The early warning radar systems Ukraine may have sold to Iraq probably will not have a significant impact on U.S. air operations over that country if military action is undertaken, according to defense analysts. Although the radars would improve Iraq's air defense capabilities, the technical capabilities of such passive radar systems have been highly exaggerated, according to Anthony Cordesman, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
An article in the Nov. 25 issue of The DAILY misstated the amount of research grants NASA has awarded related to long-duration space flight. The grants are worth up to $8.8 million total.
TANKER DEAL: If the White House signs off on an Air Force proposal to lease 100 Boeing 767 air refuelers, the Bush Administration may wait to ask lawmakers to approve the deal until Congress reconvenes in early January, Capitol Hill sources say. It would be considered bad form for the Administration to send such a big-ticket item to the Hill when lawmakers are absent, the sources say. Under terms presented to the White House, leasing the aircraft and buying them at the end of the lease would cost a total of about $21 billion.
DATA DELIVERY: NASA plans to brief contractors Dec. 18 on the agency's upcoming Space Mission Communications and Data Services (SMCDS) procurement, the agency says. The SMCDS will succeed the aerospace agency's current Consolidated Space Operations Contract (CSOC), which will expire in December 2003. The $3.4 billion CSOC contract, awarded to Lockheed Martin in 1998, includes managing data collection, telemetry and communications across NASA, but agency Administrator Sean O'Keefe said it hasn't led to the savings NASA expected (DAILY, Sept. 19).
In December, NASA will launch a satellite that the agency hopes will help reduce uncertainty about future ocean levels by taking highly precise measurements of the planet's massive ice sheets over a period of years. ICESat (Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite) is scheduled to launch Dec. 19 on a Boeing Delta II launch vehicle from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., at 7:45 p.m. EST.
RAPTOR DELIVERY: The Lockheed Martin-led F/A-22 Raptor team has delivered Raptor 4011, the last of five dedicated initial operational test & evaluation (DIOT&E) aircraft, the company said Nov. 27. Government officials signed formal acceptance documents for the aircraft on Nov. 26 in Marietta, Ga. The aircraft will be delivered to California, where DIOT&E pilot training is scheduled to begin at Edwards in February, the company said.
LOOKING GOOD: Programs involving United Technologies subsidiaries should do well in Defense Department budget plans for fiscal years 2004-2009, according to senior aerospace and defense analyst Byron Callan. "We generally believe that UT [United Technologies] programs should do okay," Callan says. "The Comanche program will go ahead and [F/A-22] and F-35 fighters ... look good too." UT subsidiary Pratt & Whitney provides engines for those programs. One question is what would happen if the V-22 program is canceled, he says.
BIG BOOST: If Lockheed Martin and Boeing human-rate their Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicles (EELVs) it could provide a major advantage for both companies over competing launch providers such as Arianespace, according to Phil McAlister, director of space and telecommunications for Futron. NASA plans to launch its proposed Orbital Space Plane (OSP) atop the EELV to ferry crew to and from the space station, and has asked Boeing and Lockheed Martin to study the feasibility of human-rating their boosters (DAILY, Oct. 31).
The sale of Boeing's Spokane Fabrication Plant to the Triumph Group (DAILY, Nov. 26) will strengthen Triumph's long-term relationship with Boeing and expand its product line, according to two financial analysts. The plant, which employs 400 workers, manufactures thermoplastic and composite aircraft parts, particularly for floor panels, air control system ducts and non-structural composite flight deck components. Terms of the sale included an eight-year single-source supplier agreement with Boeing for the parts currently supplied by the plant.
WOODWARD AIRCRAFT ENGINE SYSTEMS will be the exclusive supplier of augmentor spray bar manifold assemblies to Pratt & Whitney for the Joint Strike Fighter's F135 engine. The company previously was selected to supply fuel and pilot nozzles for the engine. The components will be produced at the company's Zeeland, Mich., facility.
