Boeing and Lockheed Martin have both selected the Advanced 27mm Aircraft Cannon, developed by a Boeing-led team, as the basis for the design of the gun for the Joint Strike Fighter. "Our goal at Boeing Ordnance and across the 27mm team has been to give the JSF the best gun option available," said Lee Ainley, program manager for the cannon. "The Lockheed Martin decision moves us one step closer to that goal."
CAE INC. won't endorse or recommend "in any way" an unsolicited bid from TRC Capital Corporation for 4 million shares, about 3.6% of CAE's total float. TRC is reportedly offering $14.35 a share, a 4.3% discount to CAE's closing share price as of June 28, 2000 on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSE). CAE advised shareholders to check with financial experts before tendering shares.
The U.S. Air Force is launching a modification of its F-117 fleet that will replace seven different stealth coating configurations with just one. In about five years, all the Lockheed Martin jets will have common repair procedures and radar-absorbing materials (RAM). This, said Master Sgt. Roger Britt, quality assurance evaluator with the 49th Operations Group at Holloman AFB, N.M., should cut the size of the technical order by about 50%. Right now, he said, getting new maintainers qualified on the various configurations is "a nightmare."
SMILING AWAY NMD? Three senators whose views vary on National Missile Defense also have different assessments of how North Korea's newly improved relations with South Korea and the United States should affect U.S. development of NMD. All three spoke at a Capitol Hill conference last week. Select Committee on Intelligence member Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), a staunch NMD advocate, takes the hardest line. "Clearly it is premature to adjust our behavior" based on a "smile" by North Korean ruler Kim Jong Il, and that point is understood by "fairly serious people," Kyl says.
Norman Mineta, a former California Congressman who has been a senior vice president of Lockheed Martin Corp. since 1995, was nominated yesterday by President Clinton to be Secretary of Commerce. If confirmed by the Senate, he would succeed William Daley, who will leave next month to run the presidential campaign of Vice President Al Gore.
LOCKHEED MARTIN'S Sanders unit has received a U.S. Navy contract for full rate production of Cooperative Outboard Logistics Update (COBLU) systems. COBLU is an upgrade of the SSQ-108 Outboard countermeasures detection and analysis system on U.S. and British Royal Navy ships. Sanders, of Nashua, N.H., said it will provide up to 35 systems. Total value of the contract, including options, could exceed $250 million. Deliveries of the first six systems will begin late next year. Additional options for the rest of the systems could be awarded each year until 2005.
While the U.S. Air Force welcomes "opening all the books" to a newly formed Space Commission, the top service officials say that a separate space force doesn't compute. "The Air Force view is that a space force does not make sense. It's a lot of overhead without much gain," Secretary F. Whitten Peters told reporters in a session at the Pentagon last week with Chief of Staff Gen. Michael E. Ryan.
RAYTHEON CO. announced two additions to its board of directors - Frederic M. Poses, chairman and chief executive officer of American Standard Companies Inc., and Michael C. Ruettgers, chief executive officer of EMC Corp. Their election, the company said, brings the number of Raytheon board members to 14.
HOUSE-SENATE CONFERENCE COMMITTEE agreed late Wednesday on a fiscal 2000 supplemental appropriations bill that includes $315 million for helicopters for Colombia's anti-drug efforts. The bill provides $234 million for 18 Black Hawk helicopters and $81 million for 42 Huey II helicopters. The bill also contains $125 million for Patriot missile "reliability," according to a House Appropriations Committee statement.
Boeing said it has demonstrated its Joint Strike Fighter logistics system and key enabling technologies, verifying how they will reduce life-cycle costs of the jet. Four days of demonstrations and technical briefings for government officials, Boeing said, spanned all elements of the system: training; mission planning; prognostics and health management or PHM; the Joint Distributed Information System, or JDIS; the supply chain management concept, and integrated product data management system.
Southwest Airlines has placed an order for up to 290 next-generation Boeing 737 airliners, Boeing Commercial Airplanes Group said yesterday. The Dallas-based carrier's order includes 94 firm 737-700s as well as 25 options and up to 171 purchase rights for an additional 196 next-generation jets over the next 12 years, Boeing said. Deliveries under the order, which Boeing said was the largest ever placed for the next-generation 737, are slated to begin in 2002.
