The House Select Committee on Intelligence yesterday passed an intelligence community overhaul bill that is devoid of the most controversial aspects of the plan it made public in March. When Committee Chairman Larry Combest unveiled his "Intelligence Community in the 21st Century (IC21)" plan, he said it would be used as the vehicle to move IC reform legislation through the House.
The Nautilus laser weapon, unwanted by the Defense Dept., has been given new life by the Senate Armed Services Committee and the House National Security Committee in their markups of the fiscal 1997 defense authorization. The SASC authorized $50 million and the HNSC settled for language in its committee report encouraging the Defense Dept. to request funding for Nautilus. Congressional sources said there is a strong expectation that the defense authorization will provide at least $40 million in Nautilus funding.
The Clinton Administration should lift unnecessary export restrictions on military sales to Latin American countries, 75 lawmakers said in a letter sent to top Administration officials. The Administration is reviewing U.S. policy governing military sales to Latin American countries.
TRACOR APPLIED SCIENCES INC., Austin, Tex., won a U.S. Navy competition for design, production, and installation of a radio communications system for the CVN 76 aircraft carrier. The contract, for $222.1 million, was awarded April 23 by the Fleet and Industrial Supply Center Norfolk, Detachment, Philadelphia.
FIRST FLIGHT of Europe's new Ariane V booster is targeted for May 30 during a two-hour launch window opening at 7:34 a.m. EDT. Final authorization to mount the Cluster payload on the rocket came from the European and French space agencies Wednesday, with completion of the work expected Saturday. The launch readiness review is scheduled for May 24-25, according to the European Space Agency.
House defense authorizers added $17 million to the Administration's $46 million request for launch vehicle and tactical missile rocket technology programs, and recommended increased collaboration between government agencies on such projects. The Pentagon request included $46 million for rocket propulsion technology programs, including the Integrated High Payoff Rocket Technology (IHPRT) initiative.
COMMUNICATIONS SOLUTIONS INC., Baltimore, won a $16.3 million U.S. Navy contract on May 8 to supply radar/microwave receivers to be used under the Vulnerability Assessment Systems Support (VASS) program which evaluates existing and future Navy electronic systems. The contract was awarded by the Naval Command, Control, and Ocean Surveillance Center, In-Service Engineering, East Coast Division, Charleston, S.C.
GENERAL ELECTRIC has been awarded a $115.5 million contract for 24 F404 engines for the U.S. Navy's fiscal 1996 F/A-18C/D buy, and for 34 F404s for Finland's F/A-18Cs, the Pentagon announced Wednesday.
U.S. NAVAL AIR WARFARE CENTER Aircraft Div., Indianapolis, on April 29 awarded contracts totaling about $3.49 million to Sparton Electronics and Magnavox Electronic Systems Co. for the AN/SSQ-26D sonobuoy program. Sparton got $2.7 million and Magnavox got $789,000. On April 30, Magnavox won a competitive $15.3 million contract from the center for 20,057 AN/SSQ- 110A sonobuoys.
Lockheed Martin told securities regulators yesterday it plans to issue $2.2 billion in notes as part of the financing for the acquisition of most of Loral Corp. Goldman Sachs, CS First Boston, Merrill Lynch and J.P. Morgan would handle the offering, which will also help pay for working capital and general corporate purposes, in addition to the Loral deal.
LOCKHEED MARTIN CORP., Government Electronics Systems, Moorestown, N.J., received a $110.6 million addition to a previously awarded contract to provide Aegis Combat System (ACS) Baseline Upgrade and Critical Experiment Development. The contract was awarded May 8 by Naval Sea Systems Command.
ASTRA JET CORP., Tel Aviv, said chairman Roy Bergstrom is resigning and will leave June 1 to pursue other interests. The company, a subsidiary of Israel Aircraft Industries, said Bergstrom will remain as a consultant to Astra Jet during the transition period. It said Wayne Oedewaldt, west coast sales manager of Astra Jet, will assume Bergstrom's responsibilities on an interim basis.
NASA plans to fly the DC-XA subscale single-stage-to-orbit prototype for the first time May 17, pending the outcome of data analysis from ground tests on the vertical takeoff and landing vehicle at White Sands Missile Range, N.M.
