Sukhoi's Su-37 research and technology demonstrator jet aircraft, now redesignated the Su-47, could be the prototype of Russia's planned fifth-generation combat aircraft, according to the air force commander-in-chief, Gen. Anatoly Kornukov. Speaking at last week's biennial MAKS International Aerospace Salon, he said that building a new fighter would cost nearly $1.5 billion, which he described as "a real number."
The system the Navy uses to report deficiencies of spare parts for weapons systems and support equipment is inadequate, according to a report released last week by the General Accounting Office. The report says the Navy's Product Quality Deficiency Reporting Program "has been largely ineffective in gathering the data needed for analyses so that Navy managers can determine the full extent of spare parts quality deficiencies affecting maintenance activities.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has given armed services budgeters fiscal guidance on preparing program objective memoranda for their Five Year Defense Plan. The FY 2003 defense budget, which is due this fall, will be the first to reflect significantly the results of the controversial strategic reviews Rumsfeld ordered. Rumsfeld's deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, acknowledged that the Defense Policy Guidance is less detailed than previous guidances and that it is budget-driven.
NASA is exercising an option under a 1996 contract with the Boeing Co., Huntington Beach, CA, for a Delta II vehicle to launch the ESSP 3/CloudSat mission on April 30, 2004. NASA's total launch services budget for the ESSP 3/CloudSat mission is valued at approximately $60 million.
August 15, 2001 Raytheon Missile Systems, Tucson, Ariz., is being awarded a $37,627,569 ceiling-priced modification to a previously awarded firm-fixed-price contract (N00019-99-C-1014) to restructure the Joint Standoff Weapon, full rate production, Lot 2 delivery schedule. Work will be performed in Tucson, Ariz., and is expected to be completed in August 2003. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Md., is the contracting activity.
[Editor's note: This story appears today because, due to a technical problem, it was omitted from some editions of The Daily published Aug.20.] Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control of Orlando, Fla., delivered its first Hawkeye eXtended Range (XR) Target Sight System to Bell Helicopter, according to the company. The Hawkeye TSS will be installed on an AH-1Z Cobra helicopter in early 2002.
RAF C-17s DEPLOY-Two of the British Royal Air Force's four recently delivered Boeing C-17 heavy-lift transports, although not scheduled for full service entry until later this year, made their first operational flights on Saturday. They were tasked with carrying RAF helicopters, military equipment and personnel from their Brize Norton base in Oxfordshire, to Skopje, in Macedonia, in support of NATO's Operation Bessemer weapons collection mission. More than 200 British parachute troops were aboard the C-17s.
The sale of 80 new F-16 Block 60 fighter aircraft to the United Arab Emirates helped the U.S. significantly widen its share as a supplier in international arms transfer agreements last year, according to a new report by the Congressional Research Service. The $6.4 billion F-16 deal is one of the largest combat aircraft sales the U.S. has ever made.
AEROSPIKE LEGACY: Although the linear aerospike engine will most likely not propel NASA's next-generation reusable launch vehicle (RLV), it will still make its presence felt, according to Lyles. "There could be some materials technology that was on the aerospike that could show up in the next generation engine," he says.
The Organic Air Vehicle promises someday to be a link in a system to take the place of the tank - but some key technological hurdles must first be overcome, according to a spokeswoman for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Two industry teams competing in the OAV program have flown vehicles that could meet the requirements of the system of systems that is intended to accomplish the same tasks of today's tank but that would be more survivable, lethal and deployable, the spokeswoman said.
Prototype rocket engines being developed under NASA's Space Launch Initiative (SLI) will incorporate a number of new technologies to help achieve SLI's goal of reducing launch costs, as well as nearly 30 years of lessons learned from development of the space shuttle's main engines. The prototype SLI engines are Pratt&Whitney/Aerojet's COBRA (Co-optimized Booster for Reusable Applications) and Boeing Rocketdyne's RS-83.
Honeywell has delivered its first Fault Tolerant Inertial Navigation Unit for Lockheed Martin's Atlas V launch vehicle, the primary avionics component for the booster, the company announced. The development and test unit was shipped to Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver, Colo.
ADVANCED EHF: The government apparently will cover the cost increase in the Advanced EHF satellite program. The cost has grown about $1 billion, and the schedule has slipped about a year, because capabilities have been added to meet changing requirements (DAILY, Aug. 16).
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said he is "increasingly comfortable" with his alternative to the two major-theater-war (MTW) force sizing construct as the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) progresses, although he doesn't know yet if it will result in force structure cuts. At a Pentagon briefing Aug. 17, Rumsfeld said his alternative will reduce force requirements to bring them in line with current capability.
NO SSTO YET: NASA's next-generation reusable launch vehicle (RLV) will almost certainly not be a single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) vehicle, according to Garry Lyles, manager of the Space Launch Initiative's Propulsion Project Office at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. "I think we're more likely to see multiple stages in second-gen," says Lyles. "It's not that we're not looking at single stage in the second-gen, but most of our architecture options appear to be [two] stage vehicles right now." However, Lyles says NASA has not given up on single stage.
SMALL DIAMETER BOMB FUZE: One of the challenges of the Air Force's Small Diameter Bomb program is coming up with a fuze that's not only small enough to do the job, but that can also be programmed from the cockpit to do the most possible damage to targets that are assigned enroute. The Joint Programmable Fuze and the Hard Target Smart Fuze are both capable of the latter, but are too big for the SDB. Because they are all-electronic, however, they can be miniaturized and adapted to SDB, one Air Force official says.
Fitch Inc., has joined other ratings companies in affirming its existing credit ratings for Raytheon Co. after the company announced Aug. 15 that contractual obligations for two large construction projects fell within the expected range. Fitch analysts have assigned a medium grade rating (BBB-) to Raytheon's senior debt and bank credit facility. The rating outlook for the company remains stable.
Northrop Grumman Corp. has once again extended its cash and stock tender offer to purchase all outstanding common share of Newport News Shipbuilding, Inc. The new offer runs to midnight Aug. 30. As of 5 p.m. Aug. 16, nearly 1.6 million shares of Newport News stock had been tendered to Northrop Grumman, including 181,611 shares with notices of guaranteed delivery. Northrop Grumman is competing with General Dynamics Corp. to acquire shares of Newport News.
Capitol Hill lost a leading advocate for military aircraft modernization and missile defense with the death late Aug. 16 of House Armed Services procurement subcommittee chairman Floyd Spence (R-S.C.), according to congressional and aerospace industry sources.
SHIELD ESTIMATE: How much will it cost to field a missile shield? The Council for a Livable World Education Fund, which is no fan of the Bush Administration's plan to step up work on missile defense, estimates the price tag for national and theater systems will be up to $273 billion if the White House has its way. That figure includes the 1996 Congressional Budget Office estimate that building, deploying and operating a layered system would cost $184 billion from 1996 to 2030.