There's no one, clear-cut scenario for deploying theater missiles defenses in Japan, South Korea or Taiwan, according to a working group from the Henry L. Stimson Center in Washington, but its report indicates sea-based systems and Patriot missiles are creating the most interest. The 85-page report, "Theater Missile Defenses in the Asia-Pacific Region," concludes that while there's an "evident need" to expand and advance TMD for U.S. troops in forward-deployed locations, the U.S. shouldn't write a "blank check."
The Pentagon's 2005 target for deploying a National Missile Defense is not the "most likely" date that the system will be actually be deployed, the head of an independent review team told the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday. "Do I believe it's feasible? Yes. Do I believe that's the most likely? No," Retired Air Force Gen. Larry Welch said when asked by the panel whether it's likely the system will be ready for deployment in 2005.
MD Robotics, a subsidiary of MacDonald Dettwiler, has won a three-year, $72 million contract from the Canadian Space Agency to support the Mobile Servicing System (MSS), Canada's contribution to the International Space Station. The MSS is critical to the assembly, maintenance and servicing of the ISS itself.
Orbital Sciences Corp. has slowed work on 15 satellites ordered by its Orbcomm "Little LEO" spinoff, which also has laid off 112 employees and contractors to bring its costs in line with revenues.
Maj. Gen. Joseph M. Cosumano Jr. has been nominated to become the new commanding general of U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command (SMDC). Cosumano, also nominated for appointment to lieutenant general, is expected to succeed Lt. Gen. John Costello in mid-October. Costello is retiring. Cosumano, currently assistant deputy chief of staff of operations and plans for Army force development, would also succeed Costello as commander of Army Space Command, the Army component of U.S. Space Command.
Atlantic Research Corp. said its LEROS 1C liquid apogee engine has been used to raise the orbits of two Lockheed Martin A2100 satellites. The increased performance of the engine - it has a specific impulse of 325 seconds, up to 10 seconds higher than other engines of its class - offers advantages in payload capability, longer on-station life and reduced launch costs, according to ARC.
Boeing Co. said it has been chosen to launch Canada's RADARSAT-2 satellite on a Delta II rocket in 2003. MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. of Richmond, British Columbia, awarded Boeing a contract on June 23. "With the selection of our launch provider, we are right on track and moving forward toward a successful mission," said David Caddey, executive vice president and general manager of MacDonald Dettwiler's Space Missions Group.
BFGoodrich Aerospace won a $14.2 million follow-on order from the U.S. Air Force for 875 Brake Carbon Heat Sinks for the C-5 fleet. The carbon heat sink is the friction portion of the brake that stops the aircraft when hydraulic pressure is applied. BFGoodrich expects to begin shipping carbon brakes in the fourth quarter of 2001. The company was also designated as the chief brake overhaul supporter for the Air Force's Thunderbirds aerial demonstration team. The Thunderbirds fly F-16s outfitted with BFGoodrich wheels and brakes.
Lockheed Martin's Sanders unit hopes to sell off its machining center to Precision Grinding and Manufacturing (PGM) of Rochester, N.Y. The two companies inked an agreement yesterday, but did not disclose a dollar value for the transaction. The sale, slated to close at the end of next month, was described as a "win-win situation" for both companies, according to a Sanders spokesman. As part of the deal, Sanders will pledge a "significant amount" of business to the company for two years.
NASA is looking for payloads for two upcoming test flights of its X-37 experimental spaceplane, designed to be deployed by the Space Shuttle and land on a runway.
U.S. Air Force officials have slated the next round of public meetings in Florida, Idaho and Virginia on where to base the first operational F-22 fighter wing, a series of 11 meetings throughout the month of July.
U.S. Army Lt. Gen. William F. Kernan has been appointed to succeed Navy Adm. Harold W. Gehman Jr. as Supreme Allied Commander, Atlantic. Kernan is currently commanding general of XVIII Airborne Corps at Fort Bragg, N.C. In addition to the NATO position, the Pentagon said, Kernan will be assigned as commander in chief, U.S. Joint Forces Command. The transfer will occur in September. Kernan will be promoted to general.
