Sens. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.) and Robert Torricelli (D-N.J.) introduced a bill yesterday aimed at countering weapons proliferation by China. Thompson, who chairs the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, and Torricelli said their bill would provide an annual review mechanism and an escalating scale of responses to future Chinese proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, missile technology and advanced conventional weapons. They will offer the bill as parallel legislation or as an amendment to the bill giving China permanent normal trade relations.
Teledyne Technologies said its Teledyne Continental Motors unit is recalling up to 3,000 aircraft engines manufactured between April 1998 and March 2000 for possible metallurgical defects in the crankshafts. Teledyne had originally estimated 1,100 engines would require inspection. The company will incur a $12 million charge in the second quarter to cover inspection and replacement costs but says it is reviewing options against the metal suppliers. Teledyne believes the flaw may be a result of metal production or forming issues.
The U.S. Navy received its first production Sikorsky CH-60S helicopter at NAS Patuxent River, Md., and will begin the developmental test (DT) program there this month with the Naval Rotary Wing Aircraft Test Squadron. Operational Test and Evaluation (OPEVAL) is to follow this Fall as the aircraft is readied for fleet introduction to NAS North Island, Calif., where pilot and aircrew training will begin with Helicopter Support Squadron Three (HC-3).
Crew members on the Space Shuttle Atlantis are set to undock from the International Space Station this evening, having "virtually completed" their work on the orbiting facility by early yesterday, NASA said. Shuttle managers decided to give the crew a full eight hours of sleep today, pushing back the undocking by one orbit to 7:07 p.m. EDT.
The House Appropriations Committee yesterday approved a $288.5 billion fiscal 2001 Pentagon spending bill without considering any amendments and despite concerns raised by the panel's ranking Democrat about the F-22 and national missile defense programs, and the legislation's total price tag. The bill's aerospace provisions closely follow what the appropriations defense subcommittee approved May 11 (DAILY May 12), including meeting President Clinton's request for the F-22 and the F/A-18E/F, and cutting $150 million from the Joint Strike Fighter budget.
Globalstar, the low-earth orbit mobile satellite provider, began commercial service to northern China with its partner, China Spacecom. "The introduction of service here brings a large and important part of Asia under the Globalstar service umbrella," said Globalstar President Tony Navarra.
The U.S. Army has changed the way it does business, its training regime and the way it mobilizes in the European theatre, but this has largely been missed, said Gen. Montgomery C. Meigs, commander of the U.S. Army Europe (USAREUR) and Seventh Army. After major cost-cutting and downsizing, USAREUR stands at about 62,000 soldiers, down from 217,000 eight years ago, the force is not only leaner, but more flexible, Meigs said. Still, he is working to make sure troops and equipment are on the ground as soon as they are needed.
Northrop Grumman's Electronic Sensors and Systems Sector said it has launched a major upgrade of the F-16C/D aircraft's fire control radar. "The updated radar will incorporate a high-resolution synthetic aperture radar capability to enable significantly increased accuracy in targeting enemy ground targets under all-weather conditions," said George Perry, director of ES3's F-16 radar programs.
Hughes has relinquished its block of 10 firm launches on Japan's H-IIA rocket, choosing not to spend money to hold space on an untried follow-on to a vehicle that failed in its final two launch attempts. The news, reported first in Tokyo by the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper, follows by a week the resignation of Isao Uchida, head of the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) as a gesture of apology for last year's two H-II failures (DAILY, May 22).
Lockheed Martin's new Atlas IIIA orbited the Eutelsat W4 Ku-band satellite Wednesday night, marking the first flight of a U.S. rocket powered by a Russian rocket engine, which was also making its first flight. Built by RD AMROSS, a joint venture of Pratt&Whitney and Russia's NPO Energomash, the RD-180 engine is a two-bell version of the four-bell RD-170 developed for the Zenit launch vehicle. Pratt&Whitney also supplied the single RL10A-4-1B engine that powered the launch vehicle's Centaur upper stage.
