The U.S. Air Force plans to use its additional B-2 bomber as an attrition reserve airplane because there's no requirement for another operational plane, a move that will also keep down the cost of maintaining the fleet, according to an Air Force official.
The U.S. Army plans to conduct nine Army Space Exploitation Demonstration Programs in fiscal 1997, all aimed at enhancing the service's use of space assets. The list was approved earlier this year by the Lt. Gen. Jay Garner, the head of the Army's Space and Strategic Defense Command. All the programs are operational demonstrations. Last year's 19 ASEDPs consisted of technology, concept, and operational demonstrations.
Rockwell International will pay $6.5 million in fines after accepting "full accountability" for a July, 1994, explosion at a Rocketdyne laboratory in Chatsworth, Calif., that left two workers dead and one severely burned. The company agreed to plead guilty in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles to a single count of improper storage of hazardous material and two counts of improper disposal in connection with the accident.
The U.S. Air Force board investigating last week's crash in Croatia of a militarized Boeing 737 that killed Secretary of Commerce Ron Brown and 33 others has brought in civilian experts who investigated the fatal crash of a USAir 737 near Pittsburgh in 1994.
LOCKHEED MARTIN'S SANDERS unit won a $5.1 million firm fixed price contract from the U.S. Navy for four AIMS antenna group systems and spares. The Nashua, N.H., company said Monday that the award to its Surveillance Systems Div. represents exercise of the second option of a three-year contract to support the Aegis program. The AIMS antenna group, designated OE-120/UPX, is part of the air traffic control and IFF system used on CG47 class cruisers, DDG51 destroyers and LHD1 class helicopter assault ships.
Ability of the U.S. Air Force's Air Mobility Command to maintain current and future levels of participation in the Civil Reserve Air Fleet (CRAF) program depends on whether it can continue to offer adequate incentives to air carriers and resolve differences on insurance coverage, the General Accounting Office reports.
Table details SAR programs for fourth quarter Selected Acquisition Report (SAR) programs for the three-month period ending Dec. 31, 1995, are detailed in the following table, released by the Dept. of Defense (DAILY, April 9). Dollar figures are in millions. Current Estimate Cost Weapon Base Base Then System Year Year $ Year $ Qty
A "blue ribbon" NASA panel is being convened to review the joint U.S./Russian Bion life sciences orbital missions as pressure mounts against the program from animal rights and taxation activists. Administrator Daniel S. Goldin has named Dr. Ronald Merrell, chairman of the Department of Surgery at Yale University's medical school, to head the panel. Merrell's group will review Bion 11 and Bion 12, scheduled to carry two Rhesus monkeys each into orbit for two weeks so U.S., Russian and French scientists can study how their bodies adapt to microgravity.
Two of the top competitors for the Link 16 datalink program have joined forces to compete for development of the low cost datalink for the U.S. Air Force's F-15 fighter. GEC Marconi's Wayne, N.J.-based Electronic Systems Corp. and Rockwell International's Collins Avionics and Communications Div., Cedar Rapids, Iowa, are teaming because they have "very complementary capabilities and very complementary technology," according to a GEC Marconi official.
The Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system has encountered schedule delays, but "these.are typical of.any complex prototype system," and field operations of the Avenger, or Pedestal Mounted Stinger, are restricted because of heat stress in the turret. These were among findings detailed in the annual report of the Defense Dept.'s Directorate for Operational Test and Evaluation (DAILY, April 8). Other findings included the following:
EDO Corp. and its wholly-owned subsidiary EDO Electro-Optics won a $12 million contract from Hughes Space and Communications Co. to produce static infrared Earth sensors for its satellites. Under the deal, EDO Electro-Optics will provide classic static geosynchronous Earth sensors to Hughes' newest satellite model, the HS 702. In addition, the company will manufacture a variation of the sensor for a series of commercial satellites based on Hughes' HS 601 model.
Two-month-old talks between Lockheed Martin and the Machinists' union will re-open this morning at the headquarters of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, the union reported yesterday. Some 4,800 aerospace workers at Lockheed Martin Aeronautical Systems Co. in Marietta, Ga. - unhappy with the prospect of company managers sending work outside the plant and annoyed at large executive bonuses - are set to strike Monday at 12:01 a.m. unless negotiators can reach a new deal.
