank of vice admiral, is a former FAA administrator and a former member of the National Transportation Safety Board.
Dutch engineering and industrial services specialist Stork plans to take over Fokker Aviation, the post-bankruptcy successor to Fokker that groups Fokker's profitable space, military, maintenance and electronic components subsidiaries.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) on Tuesday released a hold on the defense authorization bill that was preventing it from moving to the Senate floor for action. He disagreed with portions of the bill dealing with defense intelligence activities.
SIGNAL TECHNOLOGY CORP., Sunnyvale, Calif., said it received several awards from Northrop Grumman Corp. with a total value of $10.6 million. They call for various microwave and power supply products for the ALQ-165 Airborne Self-Protection Jammer (ASPJ) and the ALQ-131 jamming pod. Dale L. Peterson, chairman and chief executive officer of Signal Technology, said the contracts "represent good business for Signal Technology.
Rockwell has adopted a "lower-risk approach," based in part on its experience building the U.S. Space Shuttle but drawing on proprietary propellant-handling processes as well, in its proposal for NASA's X-33 reusable launch vehicle (RLV) testbed and a commercial RLV to follow it. Details released by Rockwell yesterday indicate the company is also tapping the experience of project partner Northrop Grumman with the B-2 bomber in developing lightweight composite structures for the RLV.
First training sortie of a Block 20 B-2 bomber was carried out June 1, the U.S. Air Force said. It said the mission, from Whiteman AFB, Mo., lasted five and a half hours and included terrain-following simulated bombing runs and a simulated release of a GPS-Aided Munition (GAM) using the Global Positioning System- Aided Targeting System (GATS).
Rockwell International has begun a program to overhaul the 1970s computer and software technology of the B-1B bomber to increase its ability to deliver conventional weapons, company officials said.
LOCKHEED MARTIN Tactical Communications Systems, Salt Lake City, said it is working under a $14.7 million contract from the U.S. Navy for support of the Battle Group Passive Horizon Extension System (BGPHES). The system, carried by the ES-3A aircraft, "enhances the Navy's ability to acquire multi-service data link signals via a shipboard terminal and surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft," Lockheed Martin said.
House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Tex.) told reporters Tuesday that several obstacles prevent passage by the House anytime soon of the Defend America Act. He said the House leadership wants to bring the legislation to the floor as soon as possible, but is waiting to review "more realistic" cost estimates from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). Also, he said, the bill won't move to the floor until the leadership has convinced GOP moderates to support it.
U.S. Naval Air Systems Command is formulating requirements for an avionics warfighting upgrade for the EA-6B aircraft, and is tentatively planning to launch the effort in 1999. All 126 planes would be modified.
Early development work on Active Electronically Scanned Aperture (AESA) technology could lead to a new radar for Sweden's JAS-39 Gripen fighter with twice the range of the plane's current PS-05. Ericsson Microwave Systems, which has been studying the idea for the Swedish Air Force since 1994 and is due to wrap up the effort in 1997, has found so far that such an improvement is feasible, according to Kenneth Svensson, Ericsson's technical manager for future airborne intercept radar.
The U.S. Navy grounded about 200 Navy and Marine Corps H-53E Super Stallion and Sea Dragon helicopters yesterday after investigators probing the fatal May 9 crash of a Super Stallion at Sikorsky Helicopters' flight facilities in Connecticut turned up problems with main rotor bearing assemblies. While the investigation continues, the Navy said Sikorsky recommended the grounding to allow thorough inspection of swashplate duplex bearing assemblies in the main rotor and to give engineers time to develop a fix or a permanent inspection regime.
GREENWICH AIR SERVICES said it has completed the $231.5 million purchase of Aviall's domestic and foreign commercial engine services operations. The cash purchase was financed by public offerings. Eugene Conese, chairman of Greenwich, said the purchase "made our company the largest, most diversified independent gas turbine engine repair and overhaul organization in the world." Greenwich can now provide repair and overhaul services for all the major original equipment engine manufacturers, he said. This includes 14 engine lines and 50 engine models.
DONALD ENGEN, former FAA administrator and NTSB member, today will be named director of the National Air and Space Museum. Engen, who also has been president of the AOPA Air Safety Foundation, is a retired Navy vice admiral who currently holds the museum's Dewitt Ramsey Chair for Naval Aviation History.
Rockwell International on Monday will restart a program to upgrade the B-1B bomber's electronic countermeasures system, company officials said yesterday. It will launch a one-year pre-engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) effort to select the best non-development technology and team to give the plane an ECM capability against a range of threats, Paul M. Hendricks III, program manger for the company's B-1B defensive systems, told The DAILY during an interview at Rockwell's Arlington, Va., offices.
THE U.S. ON JULY 1 will adopt an international standard for the reporting of aviation weather observations and forecasts. The standard, being implemented by FAA, the National Weather Service, the Defense Dept. and aviation organizations, "moves the country toward a single, worldwide standard," FAA said.
McDonnell Douglas is hiring temporary replacements for some of the 6,400 Machinists who have been on strike at the company's St. Louis-based military aircraft operation for nine days, and moving some work out to U.S. subcontractors and other company facilities. MDC said yesterday that some fabrication, subassembly, tooling and service work would move "temporarily" to "certified" U.S. subcontractors as part of a larger plan that also includes getting 5,000 St. Louis employees into production positions within a couple of months.
SATENAS, Sweden - The most recently proposed Swedish force structure cuts are reducing the country's warfighting capability below the threshold level of being able to thwart a full-scale attack, Sweden's top military officer says.
