The Roll-Out Solar Array (ROSA), a power generator with an experimental deployment mechanism launched to the International Space Station (ISS) earlier this month, was jettisoned earlier this week after it failed to retract.
The House Appropriations defense subcommittee has approved legislation that would boost weapons procurement by $18.6 billion above President Trump’s budget request, adding aircraft across the armed services.
The factory in Toulouse already has produced two “qualification satellites” for ground-testing purposes. Production of 10 “pilot satellites” has now started.
Able to detect, track, identify and defeat small unmanned aircraft, AUDS will be used to protect critical assets and personnel. The contract is estimated to be worth about €2 million ($2.3 million).
Images released by the company show a rail-mounted laser weapon capped by the company’s electro-optical infrared Multi-Spectral Targeting System, typically carried by the General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper.
Senior staffers for the committee confirm that the proposal by the House Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee to create a Space Force has been carried forward to be voted on.
The first spacecraft is in storage, awaiting launch in 2018, and the second is integrated and ready for environmental testing, according to Lockheed Martin.
The launch from Space Launch Complex 4E (SLC-4E) was the second mission for SpaceX in three days, following Friday’s deployment of Bulgaria’s first communications satellite.
The SmartGlider weapon family, which MBDA says will be available from 2025, is an unpowered glide-bomb fitted with deployable wings offering a high lift-to-drag ratio.
U.S. lawmakers want the U.S. Air Force to sustain or accelerate fielding of its T-X trainer and consider ditching the General Atomics Block 5 MQ-9 Reaper in favor of the company’s newer MQ-9B.
Lockheed Martin hopes to leave behind the F-35’s troubled past and shift the focus to the battlefield. The Paris display may not silence the critics, but it certainly changed the conversation.