General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) has demonstrated a complete sense-and-avoid system on its Predator B unmanned aircraft, generating test data that will help the FAA and industry develop standards for integrating UAVs into civil airspace. The test demonstrated both the short-term collision avoidance and longer-term self-separation functions required of an unmanned-aircraft sense-and-avoid architecture, the company says.
The Norwegian parliament has approved plans to accelerate the country’s procurement of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Ministers gave the green light to buy six F-35s for 4 billion Krone ($654.7 million). The approval means that Norway is now signed up for 16 F-35A Lightning IIs. Four were ordered back in 2011, and the other six earlier this year.
Lockheed Martin is to deliver a 60-kw ruggedized laser that will enable the U.S. Army and Boeing to demonstrate the lethal potential of the truck-mounted High-Energy Laser Mobile Demonstrator (HEL MD) in 2017, on the path to a 100-kw version planned to be tested by 2022. The HEL MD shot down both 60mm mortar rounds and tactical unmanned aircraft using a 10-kw off-the-shelf industrial laser in six weeks of testing at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., that ended on Dec. 12. This followed low-power testing with a surrogate laser in 2011.
The Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) remote minehunting system (RMS) recently successfully completed developmental testing, U.S. Navy officials say. The RMS consists of the remote multi-mission vehicle (RMMV) and the towed AN/AQS-20A variable-depth sonar. The system’s purpose is to provide detection, classification, and localization of bottom, close-tethered, and volume mines in a single pass, as well as provide identification of bottom mines.
Iraq has ordered 24 light attack fighters based on the Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) T-50 supersonic trainer, with deliveries due to be completed by 2017. The order, including training, is valued at $1.1 billion, but KAI says supporting the single-engine aircraft over 20 years, also in the contract, will take total revenue beyond $2 billion.
The fuselage and wings for the first 767-2C to be adapted into a KC-46A for the U.S. Air Force's aerial refueling tanker program have been joined at Boeing's Everett, Wash., facility.
References to images of two unmanned aircraft, Boeing's X-46A and Northrop Grumman's X-47B, were transposed in an interactive feature with the Dec. 9 cover story on the RQ-180 (p. 20). Tap the icon in the digital edition of AW&ST to view “The Road to Stealth UAS” with the correct references, or go to AviationWeek.com/stealthuas
Often, brochures for a new aircraft program depict a splendid variety of potential versions. Program managers, eager to persuade decision makers a proposed aircraft is viable, suggest it can fill this role as well as that, and—with further development—a few more besides. The temptation for such optimistic promotion is perhaps strongest for helicopters because they are so adaptable.
After less than two years in development, Textron's low-cost, jack-of-many-trades Scorpion aircraft has made its first flight, lasting 1.4 hr., at McConnell AFB in Wichita. The company is promoting the milestone as “one of the fastest developments of a U.S.-built tactical jet.” Whether the aircraft's quick transition to flight will translate into firm orders in the U.S. or abroad is an open question. The U.S. military has no requirement for such an aircraft, and the Pentagon is preparing for a new round of budget cuts.
When EADS CEO Tom Enders announced a major strategic review of the group's defense and space business earlier this year, he inadvertently raised expectations for a plan to overcome the structural limitations of operating in Europe. As it turns out, the grand plan has a lot more to do with cutting jobs and finding internal efficiencies than with a new approach to markets.
A project to arm the U.K.'s Joint Strike Fighter force with a new, indigenous, small-diameter, precision-guided munition is advancing and could also form the basis for a surface-launched weapon for naval vessels and land operations.
UAV COOPERATION: The U.S. Coast Guard told lawmakers this week it continues to work with the U.S. Navy and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to leverage their existing programs to develop naval cutter- and land-based UAVs to help meet maritime surveillance requirements. Ongoing efforts to evaluate cutter-based small UAVs will enter the final demonstration phase in early 2014, Coast Guard Vice Commandant Vice Adm. John Currier testified, with an investigation of payload capability.
The U.S. Navy is to begin making biofuels part of its regular operational fuel purchases, citing preliminary indications from its first production-scale procurements that drop-in biofuels will be competitive on price with petroleum-based fuels by 2016.
When it comes to defense acquisitions in the coming years for aviation and shipbuilding, no other U.S. partner or ally in the Asia Pacific comes close to India, according to an Aviation Week Intelligence Network (AWIN) analysis of data provided by Avascent Analytics.
Singapore’s defense minister provided a fairly lukewarm description of the island nation’s interest in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, saying twice that the military is in “no particular hurry” to buy the advanced fighter. “We’re in no particular hurry, because our F-16s are still very operational, and they’re due for upgrades,” Ng Eng Hen said during a Dec. 12 press briefing with Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. “It is a serious consideration.”
Click here to view the pdf Selected Asia-Pacific Countries Aviation And Ship Defense Acquisition,Fiscal 2009-2023 Selected Asia-Pacific Countries Aviation And Ship Defense Acquisition, Fiscal 2009-2023 Country Size Of Existing Inventory (
Helicopter pilots of the U.S. Army’s 25th Combat Aviation Brigade (25th CAB) participated in recent training operations with the U.S. Navy’s Pearl Harbor-based guided-missile cruiser CG-70 USS Lake Erie, as the two services hone their joint operating skills and concepts. Army pilots landed OH-58D Kiowa Warrior armed reconnaissance helicopters and UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters aboard Lake Erie while a mixed flight deck crew of sailors and soldiers performed standard flight deck operations, Navy officials report.
Click here to view the pdf Selected Asia-Pacific Countries Aviation And Ship Defense Acquisition,Fiscal 2009-2023 Selected Asia-Pacific Countries Aviation And Ship Defense Acquisition, Fiscal 2009-2023 Country Size Of Existing Inventor
NEW DELHI — A squeeze in India’s defense budget will hinder all future research and development projects, the chief of the state-run Defense Research & Development Organization (DRDO) says. “We need to make sure that R&D funding is not just maintained but enhanced,” says Avinash Chander, who is also the scientific adviser to the defense minister. “We may be able to meet the present requirement, but any squeeze will keep us out of next-generation products such as multi-static radars, which require high investments.”
