Lockheed Martin Corp. will not offer additional concessions to striking workers at its military aeronautics facility in Marietta, Ga., according to an internal document obtained by The DAILY. Members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers local 709 voted to strike March 10 after disagreeing with the company's final salary and benefits package (DAILY, March 12). The document says the company has made its best and final offer.
The Toronto-based CAE simulation and training company announced April 4 it has signed a contract worth about $31 million with the U.S. Army for the Army Special Operations Forces Aviation Training and Rehearsal Systems (ASTARS). As the prime contractor for ASTARS, CAE will design the AH/MH-6 Light Assault/Attack Reconfigurable (LASAR) Combat Mission Simulator (CMS), used to train aircrews for the AH-6 and MH-6 Little Bird helicopters.
Defense officials in the Czech Republic have stressed that the country's air space is secure, despite reports that it now has as few as four outdated MiG-21s available at any one time. Czech daily Pravo, quoting defense sources, said the country was left this week with around eight operational MiG-21s after the air force decommissioned the last 10 obsolete SU-22s in service. The newspaper said as many as half of these are in poor condition. According to official ministry of defense statistics, the country had 21 MiG-21s in its fleet in 2000.
F-2 WORK: Lockheed Martin Aeronautics will manufacture components, including aft fuselages and wing leading-edge flaps, for 12 Japanese F-2 fighters under a $200 million contract from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. Lockheed Martin already is producing components for the first 45 F-2 aircraft under five previous annual contracts, according to the company. The latest contract is the largest award yet for the work, with deliveries to start in April 2003. The F-2 is based on the design of Lockheed Martin's F-16.
A Lockheed Martin Corp. official warned April 4 that the Netherlands will jeopardize the ability of its companies to help develop and produce the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter if the Dutch government postpones a decision on joining the program by several months.
The United Kingdom Ministry of Defence's new Applied Research Technology Demonstrator (ARTD) laboratory achieved full operating capacity on March 31, about nine months ahead of schedule. The lab, located in Portsmouth, Hampshire, was created by the MOD's Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL). The one million pound ($1.43 million) facility is part of the Combined Federated Battle Laboratories (CFBL) international program, which links scientists and defense teams from the U.K. with colleagues in the U.S., NATO, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.
The Boeing Co. announced April 3 it delivered 110 commercial aircraft in the first quarter of fiscal year 2002, down 12 from the number delivered a year ago at this time. Boeing officials announced the company had delivered three 717 aircraft, 59 next-generation 737s, eight 747s, 12 757s, 12 767s and 16 777s. Although down slightly from last year, the first-quarter deliveries are in line with the company's revised projections of 380 commercial aircraft deliveries by year's end.
LAUNCH DELAY: The launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis to the International Space Station has been delayed until at least April 7 while NASA investigates and repairs a hydrogen leak on the shuttle's mobile launching pad. NASA said the leak appears to be caused by a failed weld.
SPANISH PORTAL: Aviation Week and AviaGlobal Corp. have created a Spanish-language web portal for aviation and aerospace professionals, the two companies announced April 4 in Santiago, Chile. The portal, called AviaGlobal.com (www.AviaGlobal.com). Its editorial focus will be on Mexico, Central and South America, Spain and Portugal, they said. The Aviation Week Group, a unit of The McGraw-Hill Companies, is the parent organization of Aerospace Daily.
Autonomous robots that operate on a perception basis and that would work with the Army's Future Combat System (FCS) and similar initiatives are being eyed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Under the Mobile Autonomous Robot Software (MARS) program, the agency plans to develop software that "will create significant, asymmetric, military advantage by enabling the pervasive employment of an entirely new class of unmanned, autonomous military systems."
Marine Corps Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has endorsed a proposal for a new standing joint task force headquarters and added that it does not need acquisition authority. The Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) submitted to Congress last year said that DOD would establish a joint headquarters to "provide uniform standard operating procedures, tactics, techniques and technical system requirements, with the ability to move expertise among Commands."