L-3 Communications' Display Systems Div. was tapped by Boeing to provide shipboard workstations for the Virtual Imaging System for Approach and Landing (VISUAL) program, intended to upgrade aircraft recovery monitoring display systems on aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships.
EGYPT is interested in a possible buy of 279 M109A2/A3 155mm self-propelled howitzers and supporting equipment at an estimated value of $48 million, the Defense Dept. reported Wednesday.
The annual Maple Flag international air combat exercise is into its second week of large-scale air operations here, unhampered by unusual weather. Hosted by Canada's 4 Wing, the exercise dealt with unexpected challenges from a freak snowstorm on May 17. For the first time, Maple Flag is being conducted under all-weather rules - a consequence of "lessons-learned" during the Kosovo air campaign a year ago - allowing pilots to deal with realistic conditions that complicate bombing missions.
Enginemaker Pratt&Whitney's JSF119 engine for the Joint Strike Fighter has finished flight clearance testing in time for this summer's JSF concept demonstrator flight tests, P&W said yesterday. "The engines are no longer concepts, or designs that need to be proven - they are real engines that are ready to be flown," said P&W JSF119 Program Director Bob Cea. "They have done exceedingly well in ground testing that's required for flight certification."
Production models of the MV-22 Osprey aircraft got the green light to resume flying yesterday. U.S. Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Jones gave the approval following an "operational pause" to review data from the investigation of the April 8 crash of an MV-22 near Tucson, Ariz., that killed all 19 aboard.
MOSCOW Following inauguration of Vladimir Putin as Russia's new president, a number of federal agencies and services have lost their independence and have been absorbed by various ministries. The Russian Aerospace and Aviation Agency (RACA), to which the industry previously reported, is now controlled by the newly established Ministry of Industry and Science under Alexander Dondukov. Dondukov, 46, has headed the Yakovlev design bureau in Moscow for the last decade.
PROBLEMS WITH A MIRROR have prompted postponed of the first attempt to shoot down a Katyusha rocket with the Tactical High Energy Laser (THEL) system, a U.S. Army spokeswoman said yesterday. The test, at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., was to have taken place yesterday but technicians "discovered a problem with one of the mirrors in the optical path of the [THEL's] pointer tracker system, so testing had to be postponed," she said. Testing was expected to resume before the end of June.
Three Dutch companies will assist the Lockheed Martin Joint Strike Fighter team in the next phases of the program, Lockheed Martin said yesterday. The companies have participated in the concept demonstration phase. Fokker Aerostructures, Fokker Special Products and Fokker Elmo, subsidiaries of the Stork Aerospace Group, have agreed to perform four work packages for the Lockheed Martin JSF team during engineering and manufacturing development (EMD), Lockheed Martin said:
Boeing said its X-32A conventional takeoff and landing (CTOL) concept demonstration Joint Strike Fighter aircraft completed initial low- and medium-speed taxi tests at Palmdale, Calif., this week. The tests, to verify the function and integration of aircraft systems in motion, such as steering, braking, engine controls and flight control surfaces, are to ready the airplane for high-speed taxi, the final step before first flight.
Astronauts used the Space Shuttle Atlantis' steering jets to raise the International Space Station's orbit about 10 miles Tuesday night, while inside the crew worked ahead of schedule replacing malfunctioning and outdated equipment and transferring supplies to the nascent orbital facility. Mission Commander Jim Halsell and Pilot Scott Horowitz fired 27 bursts of the Shuttle's tail vernier jets to reboost the Station, which has been sinking under the pressure of an unusually active sun.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff endorsed the nuclear weapon cuts that the United States and Russia agreed to in Helsinki in 1997 but said a thorough study should be done before any more cuts are considered.
DRS Technologies ended fiscal 2000 on a high note...reporting record fourth quarter and year-end results from continuing operations, setting the stage for growth in 2001 with substantial new business orders and shedding the bulk of the problematic commercial operations.
The commercial space launch industry faces some lean times in the next two to four years as soft demand collides with overcapacity, but the 10-year outlook is "very positive" as the telecommunications industry turns to satellites to finish wiring the world, a top commercial space analyst told Congress yesterday.
