Taiwan's China Airlines signed contracts to buy $800 million worth of engines from General Electric and CFM International to power the Boeing and Airbus aircraft it ordered last week. GE's CF6-80C2 engines will be fitted on the 13 firm Boeing 747-400 freighters, while the seven Airbus A340-300s will be powered by CFM56-5C engines. The airline has not decided on the engines for four optional A330-300s.
Pressure Systems Inc., a City of Commerce, Calif., maker of titanium propellant and pressurant tanks for the space industry, acquired AEC-Able Engineering Co. Inc. (ABLE), which makes deployable booms, masts and antennas, and solar arrays.
The U.S. Air Force today is slated to boot up its Y2K operational center for a dress rehearsal of the year-end calendar change. The move comes three days before the Global Positioning System satellites make their Aug. 21 rollover, resetting their internal clocks at the end of a 1,024 week cycle that began when GPS service started on Jan. 6, 1980. During the days before and after the event, the Y2K center at Maxwell AFB, Ala., will be manned 24 hours a day, monitoring the AF-wide effect of the change.
Bombardier Aerospace is increasing the production rate of the Canadair Regional Jets to meet record demand from airlines around the world. Effective next summer, the production rate for the 50-passenger CRJ100 and 200 Series will increase to 9.5 aircraft per month from 7.5. This will lead to an annual production rate of 112 units, an increase of more than 25% at manufacturing facilities in Dorval, Quebec. It is the second time Bombardier has increased production of the CRJ in less than a year.
The U.S. Army has decided to increase its depot maintenance capability in South Korea rather the hire a Korean company to maintain General Electric T700 engines used by helicopters assigned to United Nations forces there. The service, in fact, has decided to beef up all of its maintenance capability in the region. A 1998 report revealed that top officers in the region didn't think maintenance facilities there could meet wartime surge requirements, and said they needed to be augmented.
CORRECTION: The monthly Aerospace Daily letter to subscribers, dated Aug. 17, incorrectly reported the history of Lockheed Martin's stock over the past year. A two-for-one stock split on Dec. 1, 1998, gave it a 52-week high of 56 3/4 and a 52-week low of 33 3/4.
An AGM-130 penetrator missile flew through a four-foot concrete target at Eglin AFB, Fla., in an Aug. 12 test to demonstrate the precision weapon's new ADA processor which has eight times the capability of the prior Jovial system.
Loch Harris Inc., Austin, Tex., reached an agreement on all conditions to acquire System Specialists Inc. (SSI) of Tucson, Ariz., Loch Harris reported yesterday. SSI is a subcontractor for its Loch Harris' ELF (Eliminate Landmines Forever) program and probable front-runner to build its VAMMP (Vacuum Multi-constituent Monitor for Plasma) system. Terms of the deal were not revealed, except that the buy was made with 144 restricted shares of Loch Harris common stock, adding no long-term debt.
EDO Corp. won a contract to supply and integrate the weapons suspension and release equipment system for Lockheed Martin's Joint Strike Fighter, EDO reported yesterday. The EDO Marine and Aircraft Systems business unit, Amityville, N.Y., will perform the design, manufacture and integration effort, providing the means to carry and eject a variety of stores.
The 100th external fuel tank for the Space Shuttle has been delivered to NASA, the agency said. NASA and Lockheed Martin Michoud Space Systems of New Orleans, builder of the tanks, will mark the delivery in a ceremony this week at Michoud Space Systems. The program is managed by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.
The Airbus Corporate Jetliner (ACJ) has received its basic JAA certification, an amendment of the existing A319 type certificate required by the modifications for transferring it into a business jet. The modifications included installation of up to six auxiliary fuel tanks to provide a range of 6,300 nautical miles. The ACJ also is certificated to cruise at altitudes up to 41,000 feet.
Changes in the nature of the aerospace industry prompted creation of Compass Aerospace Corp., according to Alexander Hogg, the company's chief executive officer and president.
The U.S. Air Force yesterday awarded two $275 million contracts for the program definition and risk reduction phase of the Space Based Infrared System Low (SBIRS Low) program. TRW of Redondo Beach, Calif., and Spectrum Astro of Gilbert, Ariz., were selected over a Lockheed Martin-Boeing team to win the 38-month contracts. The TRW team includes its Space&Electronics Group and Raytheon Systems Co., El Segundo, Calif. Spectrum Astro is teamed with Northrop Grumman Corp., Linthicum, Md.
