FAA Administrator Jane Garvey said 25 airports across the U.S. will receive a new ground safety system to help prevent runway collisions. The system, called ASDE-X, is designed to show air traffic controllers the location of planes and vehicles at night and when visibility is limited. Garvey made the announcement Monday at the FAA's Runway Safety National Summit in Washington. The FAA is expected to gather recommendations from the summit and put together a detailed plan later this year.
SpaceWorks Inc., a business-to-business Web commerce software company based in Rockville, Md., is setting up a European operation to tap into the growing market for B2B e-commerce software. "With the B2B e-commerce market poised to reach more than $7 trillion in the next four years, our new SpaceWorks operation in Europe will help fulfill the growing demand for robust, industrial-strength B2B Web commerce solutions in Europe," said Dave MacSwain, president and CEO.
Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Technology Jacques Gansler yesterday rejected criticism of the proposed National Missile Defense system, saying opponents are promoting several "destructive and distracting misconceptions."
Russia is moving ahead to a July 12 launch of the long-awaited Zvezda Service Module to the International Space Station, which should set up arrival of the first full-time Station crew on or about Nov. 1 even if Zvezda's automatic docking system doesn't work, NASA officials said yesterday. But if Zvezda is lost during its ascent from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, it could be 2005 at the earliest before a crew can live on ISS, unless the Russians can produce another Service Module before then, the officials said.
The F-22 program is still expected to meet all 10 congressionally mandated criteria for a Defense Acquisition Board (DAB) decision and get the green light to proceed into low rate initial production, although senior program officials say the schedule is "going to be tight." "We are meeting all of our objectives," Assistant Secretary of the Air Force Lawrence J. Delaney said yesterday during a program update at the Northrop Grumman F-22 radar facility in Linthicum, Md.
The threat of information warfare is real and present every day, and on some levels is already being waged against the U.S. and its allies, said Air Force Maj. Gen. Bruce Wright. "The bad guys are into our systems and into our lives in an asymmetrical fashion without a lot of investment," Wright said at a conference here. Some groups, such as Bosnian Serbs, are waging effective information warfare on the cheap, said Wright, the commander of Air Intelligence Agency and Joint Information Operation Center.
The House late Monday passed a fiscal 2001 Commerce-Justice-State appropriations bill that the Clinton Administration has said would underfund many agencies, including the Commerce Dept.'s Bureau of Export Administration. The 214-195 vote came after the House approved an amendment by Rep.
Flexibility in decision-making and more information for commanders at all levels will produce the decision superiority that will key success for U.S. forces in future conflicts, according to Larry D. Welch, president of the Institute for Defense Analyses.
LOCKHEED MARTIN won a contract worth $4 billion, including options, for the engineering and manufacturing development phase of the Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) tactical ballistic missile defense system. "The award caps a wonderful quarter in terms of new deal for Lockheed Martin," a company spokesman said.
Lockheed Martin's Naval Electronics&Surveillance Systems (NE&SS) unit, based in Baltimore, is realigning programs and activities to boost its competitive position.
FIRST PICTURES from the Imager for Magnetopause to Auroral Global Exploration (IMAGE) spacecraft are revealing the hot plasma surrounding the Earth when it is buffeted by the stream of charged particles flowing from the Sun. Severe disturbances in this region controlled by the Earth's magnetic field can disrupt satellites, radio communications and power systems. Irregularities at the fringe of one of the first images indicate magnetic storm activity - the first time such features have been captured. Researchers are anticipating more dramatic images as solar storms occur.
Cessna's new Sovereign business jet will be the next member of the Citation family to be equipped with BFGoodrich wheels and carbon brakes. All nine aircraft types that comprise the family have BFGoodrich equipment. The Citation fleet has doubled since 1990, and the growth is expected to continue.
SpaceDev Inc. was added to the securities traded on the Nasdaq OTC Bulletin Board (OTCBB) quotation system, effective June 26. Charles Lloyd, CFO of the Poway, Calif., company, said last month that SpaceDev has been angling to get the OTCBB listing as part of the normal evolution to moving to a national trading market and getting Wall Street's attention (DAILY, May 16). SpaceDev touts itself as the world's first publicly traded commercial space exploration and development company.
BOEING yesterday began assembly of the first C-17 airlifter for lease to the U.K. Royal Air Force. Attending the ceremony on the Long Beach, Calif., C-17 production line marking the event were officials from the U.K. Ministry of Defense, the U.S. Air Force, the City of Long Beach and Boeing.
The U.S. supports the European Security and Defense Initiative (ESDI), which includes a force of 50,000 - 60,000 troops by 2003, because it means a stronger NATO, Defense Secretary William S. Cohen told a European Union forum in Washington yesterday.
Raytheon Co., convinced its P-3 patrol plane revamp program, dubbed Procyon, is the best of several proposals, is out to convince the U.S. Navy, Italy and Germany to sign on. James E. Burkhardt, senior manager for Raytheon's Aircraft Integration Systems, which spearheads Procyon and other upgrades of the Lockheed Martin P-3 Orion, said Procyon - named for a star in the constellation Orion - has a number of advantages over the current P-3.
BAX Global, a transportation and supply chain management company, said it has signed a contract with Lockheed Martin to fly AGM-142 missile parts from Israel to the U.S. over the next two and a half years. Twenty-six charter flights are planned with the first scheduled for July, the Irvine, Calif., company said. Components of the air-launched standoff missile will be transported from Israel to Birmingham, Ala., via BAX operated charter airplanes.
Airbus Industrie's projected A3XX superjumbo jetliner would probably win a market share battle "handily" against Boeing747-based derivatives, but might nonetheless never turn a true profit, argues investment advisor JSA Research.
Cost shouldn't and likely won't be a major impediment to building a National Missile Defense system if other criteria are met, Senate Armed Services Committee ranking Democrat Carl Levin (D-Mich.) said yesterday. "I don't believe that cost will be a likely showstopper, nor should it be," Levin told a conference sponsored by the Cato Institute, the Council for a Livable World Education Fund and the National Defense University Foundation.
Pentagon plans to revamp its logistics support systems were criticized yesterday on Capitol Hill. Rep. Solomon P. Ortiz (D-Tex.), ranking member of the House Armed Services readiness subcommittee, said it often seems as if the individual branches and the Dept. of Defense are "working in opposite directions or at cross-purposes." There may be 30 prime initiatives designed to chart the course of future reforms, but the services are evaluating over 400. Few seem to have the input of the intended recipient - the military commanders.
The House International Relations Committee is scheduled to mark up a bill Thursday that would undo part of the defense-related export control reforms that the Clinton Administration announced last month, sources said. A congressional source said the bill will be offered by committee Chairman Benjamin Gilman (R-N.Y.) - and opposed by industry and by many Democratic and Republican lawmakers. Gilman spokesman Lester Munson declined to discuss details of the bill but confirmed that a bill is being drafted.
ROCKETDYNE AND ASTRIUM have completed hot-fire testing of the RS-72 Pathfinder engine at NASA's test facilities on the White Sands missile range in New Mexico. The test marks the latest milestone in the joint effort to build and test a 12,500 lbst pump-fed storable-propellant prototype rocket engine. In the final test of the engine, an upgraded derivative of the Astrium Aerstus engine and Rocketdyne's XLR-132, ran at full power for 60 seconds.
