Kaman Aerospace Corp., Bloomfield, Conn., won a $4.2 million contract from the U.S. Marine Corps Warfighting Lab to design, fabricate and install a remote piloting package in a Kaman K-MAX helicopter, Kaman reported Wednesday.
A new report released on Capitol Hill calls for creation of a new post of national director for combating proliferation within the National Security Council. The report, released Wednesday, was prepared by a special commission set up to assess the organization of the federal government to combat the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
BMW Rolls-Royce signed a 10-year deal with Rolls-Royce Canada Ltd. for "complete repair and overhaul" of the BR715 engine that powers the Boeing 717. BRR has a guaranteed-cost-per-hour program, called a Fleet Hour Agreement, with 717 launch airline AirTrans and is offering the program to other potential operators. Rolls-Royce Canada will support the engines at its Lachine, Quebec, facility.
House defense authorizers' proposed cuts to the Navy Area theater missile defense program would delay initial procurement and hike up the cost of components for the system's Standard Missile, according to an appeals package DOD sent to authorization conferees. The Pentagon is trying to get the cut restored as the authorizers go to conference to resolve differences in their respective fiscal year 2000 defense spending bills.
Wood Group Gas Turbine Holdings, Inc., agreed to buy tube and manifold maker Kreisler Manufacturing Corp. for $25.5 million, the companies report. Wood Group is part of the Gas Turbines division of international energy services company John Wood Group PLC. "We have worked with Kreisler for a number of years and believe that their activities fit very well within our gas turbine division," says Tom Motherwell, CEO of the division.
Raytheon Aircraft Services reports that its Little Rock, Ark., facility just won FAA approval to service the Beechjet 400 series and Pratt&Whitney JT15 series engines.
An article in The DAILY of July 14 incorrectly stated the position of Roald Sagdeev, director of the East-West Center at the University of Maryland, on legislation that would cut off funds to the Russian Space Agency if the president determines RSA has aided Iran's ballistic missile program. Sagdeev said it would not be fair to penalize RSA for the actions of Russian companies before those company came under RSA's control.
The U.S. Navy could sign a contract this month to begin full rate production of the Standoff Land-Attack Missile-Extended Response (SLAM-ER) being developed by Boeing.
Bo eing, paced by a strong recovery from its Commercial Airplane group, earned $701 million inthe 1999 second quarter on sales of $15.13 billion, the company reported yesterday. In the 1998 second quarter, the company earned $258 million on sales of $13.39 billion.
Enginemaker Pratt&Whitney recently completed a compatibility study of Raisbeck Commercial Air Group's JT8D external exhaust tailpipe mixer nozzle, concluding that the hushkit component poses no compatibility issues, reports Seattle-based Raisbeck.
UAL Services, San Francisco, Calif., will handle routine engine maintenance of CFM56-3-powered Boeing 737s for TAESA of Mexico City in a five-year contract. UAL Services notes TAESA recently used UAL's new Engine Leasing Div., with a 737 flying a charter from Oakland to Mexico City becoming the first fitted with a leased engine at the UAL Services San Francisco Maintenance Operations Center.
Safety Harbor, Fla.-based AvAero, steadily booking new orders and options for its 737-200 Stage 3 Hushkit as the Stage 3 and ICAO Chapter III deadlines approach, now has 20 airlines, 13 leasing companies, three private operators and Boeing as customers. Lessor Pegasus Aviation has ordered two and optioned another six shipsets. Southwest Airlines boosted its order by two for a total of 35. WestJet Airlines recently bought two shipsets, raising its order to seven.
The Marine Corps is looking for a few good unmanned vehicles to fight in the urban environment and help with tactical reconnaissance, according to Gen. Terrence Dake, assistant commandant. "The Marine Corps is committed to being a leader in unmanned vehicles" in the air, on the ground and beneath urban streets, Dake told an audience here Wednesday at the annual conference of the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International.
Russia plans to launch a critical Progress resupply capsule to the Mir orbital station from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan today, now that a ban on launches from the Soviet-era facility has been eased.
The House Appropriations defense subcommittee's version of the fiscal year 2000 defense spending bill provides $226.1 billion in discretionary spending for the Pentagon, boosting funds for a number of weapons platforms. The bill provides $15.5 billion more than the amount appropriated for fiscal year 1999 and is $2.8 billion above the president's FY '00 budget request, Subcommittee Chairman Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.) told reporters. The bill will go to the full Appropriations Committee for consideration on Friday.
DONALD D. ENGEN, 75, director of the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum in Washington, was killed Tuesday in the crash of a self-launching sailplane at Minden, Nev. Also killed was William S. Ivans, 79, of La Jolla, Calif., a highly regarded sailplane pilot and former president of the Soaring Society of America. Ivans owned the Schempp-Hirth Nimbus 4DM that crashed. Engen, who had a sailplane of his own and who was on vacation, had gone to the High Country Soaring center at Douglas County Airport, Nev., where he met Ivans, an airport official said.
A large-scale test of Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) system carried out over the weekend were described as successful by Steve Alterman, president of the Cargo Airlines Association (CAA). ADS-B can provide pilots and controllers with real-time information about aviation traffic. The tests were co-sponsored by CAA and FAA and included other aviation industry, academia, government and military participants, along with 12 cargo aircraft provided by Airborne Express, FedEx and UPS.
U.S. companies and industry analysts yesterday hailed a White House move to increase the number of U.S. commercial satellites using the Russian Proton, but said the numbers are still low, and future increases could be needed to keep up with demand. The White House will increase the number of launches per year from 16 to 20 to recognize that Moscow is taking steps to stop the transfer of missile-related technology to Iran.
Boeing and NASA have signed a $173 million cooperative agreement to build the X-37 "Future-X" orbital and reentry testbed, the first in a series of experimental "Pathfinder" vehicles designed to prove out technology that can lower the cost of space access from $10,000 to $1,000 a pound.
Senate defense authorizers' action on the Airborne Laser (ABL) in their version of the fiscal year 2000 defense bill will force another program delay and add up to $100 million to the cost, the Pentagon said in an appeals package sent to Capitol Hill.
Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. will consolidate its Connecticut operations and cut its workforce by 1,100 people during the next year, the company said yesterday. "The restructuring plan will strengthen the company's position in the future marketplace, which during the past decade has shifted from a U.S. government-driven market to a global market with an international and commercial base," Sikorsky said.
The many contingency operations maintained by U.S. forces are wearing down key equipment and personnel, according to the General Accounting Office. It said the missions, including peacekeeping in Bosnia and enforcement of the no-fly zones over Iraq, may actually reduce military readiness for a major theater war.
The U.S. Air Force is expected to make the Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) a regular acquisition program soon. Teledyne Ryan, the UAV's prime contractor, and service officials are working out the final details of a contract to move the program out of the advanced technology demonstration phase and to begin buying the UAV in numbers.
Russia may launch a critical Progress resupply mission to the Mir orbital station from the Baikonur Cosmodrome this week under a deal hammered out with Kazakhstan yesterday, but a launch ban imposed after a July 5 Proton launch failure showered debris on populated areas of the Central Asian nation where Baikonur is located continues for the Proton itself.