Dassault Aviation accused South Korean military officials of unfairly favoring the Boeing Co. in a multi-billion fighter jet competition and filed a lawsuit to halt the program, the Associated Press reported April 4. 'Definite breach of fairness' Yves Robins, Dassault's vice president of international relations, reportedly said Dassault has "definite reasons to believe there is a breach of fairness and a breach of transparency in the competition."
The European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. (EADS) won't concede the military tanker market to the Boeing Co. despite the Air Force's decision last week to explore tanker leasing options with Boeing instead of Airbus, according to an EADS spokesman. Sam Adcock, vice president of government and public affairs, said EADS, the majority owner of Airbus Industrie, "learned a lot" in the competition with Boeing.
The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) is interested in proposals from industry on alternative methods of boost-phase ballistic missile intercept, as well as new ways of placing interceptor technology on ships, according to the agency's chief scientist.
An electromagnetic pulse (EMP), which would result from a single, crude nuclear weapon detonated in space above America, represents a very real and potentially disastrous asymmetric threat, according to Rep. Roscoe G. Bartlett (R-Md.) EMP effects can result from any nuclear blast occurring more than 31 miles (50 kilometers) above the surface of the Earth. EMPs have no effects on the human body, but can wipe out microelectronics systems at distances of hundreds of miles.
The FT-7P fighter/trainer, an improved version of China's FT-7, has been rolled out from the Shuangyang aircraft plant by the China National Guizhou Aviation Industry Group (GAIG), and has entered the flight test stage. Technical documents related to more than 330 technological changes in the aircraft have been modified and re-compiled. Also, in March the Chengdu Aircraft Industrial Co. Ltd. (CAC) began production of the F-7G, the improved version of the F-7E fighter.
Seeking proof of an asteroid belt first hypothesized nearly a century ago, two Colorado astronomers this week took a series of observations at 49,000 feet - flying from the back seat of a NASA F/A-18 jet. Dan Durda and Alan Stern, of the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colo., will spend the next two weeks crunching data that may, or may not, confirm the existence of Vulcanoids, a string of orbiting rocks possibly lying between Mercury and the Sun.
Boeing delivered two new AH-64D Apache Longbow helicopters to the U.S. Army at a ceremony in Mesa, Ariz., on April 3, the company announced. The helicopters delivered were the last Apache Longbow helicopter built under the first five-year production effort, called multiyear I, and the first built under a new five-year program, multiyear II. Multiyear I provided 232 Army Apache Longbows, including the one delivered April 3. Multiyear II is slated to provide 269 Apache Longbows through 2006.
NASA has agreed to require better accounts of spare parts it buys from the Boeing Co. for the International Space Station (ISS), according to a new agency inspector general report. NASA's Office of Inspector General audited ISS spare parts costs and determined that "NASA generally did not properly acquire and account for ISS spare parts," says the report, released April 2.
The Army's howitzer-launched QuickLook unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is on schedule for its first full-system demonstration in September. QuickLook is an expendable, GPS-guided loitering UAV capable of transmitting imagery, providing target coordinates, and performing battle damage assessment for up to 45 minutes.
China could display its J-10 fighter aircraft for the first time at the Zhuhai airshow in November, according to Chinese officials who attended Singapore's Asian Aerospace exhibition in March.
Roger Krone will become vice president of Strategic Projects. Patrick Shanahan will succeed Krone as vice president and general manager of U.S. Army programs for Boeing Military Aircraft and Missiles Systems. Francisco Escarti has been named vice president, business development, Europe. Tim Neale has been named director of communications.
As several of the Missile Defense Agency's programs step up their testing, interest is growing in higher-quality targets that better represent missile threats. While solid-fuel booster targets have been used for mimicking Scud missiles in PAC-3 tests, the Joint Target Office at the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) is "looking at different types of targets - liquid-fuel types now instead of solid-based booster targets," Lt. Gen. Joseph Cosumano, head of the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command (SMDC), recently told a group of reporters.
