The Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) was tested last month in a ground-to-air mode intended to meet NATO desires for an upgrade to the Hawk air defense system. In a demonstration Aug. 8 at Ft. Greely, Alaska, two AMRAAMs were fired from Hawk launchers and "directly hit" their targets, a U.S. Air Force official said. Erik Stoer, chief of AMRAAM advanced projects, told The DAILY that the demonstration was part of the U.S. Army's Safe Air '95 exercise, and was observed by representatives of about 15 countries.
Orbital Sciences Corp. wants to try again with its troubled Pegasus XL booster late in October, hoping the third time will be the charm for the troubled upgrade of its basic Pegasus air-launched booster. J.R. Thompson, executive vice president and general manager of Orbital's Launch Systems Group, told The DAILY that the company believes it understands what caused the June 22 staging anomaly that led to the second range safety destruct command in as many tries to fly the new booster (DAILY, June 23, page 469).
The European Commission has okayed plans by British Aerospace, Aerospatiale and Alenia to pool their small civil aircraft lines into a regional aircraft venture, and officials expect a formal announcement of the decision today. A European Union panel looking into possible anti-trust problems stemming from the arrangement was supposed to complete its review of the creation of the AIR consortium this summer (DAILY, June 30, page 511), and EC officials couldn't tell The DAILY Friday why the decision-widely expected-took so long.
RAYTHEON CO., Missile Systems Div., Bedford, Mass., will provide depot level diagnostic, cleanup, repair, and maintenance for Patriot missile major item repairs under a $6.5 million contract from the U.S. Army Missile Command awarded Aug. 31. The Dept. of Defense said the work will be performed at Ft. Bliss, Tex. (32%), Ft. Polk, La. (5.3%), Ft. Hood, Tex. (2.7%), Ft. Lewis, Wash. (2%), and the balance in Germany, Southwest Asia and Korea.
PIONEER UAV INC., Hunt Valley, Md., on Sept. 13 will roll out the first of 30 Pioneer unmanned aerial vehicles being purchased by the U.S. Navy in the fiscal year 1994 buy. The 14-foot-long, 463-pound vehicle will be rolled out of the final assembly facility to an audience of U.S. Navy customers. The UAV was completed two months ahead of schedule.
Federal prosecutors will join whistleblower Daniel O'Keefe in a lawsuit claiming McDonnell Douglas routinely mischarged the government for A-12 Avenger and C-17 Globemaster labor costs from at least 1989 through this year. Justice Dept. officials said Friday a probe of the claims made in O'Keefe's October, 1993, suit uncovered evidence the company may have "defrauded the United States by routinely mischarging on a number of Department of Defense contracts" in both the A-12 and C-17 programs.
BEECH AEROSPACE SERVICES INC., Madison, Miss., will conduct maintenance and logistical support services for the U.S. Navy's T-34 and T-44 aircraft at NAS Whiting Field, Fla., NAS Pensacola, Fla., and NAS Corpus Christi, Tex. The Naval Aviation Depot, Operations Center, Patuxent River, Md., awarded the contract on Sept. 5.
Three defense experts have floated proposals to build prototype submarines before the U.S. Navy settles on a new class of submersible warships, in effect rejecting the Navy's preferred approach. In congressional testimony, former Pentagon research chief John S. Foster Jr. advocated rapid prototyping of attack submarines over the next decade, and former House Armed Services research and development staffer Anthony R. Battista also urged building three or four submarine prototypes before moving out on a new class sub.
The Defense Dept.'s Transportation Command will look at ton- mileage and outsized cargo in determining the force mix between C-17 and Non-Developmental Airlift Aircraft, says Lt. Gen. George Muellner, the U.S. Air Force's principal deputy assistant secretary for acquisition. But he also says during a Washington breakfast session with defense reporters that NDAA looks attractive "purely from a ton mileage perspective."
Muellner says "there's no singular solution" to the problem of boost phase intercept of theater ballistic missiles. "I've not seen the silver bullet out there that's going to deal with all the issues" involved in BPI, he says. For the future, "the best answer is...doing it from space." Space-based lasers and sensors provide "the best capability with the least logistics tail long term." In the nearer term, Muellner says, the projected Airborne Laser would target missile in their boost phase, while other aircraft would strike at the launchers themselves.
NASA has been warned that launch of the Priroda pressurized module to Mir may slip, raising concerns that astronaut Shannon Lucid's planned five-month stay on the Russian station next year will be hampered for lack of gear scheduled to ride up on Priroda. In Moscow, Boris D. Ostroumov, deputy director general of the Russian Space Agency, tells reporters Priroda has been slowed both by laggard funding and problems with foreign-supplied gear that had to be returned for modifications.
A draft of the classified U.S. National Space Policy in the works at the Office of Science and Technology policy draws scant response from government agencies that helped prepare it. NASA alone made formal comments on the draft last month, which was produced with input from all space-related federal agencies, including DOD, DOT and the National Security Council. Due for completion Nov. 1, the policy is an attempt to draw together Clinton Administration updates to federal space policy assembled without coordination over the past two-and-a-half years.