CSA CZECH AIRLINES, which now operates five 737-500s and two 737-400s, ordered another 10 737-500s valued at about $350 million, Boeing said yesterday.
A bipartisan congressional coalition, which has diligently supported increased production of the B-2 bomber, plans to put off pushing the Pentagon to buy more of the planes in fiscal year 1997 and instead will promote efforts to upgrade the current fleet, said congressional aides close to the coalition.
Russia's Proton launcher has made a successful debut in commercial service, orbiting the Astra 1F direct- broadcasting satellite in a spectacular night launch here. Liftoff of the Proton K came right on schedule at 3:09 a.m. Moscow Summer Time yesterday (7:09 p.m. EST Monday) from Site 81 at this sprawling launch facility, once the center of the Soviet Union's space effort. Clear desert air above the dark Kazakh desert allowed some 150 foreign visitors to follow the rocket's flight until about halfway through third-stage operations.
Pentagon leaders are preparing to defend their plan to privatize depot-level maintenance on Capitol Hill next week, and have been holding strategy sessions with congressional supporters to help stave off expected opposition, Deputy Secretary of Defense John P. White said yesterday. Meanwhile, he said, the Pentagon is working with the Office of Management and Budget on other possible changes to laws governing privatization of Defense Dept. work.
Teams headed by British Aerospace Dynamics and Thomson-CSF stand to receive contracts later this year to study the feasibility of developing a short or very short range air defense system for NATO, one BAe official said. Nick Stoppard, BAe's business development manager for future air defense and naval systems, told The DAILY during an interview in Washington that the study contracts will run about two years. Other companies may become involved later.
April 1, 1996 Northrop Grumman Corporation, Pico Rivera, California, was awarded on March 29, a $6,891,537 face value increase to a fixed price incentive fee contract to provide for data, equipment, and tooling consolidation and storage in support of the curtailment program for the B-2 aircraft. Contract is expected to be completed December 1996. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, is the contracting activity (F33657- 87/C-2000, P00667).
The NAVSTAR GPS Joint Program Office (JPO) will issue a solicitation April 22 for the evaluation phase of a program to protect use of the Global Positioning System by the U.S. and its allies and deny it to enemies during conflicts. An April 8 Commerce Business Daily notice said more than one contract may be awarded. The JPO plans to select one prime contractor to design, develop, implement and support an integrated navigation warfare, or NAVWAR, architecture, according to an earlier CBD notice (DAILY, March 12).
THIOKOL CORP. will move its Huck International subsidiary headquarters from Irvine, Calif., to existing manufacturing facilities in Tucson, Ariz. Forty-eight employees, including those working in the company's research and development functions, will be affected by the relocation, slated to be complete by July 31. The R&D functions at Irvine represent about one-third of the total work force. Those positions will be transferred to Huck's Carson, Calif., plant.
The first C-130J Hercules, a -30 model slated for delivery to the U.K. Royal Air Force, flew for the first time on April 5, Lockheed Martin said. The flight, from Dobbins Air Reserve Base, Ga., had been slated for last December, but software and hardware problems and delays in hardware delivery forced the slip, company spokesman Julius Alexander said. He said that the C-130J has two mission computers, more than 30 processors and over 700,000 lines of software, and that it took a little longer to get on line than expected.
The cost of the Pentagon's major acquisition programs fell $15.8 billion in the fourth quarter of 1995, largely because of lower inflation rates, according to Selected Acquisition Reports submitted yesterday to Congress. The Defense Dept. said the SAR number dropped from $723.7 billion in September to $714.4 billion in December. The lower rates drove the price of acquisitions down $40 billion, but increased procurement of the C-17 airlifter and other systems resulted in a total reduction of only 2.2%.
April 2, 1996 Lockheed Martin Corporation, Fort Worth, Texas, was awarded on April 1, a $43,938,236 face value increase to a cost plus incentive fee contract to provide for engineering and manufacturing development for modification kits to convert Block 40 F-16 aircraft to a close air support mission. Contract is expected to be completed June 1998. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. Aeronautical Systems Center, Wright- Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, is the contracting activity (F33657-95/C- 2028, P00001).
The U.S. Air Force's two-level maintenance (TLM) program is not meeting the service's goals for cutting maintenance cost and time, and instead is resulting in some lower-than-standard repair turnaround times, the congressional General Accounting Office reports.
