The new makeup of the House Intelligence Committee is starting to take shape, although the Democrats still need to fill their seats. On the Republican side, Rep. Porter Goss (R-Fla.) returns as chairman of the committee in the 106th Congress. The Democrats have selected Rep. Julian Dixon (D-Calif.) as the ranking member of their party on the panel. The two new Republican members are Reps. Ray LaHood (R-Ill.) and Heather Wilson (R-N.M.).
Yuri Koptiev, head of the Russian Space Agency, last week urged closer cooperation between Russia's space industry and companies in Germany. Koptiev told representatives of Germany's aerospace, electrical, communications and other industries that cooperation with other nations and particularly with Germany is of "principal importance to us." He spoke at a conference on "Russian Space Exploration: Commercial Cooperation Prospects" organized by the Russian Embassy in Bonn, according to Russia's Itar-Tass news agency.
DANIEL MEHAN will be the Federal Aviation Administration's first chief information officer. Mehan, most recently international vice president-quality and process management at AT&T, will serve as the principal FAA advisor on information technology and will direct strategic planning activities for information technology. At AT&T, Mehan led efforts to align and optimize the processes and systems of the company's global operations.
Two big U.S.-built communications satellites are set for launch this weekend half a world apart, with a Russian Proton scheduled to lift Telstar 6 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Saturday and an Atlas IIAS in final preparations to orbit Japan's JSCAT-6 from Cape Canaveral Air Station, Fla., on Sunday.
The General Accounting Office has issued a biting criticism of the way the Federal Aviation Administration manages modernization of U.S. air traffic control, and expressed doubt that the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) "can perform as originally intended" as the sole means of navigation for a given operation or phase of flight.
Just as technological leadership shifted from the government to the commercial sector in computers in the 1970s and satellite communications in the 1980s, commercial-off-the-shelf components and systems will soon mark the U.S. military in the area of C4ISR - command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance - according to Gene W. Ray, president and chief executive officer of Titan Corp.
Work on Russia's Service Module for the International Space Station continues to stay on schedule for a launch by September, but overall "each year gets tougher and tougher" as NASA works with its Russian partner to build the orbiting laboratory, according to Administrator Daniel S. Goldin.
HERLEY INDUSTRIES INC., Lancaster, Pa., and Reliable System Services Corp., Melbourne, Fla., have teamed to pursue business in the space launch industry for their products. Herley sells communication data links and flight instrumentation systems worldwide, while RSSC has supplied turnkey electronic systems and services for telemetry, range safety, flight control, communications and automated instrumentation.
Senators pushing a bill that mandates deployment of a national missile defense (NMD) system believe it will pass this time around due to the Administration's acknowledgement that the threat to the U.S. is growing. The National Missile Defense Act of 1999, introduced by Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), is the same as the American Missile Protection Act, which twice failed to pass the Senate. The bill states that it is the policy of United States to develop and deploy a national missile defense as soon as technologically possible.
Russian Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov decreed Friday that the aging Mir space station can be kept in orbit for at least three years beyond its scheduled reentry date this summer, and granted RSC Energia exclusive rights to operate the station as a commercial business.
Launch delays on the Chandra Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF) program (DAILY, Jan. 21) aren't the only source of headaches for NASA's Space Shuttle schedulers. The timing on a whole series of Shuttle missions hinges on when Russia can get its long-awaited Service Module into orbit and attached to the International Space Station. Most of the Station flights scheduled this year must await the Service Module, and while it seems on track for a launch by September (see story page 116), the Shuttle program is keeping a careful eye on its progress.
FIFTEEN COMPANIES have won contracts to provide production services to the U.S. National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) under NIMA's Omnibus Geospatial Information and Imagery Intelligence Solicitation program. Contracts carry unguaranteed maximum values of $20 million to $600 million over five years for surveying, mapping and charting; imagery intelligence, and photogrammetric services.
PERSISTENT WINDS over Vandenberg AFB, Calif., triggered yet another delay in launch of the Air Force's ARGOS science satellite and two piggyback payloads Friday. Range safety officers scrubbed the early morning launch again out of fears debris from an in-flight explosion of the Boeing Delta II launch vehicle could blown back over populated areas (DAILY, Jan. 20, 21, 23). With forecasters calling for deteriorating weather conditions over the weekend, the launch was rescheduled for no earlier than 5:35 a.m.
