Defense

The Saudi Airshow- due to take place in February - has been postponed.
Aerospace

By Daniel Urchick
AVIATION WEEK NETWORK estimates that at the start of 2020, there were 871 Western-designed aircraft performing air-refueling missions. A total of 442
Defense

By Jen DiMascio
Where weapons exports are going; Russian mercenaries hit U.S. UAS; Rocket Lab’s next NRO launch; and a Sea Venom Trial.
Defense

By Steve Trimble
Pratt & Whitney, a former opponent of fighter engine competitions, seeks to overturn the sole-source award for the F-15EX.
Aircraft & Propulsion

North America The U.S. military is requesting an additional 17 Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighters and U.S. Transportation Command is pushing
Defense

News in brief
Defense

Brief news items of interest to aerospace & defense professionals.
Defense

By Graham Warwick
Canada’s Longview Aviation Services has flown the first Canadair CL-215 amphibious aircraft upgraded to CL-415EAF Enhanced Aerial Firefighter configuration.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Tony Osborne
The British government plans to create a DARPA-like agency to fund “high-risk, high-reward” science capabilities.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Steve Trimble
A series of requests for information to industry since last fall has generated proposals to accelerate the current, 10-year schedule.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Tony Osborne
Exercise Cold Response 2020, planned for March 2-18, was to involve some 14,000 troops from Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, UK and U.S
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Steve Trimble
The first change to the aircraft removes the skin and structural material in lower lobes of the forward and aft fuselage, the Air Force said.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Tony Osborne
Italian aerospace and defense company Leonardo says operations are continuing normally despite the national lockdown.
Supply Chain

By Lee Hudson
The Blue-Ribbon Future Carrier 2030 Task Force is seen as complementary to a broad review of shipbuilding requirements being led by Deputy Defense Secretary David Norquist.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Graham Warwick
Japanese suborbital spaceflight startup PD AeroSpace plans to fly the latest in a series of the subscale company’s first suborbital test vehicles.
Space

By Jen DiMascio
The strategy aims to correct a longstanding problem for the Pentagon—that its communication networks use thousands of disparate terminals that are not compatible with each other.
Budget, Policy & Operations

Late last year, H3 Grob Aircraft completed the delivery of a first batch of Grob G 120TPs to the Ethiopian Air Force. As African Aerospace was going to press, a second batch was expected to be delivered to fulfil the EAF’s requirement for 12 aircraft. Alan Warnes reports.
Defense

By Lee Hudson
The U.S. Marine Corps now is pursuing an unmanned family of systems for its Marine Air-Ground Task Force Unmanned Aircraft Expeditionary (MUX) effort.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Graham Warwick
The U.S. Marine Corps is joining the U.S. Air Force’s Agility Prime program to accelerate commercial development eVTOL vehicles, with a view to using them for logistics.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Steve Trimble
The F-15 fleet is expected to enter qualifications by the end of 2021, to be followed by the F-16, F-22, A-10 and B-1.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Steve Trimble
Boeing has started delivering a new version of the Joint Direct Attack Munition tail kit with improved resistance to GPS jamming.
Missile Defense & Weapons

By Thierry Dubois
Record deliveries of the Rafale fighter helped Dassault Aviation’s revenues reach unprecedented heights last year.
Aircraft & Propulsion

By Steve Trimble
The Russian private military company used a “sophisticated Russian air defense system,” according to U.S. Africa Command chief Gen. Stephen Townsend's testimony to the HASC.
Budget, Policy & Operations

By Lee Hudson
“Soon we will release an inaugural doctrine” for the Space Force, Air Force Secretary Barbara Barrett said March 10 in Washington.
Space

By Irene Klotz
"Unless we improve our rate of innovation dramatically, then there is no chance of a base on the Moon or a city on Mars,” SpaceX Founder Elon Musk says.
Space