The Air Force is looking at all possible ways to get payloads into orbit more efficiently, according to Brig. Gen. John T. "Tom" Sheridan, Air Force Space Command's director of requirements. "We're in the process of conducting an Analysis of Alternatives to rigorously evaluate all of the possibilities ... with the goal of selecting an alternative, developing any necessary technologies, and testing the capability before the end of the decade," Sheridan said.
ALLIED RESEARCH, Vienna, Va. Gen. J.H. Binford Peay III (ret.), chairman of the board, president and CEO, will resign effective June 2003, to serve as superintended of the Virginia Military Institute. He will remain as non-executive chairman. THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERS, New York Reginald I. Vachon, president of VNA Systems Inc., has been named president.
The Defense Department continues to be under-equipped for defeating surface-to-air missiles and other enemy air defenses, even though the General Accounting Office called attention to the problem almost two years ago, the GAO said Nov. 26. DOD has made "little progress" since January 2001, when the GAO expressed concern about the military's capabilities for suppression of enemy air defenses (SEAD), the GAO wrote in its latest report.
The F/A-22 Raptor successfully completed the last of four flight tests scheduled for this year, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. said Nov. 26. The test, which took place at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., on Nov. 22, involved the launch of a unarmed, heat-seeking AIM-9M Sidewinder missile at a QF-4 target drone flying at 14,000 feet. Supercruising at 24,000 feet, a Lockheed Martin F/A-22 test pilot positioned Raptor 4007 several miles directly behind the drone and launched the Sidewinder, the company said.
SPACEWALK: The International Space Station's fourth truss segment was attached to the station Nov. 26, and mission specialists Michael Lopez-Alegria and John Herrington, who arrived at the station the day before, conducted the first of three spacewalks to outfit and activate the new segment.
NEW DELHI - The Indian air force plans to buy an advanced centrifuge simulator to improve pilot training. Air Marshal S.K. Dham, the director general of medical services for the air force, told The DAILY the simulator would allow pilots to experience up to nine Gs of acceleration forces, allowing the Institute of Aerospace Medicine to prepare pilots to fly advanced aircraft. India plans to spend about $21 million on the simulator.
The Senate has adjourned for the year without voting on dozens of presidential nominations, including Air Force Maj. Gen. John Corley to be the Air Force's No. 2 acquisition official. However, President Bush can resubmit those nominations when the new 108th Congress takes office in January, and Corley is expected to be among those that are resubmitted, an Air Force spokesman said Nov. 26.
Raytheon Co.'s work on a communications system for the Army's Future Combat System (FCS) will help officials decide whether to proceed with further tests. Raytheon's Intelligence and Information Systems business unit, of Falls Church, Va., demonstrated the first low- and high-band directional, networked communication system for FCS (DAILY, Nov. 26), and was selected over competitor TRW to move into the third phase of the effort, slated to run through next April.
The Littoral Airborne Sensor Hyperspectral (LASH) airship program will return to Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md., for further testing Dec. 1, equipped with additional sensors for demonstrating homeland security surveillance applications. Built by Honolulu-based Science and Technology International (STI), the LASH system originally was developed for the Navy as a means of detecting submarines, undersea mines, and ocean mammals. The system was designed to be flown on SH-60 Seahawk helicopters and PC-3 Orion aircraft.
The launch of the Astra 1K satellite ended in failure when the Block DM upper stage of its Proton K launch vehicle failed to place the spacecraft in its proper orbit. The Proton K lifted off on schedule at 4:04 a.m. local time Nov. 26 from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan (6:04 p.m. Nov. 25 EST), and all three stages of the rocket performed as expected.
Taiwan has requested four Kidd-class guided missile destroyers, 248 SM-2 Block IIIA Standard missiles, 32 RGM-84L Block II Harpoon missiles and related equipment and services, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency notified Congress Nov. 21. The estimated cost of the sale is $875 million, DSCA said, and the equipment will "continue [Taiwan's] naval modernization program and enhance its anti-submarine warfare capability.
