The National Air Traffic Controllers Association of Atlanta has presented the Archie League Medal of Safety to controllers Kristina Kurtz, Anchorage Tracon; Todd Mariani, Kansas City Center; Matt Reed, Potomac Tracon; Guy Lieser and Steve McGreevy, Chicago Center; Chris Henchey and Ryan Workman, Boston Center; Charlie Rohrer, Denver Center; Ken Greenwood, Josh Haviland and Ryan Herrick, Seattle Tracon; Alvin Kent, Atlanta Center; Frank Fisher and Greg Fleetwood, Corpus Christi Tower/Tracon; and Kevin McLaughlin, Southern California Tracon.
USAF Lt. Gen. Ellen Pawlikowski, commander of the Space and Missile Systems Center of Air Force Space Command, has been selected by the Society of Satellite Professionals International of New York, to receive its Stellar Award for Government Service. Pawlikowski is being honored for introducing new satellite communications technologies and exploring ways to acquire space systems.
Jeff Chalupa (see photo) has been named general manager-domestic operations for Tulsa, Okla.-based Nordam's transparency division. He was senior director-global engineering and quality for the repair division.
Ellen Tauscher has been named vice chair-designate of the Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security, which will be inaugurated later this year, by the Atlantic Council of Washington. She was U.S. undersecretary of state for arms control and international security. HONORS AND ELECTIONS
Richard DeFatta has joined Kratos Defense & Security Solutions in San Diego, as VP-engineering support services for the Madison Research Business Unit of the Weapon Systems Solution Div. He was VP of Teledyne Solutions.
Michelle A. Scarpella and Stephen D. Hogan (see photos) have been appointed Falls Church, Va.-based VPs for the F-35 and F/A-18 programs, respectively, for the Northrop Grumman Corp. Scarpella has worked on the B-2, Joint Stars and E-2C Hawkeye programs, and Hogan was EA-18G and EA-6B program director.
William Greenwalt has joined the Aerospace Industries Association, Arlington, Va., as VP-acquisition policy. He was deputy director for surveys and investigations of the U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations Committee.
Mike Fetcko has joined Elliott Aviation, Moline, Ill., as avionics manager for the Quad Cities team. He was a systems design engineer with Great Lakes Aviation and a private contractor. Randy Davis has been promoted to accessory shop sales manager from sales data administrator.
R. Scott Rettig has been named chairman and CEO of OTO Melara North America in Washington, succeeding U.S. Navy Adm. (ret.) James Amerault, who will retire. Rettig was chairman and CEO of AgustaWestland North America.
Gene L. Stygles and Renee D. Palyo have been appointed chief and deputy chief, respectively, of the Facilities Div. at the NASAGlenn Research Center in Cleveland. Stygles worked on the advanced solid rocket motor program, and Palyo was head of the division's Program Management Office.
Robert G. Semelsberger (see photo) has joined Rincon Research Corp., Tucson, Ariz., as director of the Procession and Development Div. He was a senior officer at the CIA.
HOUSTON – The International Space Station is in line for an artificial gravity inducing centrifuge for future research projects involving small biological and materials samples later this year, following a Feb. 14 hardware exchange between Astrium Space Transportation, the developer, and NanoRacks LLC, the equipment integrator.
A European research collaboration has developed the prototype for an augmented reality device that could move distant astronauts through a range of medical procedures for which they are not thoroughly trained, from diagnosing internal ailments with ultrasound to performing surgeries.
PARIS — Two of Europe’s biggest International Space Station contributors have rejected a NASA proposal that would see the European Space Agency (ESA) pay its share of ISS operating costs by building a propulsion module for NASA’s Orion crew transport capsule, saying the proposal is technologically lackluster and unlikely to generate public enthusiasm.
HOUSTON — President Obama’s proposed 2013 NASA budget of $17.771 billion, just $59 million below this year’s spending plan, has many at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston relieved they were spared deep cuts. Yet there is a simmering concern of an imbalance between investments in commercial crew systems intended to ferry astronauts to low Earth orbit and the agency’s own Orion/Space Launch System for future deep-space destinations.
The FCC is indefinitely suspending LightSquared’s conditional waiver to operate its proposed 4G voice and data network in bands adjacent to those used by GPS, citing concerns that potential interference with GPS units could pose aviation safety risks. “The commission clearly stated from the outset that harmful interference to GPS would not be permitted,” the FCC says. “Consequently, the commission will not lift the prohibition on LightSquared.”
Risk reduction for the advanced strap-on boosters that will be needed to give NASA’s planned Space Launch System (SLS) the 130-metric-ton lift capability to low Earth orbit ordered by Congress will cost as much as $200 million over a 30-month period. The U.S. space agency on Feb. 14 released its expected NASA Research Announcement (NRA) for the advanced-booster risk mitigation, saying that it will make “multiple awards” for analysis and hardware demonstrations “and anticipates $200 million total funding.”
PARIS — Europe’s new Vega rocket lifted off like a streak from its launch pad at the Guiana Space Center in Kourou during a flawless Feb. 13 debut that carried nine satellites to orbit: the Lares laser relativity satellite, Italy’s Almasat-1 and seven cubesats developed by European universities.
THE PENTAGON — The U.S. Air Force’s $154.3 billion fiscal 2013 budget request — roughly $12 billion less than the service requested in 2012 — includes termination of two aircraft efforts aimed at building partnerships with allies, as well as a new missile outlined for use in stealthy aircraft.
The new NASA budget request pulls the plug on two long-planned joint missions to Mars with the European Space Agency, but agency managers say they are already in touch with their ESA counterparts about a smaller-scale Mars mission in the 2018 planetary launch window.
Faced with a cut in its fiscal 2013 aeronautics budget, NASA plans to reduce its hypersonics research, but maintain spending on technologies for subsonic and supersonic fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft. NASA is requesting $551.5 million for aeronautics research in 2013, down from $569.4 million in 2012. “The budget is very tight. We got $18 million less than we requested,” says Jaiwon Shin, associate administrator for aeronautics.
THE PENTAGON — The U.S. Missile Defense Agency’s fiscal 2013 funding request of $7.75 billion includes a major departure for the agency’s testing regime: shelving the massive Raytheon Sea-Based X-Band (SBX) radar. MDA has long used the radar, which is mounted on a large, floating platform, for providing targeting and discrimination data during flight tests in the Pacific region.
New programs to continue research into boost-glide hypersonic weapons for tactical and global precision strike are included in the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (Darpa) $2.82 billion budget request for fiscal 2013.