Northrop Grumman's Field Support Services Inc. (FSSI), a wholly-owned subsidiary based at Point Mugu, Calif., won a $6.5 million contract from the U.S. Navy to produce kits for F-14B and F-14D aircraft to carry GBU-24 precision-guided munitions, Northrop Grumman reported. FSSI's Integrated Systems and Aerostructures (ISA) will assemble 116 kits. It will take about a year to produce and deliver the kits, which include Tomcat weapon rail adapters and the interfaces between weapon and aircraft.
European airline traffic delays grew worse in June as air traffic control systems were hampered by restrictions over Yugoslavia during NATO's military action there and hit by aftereffects of a switch to new ATC systems by Switzerland and France in February. The Association of European Airlines said 37.3% of all intra-European flights left more than 15 minutes late in June. Milan Malpensa Airport had the worst delay rate in the second quarter, with 74.7% of departures leaving late, by an average 52 minutes.
From Commerce Business Daily: Posted in CBDNet on August 9, 1999 ... PART: U.S. GOVERNMENT PROCUREMENTS; SUBPART: SERVICES; CLASSCOD: A-Research and Development; OFFADD: Department of the Air Force, Air Force Materiel Command, AFRL - Wright Research Site, Det 1 AFRL/PK, Bldg 7, Area B, 2530 C Street, Wright-Patterson AFB, OH, 45433-7607 ... SOL PRDA-99-05-SNK DUE 092899; POC David Box, Contract Negotiator, Phone (937)255-2902, Email [email protected] - Kenneth Smith, Contracting Officer, Phone (937) 255-5201, Email [email protected]
Marconi Systems Technologies, Inc., Rockville, Md., is being awarded an $8,065,830 cost-plus-award-fee level-of-effort option exercise for 193,958 man-hours to perform AEGIS system engineering operations, DDG 51 class, in support of PEO Theater Surface Combatants. With this options exercise, the cumulative value of the contract is $49,467,004. Work will be performed in Marlton, N.J., and is expected to be completed by August 2000. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year.
Northrop Grumman Corp., Melbourne, Fla., is being awarded a $244,393,253 modification to a fixed-price-incentive contract, F19628-97-C-0001-P00026, to definitize acquisition of two Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS) aircraft. Expected contract completion date is May 31, 2002. Electronic Systems Center, Hanscom AFB, Mass., is the contracting activity.
Northrop Grumman Corp., El Segundo, Calif., is being awarded a $31,156,976 firm-fixed-price contract to provide for 54 (best estimated quantity) T-38-29 wing assemblies applicable to the T-38 aircraft. There were 15 firms solicited and two proposals received. Expected contract completion date is August 2006. Solicitation issue date was April 29, 1999. Negotiation completion date was June 15, 1999. San Antonio Air Logistics Center, Kelly AFB, Texas, is the contracting activity (F41608-99-D-0501).
TRW Aeronautical Systems' Lucas Aerospace unit has won a competition to supply a rescue hoist to the U.S. Marine Corps' fleet of Bell UH-1N helicopters. The company didn't disclose the value of the contract, but said it will deliver 75 hoists to the Marine Corps beginning in January. "This is a significant win for TRW Aeronautical Systems representing the largest single order for rescue hoists in nearly ten years," said Bob Hopkins, hoist and winch marketing manager for TRW Aeronautical Systems, Lucas Aerospace.
The U.S. Defense Dept. is offering testing to help commercial manufacturers determine if their Global Positioning System (GPS) products can handle the scheduled rollover in the system's clock on Aug. 21.
U.S. AIR FORCE signed a contract yesterday to purchase its sixth Predator unmanned aerial vehicle system from General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Co., San Diego. The $47 million contract provides for seven UAVs, a ground control station and deicing kits, and will bulk up the operational fleet when it is delivered in April 2001. The AF currently maintains two operational systems with three air vehicles each, a test system and two additional systems in various stages of readiness with two air vehicles each.
Signal Technology Corp., Danvers, Mass., is working under contracts from Raytheon Systems Co. and Raytheon's suppliers totaling $971,000 to make components for the Patriot missile system. "We are very pleased to have been selected by Raytheon and its suppliers to provide a wide variety of components and assemblies for this critical system," said Ronald Schlaefli, president of Signal Technology's California Div. in Sunnyvale, Calif., which will produce the components - isolators, mixers, limiters and limiter/filter assemblies.