Commercial spaceports around the U.S. that are competing to be the launch site for Lockheed Martin's proposed VentureStar reusable launch vehicle will have to wait another year to know if they're getting the plum. Jerry Rising, RLV vice president at the company's Skunk Works unit, says plans to pick a launch site by the end of 1999 will slip while a full management team for the limited liability company being established to develop VentureStar is fielded. That team in turn will set the schedule for picking a site, but "I can't say when that will be," Rising says.
EXIGENT INTERNATIONAL INC., Melbourne, Fla., has been named lead contractor to develop flight and ground test integration software for the Interim Control Module (ICM) being built for NASA by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory as a backup propulsion source for the International Space Station. Software Technology Inc., an Exigent subsidiary, got the job as a task order under a five-year, $61 million software engineering contract with NRL. The software will be developed using STI's "flagship" OS/COMET command and control product.
The British Aerospace-Marconi deal could change the way governments view anti-trust issues, some analysts say. "Lockheed Martin-Northrop Grumman was killed because of program concentration and vertical integration," says Richard Aboulafia of The Teal Group, Fairfax, Va.
LOCKHEED MARTIN ASTRONAUTICS will launch ROCSAT-1 from a pad at Cape Canaveral operated by the Spaceport Florida Authority on Jan. 26. Taiwan's first satellite will be launched on an Athena I in the first flight of the three-stage solid-fuel vehicle from Florida. Researchers in Taiwan plan to use the satellite for ocean color imaging, communications experiments and experiments on ionospheric plasma and electrodynamics. The mission will fly from Launch Complex 46, which also can handle Orbital Sciences Corp.
CPU TECHNOLOGY INC., has been picked by Hughes Space&Communications to join its team studying architectures for advanced space computers. The Pleasanton, Calif., company specializes in processor design automation and methods and holds more than 35 patents in system and processor design and complex system modeling. Its "Behavioral Verification Technology" and "SystemLab" products provide compatibility testing and virtual prototyping of complex systems.
ALLIEDSIGNAL TECHNICAL SERVICES CORP. will provide early-orbit checkout and flight control support for ROCSAT-1 following its launch from the Spaceport Florida-operated facility. The Columbia, Md.-based company designed and integrated ROCSAT-1 ground systems, which include two rooftop tracking stations on opposite ends of Taiwan and a mission control center.
NASA'S NEAR Earth Asteroid Rendezvous probe successfully executed a hydrazine engine burn Jan. 20 to fine-tune its trajectory after a 24-minute bipropellant burn Jan. 3 put it on course for a February 2000 rendezvous with the asteroid 433 Eros (DAILY, Jan. 5). Accuracy figures won't be available for a few weeks.
The U.S. Air Force's long-grounded T-3A Firefly trainer/flight screener is one step closer to taking off again after getting a supplemental type certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration's Southwest Region Airplane Certification Office, the service reported. Issuance of the STC is the first of many steps in the process of returning the Firefly to operational flight. The T-3A has been suspended from flying since July 1997 because of three fatal accidents involving ground and air engine stalls.
A BAe-Marconi deal will mean that defense companies in Italy, Spain and Sweden will be left waiting even longer to see where they fit into the new European aerospace and defense community, Aboulafia says. "BAe has decided to look inward, possibly for good reason, but I don't think they're going on any shopping sprees anytime soon."
Japan's Defense Agency approved procurement of 51 new aircraft for the country's three services in fiscal year 1999, five less than the services requested, but three more than were bought in 1998. The breakdown is as follows: Aircraft type Requested Approved Bought in 1999 in 1999 in 1998 The Ground Self-Defense Force Kawasaki OH-1 light helicopter 4 3 2
MAGELLAN CORP., a subsidiary of Orbital Sciences, has introduced several new consumer products linked to the Orbital's Orbcomm "Little LEO" satellite network. The products include hand-held satellite navigators that can be enhanced with site-specific information on a personal computer; a second-generation vehicle navigation system; satellite modems and the "Ashtech Locus" GPS surveying system, which achieves "centimeter-level" position accuracy in a one-operator portable package.
