The U.S. Navy is getting set to renew its approvals for at-sea sonar and explosives testing, while trying to defuse concerns about the possible effects on marime mammals. “The Navy is renewing authorizations that will enable us to continue to train and test live sonar and explosives at sea for another five years [2019],” says Rear Adm. KevinSlates, director of the energy and environmental readiness division for the chief of naval operations, in a recent blog.
Lawmakers came up with a budget penalty bad enough to prompt themselves to deal with taxes and entitlements. Until now, the consequences of the $85 billion budget penalty known as sequestration were largely an academic exercise, but the looming closure of FAA contract towers is already making that tangible (see p. 18).
One of Mexico's smallest states in area and population, Queretaro had a well-established industrial base in food processing, electronics, metals and automotive products in its eponymous capital city when the persistence of state officials caught the attention of Bombardier Aerospace in 2005.
LANGKAWI, Malaysia — Indonesian Aerospace (IAe) is aiming to start manufacturing C295s in September 2014 and is speaking to Airbus Military about jointly marketing the CN235 and ensuring commonality. Airbus Military in Spain and IAe in Bandung both assemble CN235s, but there are some differences between the products and the two companies have had a tendency to compete against one another for CN235 sales.
Chihuahua, the capital of Mexico's largest state (also called Chihuahua), is a pioneer in aerospace manufacturing and a locus especially for general and business aviation original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). But in the past few years, growth has come courtesy of larger aircraft.
Northrop Grumman’s AN/TPS-80 Ground/Air Task Oriented Radar (G/ATOR) successfully detected multiple rocket launches during company-funded testing that the firm says demonstrates the radar’s ballistic missile defense (BMD) capability. The G/ATOR system detected multiple rockets launched by NASA from its Wallops Island, Va., test site, including three different rocket types. Data collected from the testing will be used to verify potential future theater ballistic missile algorithms and ballistic missile defense capabilities.
LONDON — State-owned consortium Russian Helicopters sold nearly 300 helicopters during 2012 and increased revenues by 21% to 125 billion rubles ($4 billion). The Moscow-based company delivered 290 aircraft, up from 262 during 2011. Nine models of rotorcraft were sold to operators from 19 nations. The company now has a backlog of 817 helicopters worth nearly 360 billion rubles ($11.5 billion).
A new NASA mission to bring an asteroid closer to Earth in time to meet President Obama's goal of landing humans on one by 2025 would do more than bring the mountain to Mohammed. It also would add relevance to some of lawmakers' favorite NASA programs—the Orion crew vehicle, heavy-lift Space Launch System and commercial human spacecraft. NASA's fiscal 2014 budget request will include $100 million for the mission to find a small asteroid, capture it with a robotic spacecraft and bring it into range of human explorers somewhere in the vicinity of the Moon.
To counter the mounting number of cyberattacks, a group of senators led by Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) are working on legislation urging the Pentagon to train members of the National Guard to respond to cyberthreats. The bill would establish Cyber Guard units in every state that could be activated by governors or the Defense Secretary and would draw on the private-sector information technology expertise of members of the National Guard. The bill is aimed at offsetting a shortage of cyberexperts across the government.
GRIPEN DEAL: Saab and Swedish defense procurement agency FMV have signed a SEK 10.7 billion ($1.65 billion) contract for development work on the next-generation Gripen fighter. The contract follows on from a smaller SEK 2.5 billion deal contract in February. The development order, signed on March 22, accounts for operations on the Gripen E program from 2015-2023.
Open architecture is frequently a misnomer in avionics development, as proprietary elements often sneak in during design and prevent software from being truly reusable and portable between platforms.
NEW DELHI — India’s Bharat Electronics (BEL) will manufacture sub-assemblies for the Boeing Super Hornet fighter. “Under a follow-on contract of 2011, BEL will deliver components for our F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and P-8I maritime reconnaissance aircraft,” says Dennis Swanson, vice president of international business development for Boeing Defense, Space & Security in India.
No war can be won except by ground forces: Washington buzzes with that mantra, often from terminally degreed employees of academic institutions linked to the Army and Marines.
Global climate change, increasing population and development are growing as national security issues, a U.S. State Department official said March 20. Kerri-Ann Jones, assistant secretary of State for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, says she is “seeing these issues now become more and more threats to stability. They’re foreign policy issues.”
CYBER GUARD: To counter the mounting number of cyber attacks, a group of senators led by Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) are working on legislation urging the Pentagon to train members of the National Guard to respond to cyber threats. The bill would establish Cyber Guard units in every state that could be activated by state governors or the Defense Secretary and would draw on the private-sector information technology expertise of National Guard members. The bill is aimed at offsetting a shortage of cyber experts across government.
LANGKAWI, Malaysia — Indonesia, which will soon become a manufacturer and marketer of the Airbus Military C295, is considering off-loading its unwanted Indonesian air force Fokker F27s by offering the Dutch-made aircraft in conjunction with the sale of new C295s.
THE PENTAGON — While U.S. Navy and media reports continue to surface questioning the survivability and combat capability of the service’s Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) fleet, the service’s leading admiral now overseeing the program says the vessel’s survivability is a package deal that combines aspects of ship design, operations and even paint scheme.