CAMBRIDGE ACOUSTICAL ASSOCIATES, INC., Medford, Mass., won a $7.7 million U.S. Navy contract for scientific and engineering services in support of ongoing surface ship/submarine noise and vibration programs. The Naval Surface Warfare Center, Carderock Div., Bethesda, Md., awarded the contract on April 16.
LORAL FEDERAL SYSTEMS, Manassas, Va., won a U.S. Navy competition to design, develop, integrate and test the New Attack Submarine (NSSN) Command, Control, Communications and Intelligence (C3I) System for sonar, combat control, and architecture subsystems. Naval Sea Systems Command awarded the company a $159.1 million contract for the work on April 24.
Pentagon leaders have signed off on the Air Force's proposed acquisition master plan for the Airborne Laser program, allowing the service to proceed with a competition between teams headed by Boeing Co. and Rockwell International.
TENTH SHIP in a series of Aegis guided missile destroyers was christened April 20 in ceremonies at the Pascagoula, Miss., shipyard of Litton's Ingalls Shipbuilding Div. The ship is one of 14 of the Arleigh Burke (DDG- 51) class contracted to date for production at Ingalls, Litton said. Seven are in service and the eighth is slated to be commissioned in June. The ship will be named Ross (DDG-71).
EDO CORP., College Point, N.Y., will supply ceramic components used in the U.S. Navy SSQ-62C sonobuoy program under a $6.3 million contract from Sparton Corp.'s Electronics Div. and a $1 million contract from Magnavox Electronic Systems Co. The components will be manufactured by EDO Ceramics, a business unit of EDO Corp.
THE JAPANESE NAVY has chosen the Ocean Master maritime patrol radar, developed by Thomson-CSF of France and Daimler-Benz Aerospace of Germany, for its Shinmaywa amphibious patrol aircraft. It is the first time that the Japanese armed forces have bought non-U.S. foreign radar equipment. The navies of France and Pakistan have already acquired the system.
Spacehab Inc. posted a $6 million net loss in its second quarter, which ended March 31, but expects to regain the lost ground as the tempo of Space Shuttle missions carrying its middeck augmentation modules picks up. With no revenue for the year, the net loss per share as of March 31 was 55 cents, the company reported. Net income for the same quarter in 1995 was $33.2 million on revenue of $46.1 million, or $5.03 per share, the company said.
The Defense Dept.'s approach to the Joint Airborne Signals Intelligence System (JASS) program may not satisfy near-term operational needs and fully capitalize on commercial technologies, House defense authorizers say in draft language accompanying their fiscal year 1997 defense bill. DOD's approach has been to evolve existing SIGINT platform programs into one common program and a testbed aircraft, and to allow all airborne SIGINT systems to benefit from sensor upgrades developed by a service or agency.
COMPUTER SCIENCES CORP., Systems Engineering Div., Falls Church, Va., won a $7 million U.S. Navy contract for software development and life cycle support services for the Advanced Combat Direction System. The Dept. of Defense, announcing the contract May 1, said the contract has two options which, if exercised, will bring its total cumulative value to $35.9 million. The contract was awarded by the Naval Command, Control and Ocean Surveillance Center Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation Division, San Diego.
NASA plans to use the two 10-meter Keck telescopes atop Hawaii's Mauna Kea mountain to test the techniques it is developing for spaceborne interferometry as part of its "Origins" search for potential life- sustaining planets around other stars. The W.M. Keck Observatory dedicated its second 10-meter telescope yesterday, making two huge adaptive-optics mirrors available in the same complex for NASA to use as an ultra-sophisticated testbed for its Origins concepts.
Lockheed Martin Tactical Aircraft Systems said it has been certified by the British Standards Institution as meeting the requirements of the ISO 9001 quality standard. The standard is being used in lieu of military specifications being phased out under Dept. of Defense acquisition reform initiatives, Lockheed Martin said yesterday.
Worldwide spacecraft launches in the first quarter of 1996 are listed in the following table. A total of 20 launches with 28 spacecraft were attempted, including one launch failure and one in-orbit failure. Russia made six launches with 11 satellites (one of which was stranded in a useless orbit because of an upper stage malfunction), the U.S. performed nine launches, orbiting 11 spacecraft including one satellite each for Korea, Indonesia and Italy. Arianespace performed three launches and orbited four satellites belonging to the U.S., Malaysia, Japan and Intelsat.