Prudential Securities has added BFGoodrich to the stable of aerospace companies it covers, and is urging investors to buy, citing strong sales and the possibility for ballooning profits.
U.S. AIR FORCE plans to award a contract next July for production of 51 Conventional Bomb Modules (CBMs) for the B-1B bomber. The AF said in a Sept. 6 Commerce Business Daily notice that each module will carry ten CBU- 87/89/97 cluster bombs. Plans are underway for interested contractors to visit Edwards AFB, Calif., to view the module in the second or third week of October. Also, service officials would visit prospective contractors.
Boeing 777 launch customer United Airlines has turned up a potential cracking problem on PW4084 turbofan oil tubes, but Pratt&Whitney said its engineers understand what's happening and already have a fix developed. Technicians discovered the beginnings of tiny cracks along the inside bend of an elbow joint in the tube, which led to rumors circulating throughout the airline industry Wednesday that the planes had suffered oil leaks from cracked tubes, and that United was grounding two aircraft as a result.
The U.S. Air Force's Air Combat Command plans to delay its fighter datalink acquisition a couple of years and then buy derivatives of the Multifunction Information Distribution System, or MIDS, rather than the more expensive Class 2 Joint Tactical Information Distribution Systems terminals, according to an ACC officer.
NASA managed to launch the Space Shuttle Endeavour just ahead of an approaching rainstorm yesterday, avoiding another delay as Hurricane Luis began to churn the waters off Kennedy Space Center and ending a five-week schedule slip that forced Endeavour's next planned flight into 1996.
The House yesterday narrowly kept alive this year's congressional campaign to provide $493 million that the Defense Dept. doesn't want for additional B-2 bombers, defeating by a vote of 213 to 210 an amendment by House Budget Chairman John R. Kasich (R-Ohio) that would have killed the add-on. Had the amendment succeeded, the chances of funding B-2s beyond the currently approved program of 20 would have been dead for this year, at least. Supporters are talking about a buy of 20 more of the Northrop Grumman stealth bombers.
The House yesterday accepted an amendment to the fiscal 1996 defense appropriations bill that would prohibit contractors from using funds in the bill to lobby the federal government. The amendment, sponsored by Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D-Colo.), was written into the defense money bill in a low-key debate following the high profile battle over the B-2 bomber in which the House supported the Appropriations Committee's $493 million B-2 add-on by a vote of 213-210.
The first production standard C-130 airlifter retires from active U.S. Air Force service Sunday, some 40 years after making its first flight. Over its career the plane, named The First Lady, has carried cargo, tracked rockets and snatched satellites returning to Earth by parachute, all before being converted during the Vietnam War into a gunship. As an AC-130, The First Lady logged more than 4,500 combat hours, mostly shooting trucks on the Ho Chi Minh Trail.
The U.S. Air Force is preparing for first launch of an AGM-130 standoff weapon that features an improved seeker, an AF officer says. Launch of the weapon from an F-15 fighter over the Eglin AFB, Fla., range in about two weeks will complete a program that started last October and so far has involved only captive carriage tests, 1st Lt. Matthew Zickafoose, the AF's lead engineer for the AGM-130 air vehicle, said yesterday in a telephone interview.
British Aerospace's latest Harrier V/STOL fighter, the GR.7, made its full-combat debut supporting UN forces' recent attacks on Bosnian Serb positions in the former Yugoslavia. Six Harrier GR.7s from the RAF's No. 4 Squadron at Laarbruch, in Germany, plus two more GR.7s with reconnaissance pods, have been flying Bosnian sorties in pairs with a few remaining Jaguar GR.1Bs from RAF Coltishall.
Lockheed Martin's decision to consolidate its satellite manufacturing operations was made with the aim of maximizing efficiencies by manufacturing commercial, civil and military satellites in the same set of facilities. But the company also faces a major hurdle in meeting that goal: It must prove that it can seamlessly shift production of satellites across the nation while maintaining its position in the fiercely competitive commercial satellite market.
RAYTHEON HAWKER business jet variants would be used by South Korea in the role of tactical military reconnaissance, the Pentagon said yesterday. It said Seoul is conducting a competition for planes to conduct the mission, and that four of the eight aircraft it needs would be Hawkers. It has not yet decided which other aircraft would be used, the Defense Dept. said. Principal U.S. contractors involved, in addition to Raytheon, are E-Systems and Loral Defense Systems.
The Defense Dept.'s information specialists may prefer to focus on offensive information warfare, but the most difficult piece of the IW puzzle lies on the defensive side, according to Advanced Research Projects Agency Director Larry Lynn. "The favored game in town is offensive information warfare," Lynn told The DAILY in an interview. "It's easy. It's fun. Exciting. You get a chance to try it. You go penetrating systems. Obviously there are lots of nuances to it. Everybody in the information warfare business wants to work on offense."
