Grants of as much as $500,000 for use of commercial suborbital human-rated spacecraft will be available.

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.

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.

Maj. Gen. (ret.) Ajit Hari Gadre has become CEO of the Helicopter Academy to Train by Simulation of Flying, Bengaluru, India. He was director-general of army aviation of India.

Managers of Europe's new Vega rocket plan to ask European Space Agency (ESA) ministers to approve modifications to the launcher that would anchor it more solidly in Europe by replacing its Ukrainian-built upper stage with European hardware, preferably from Germany. The Feb. 13 debut flight (see photo) qualifies the Vega system—including the four-stage launch vehicle, ground infrastructure and operations—to operate alongside the Ariane 5 and Europeanized Soyuz rockets from the recently expanded spaceport in French Guiana.

Larry Lawson has been named executive VP for the aeronautics business at the Lockheed Martin Corp., Bethesda, Md., succeeding Ralph D. Heath, who plans to retire April 1. Lawson is VP and general manager for the F-35 program and will be succeeded by Orlando Carvalho. Lorraine Martin will follow Carvalho as VP and deputy for the program.

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.

Launch of the replacement Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO-2) will be delayed at least into mid-2014 while NASA finds a new launch vehicle and fixes a problem in the spacecraft reaction wheel assemblies. After two launch failures with Orbital Sciences Corp.'s Taurus XL solid-fuel rocket, NASA has decided to try to launch its replacement on another vehicle. Possibilities include the Pegasus XL, Falcon 9, Delta II and Atlas V, according to Jim Norman, director of launch services at NASA headquarters.