The Department of Homeland Security plans to ask two companies to develop prototype countermeasure systems to shield commercial aircraft from shoulder-fired missiles, lawmakers said May 15. To ensure it does not ignore promising ideas from anyone else in the private sector, DHS also intends to issue a Broad Agency Announcement to solicit proposals from high-tech firms "on the best way to protect our aircraft from this threat," Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) announced at a press conference with Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.).
SELLING: Vector Aerospace of Toronto is selling its fixed-wing repair and overhaul business to focus on its helicopter business, the company said May 15. The company has received "a number of expressions of interest," it said.
NASA, Boeing Rocketdyne and the U.S. Air Force have begun a series of nine hot-fire tests of a new liquid oxygen turbopump at NASA's Stennis Space Center, Miss., Boeing announced May 15.
PEACE CAESAR: Officials from Lockheed Martin, the U.S. Air Force and the Italian air force participated in a rollout ceremony May 9 at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, for the first of 34 F-16 Fighting Falcons to be provided to Italy under the "Peace Caesar" program. Italy is leasing the F-16s for five years, with an option for another five years.
NASA has chosen William Parsons, director of Stennis Space Center in Mississippi, to succeed Ron Dittemore as manager of the space shuttle program at Johnson Space Center in Houston later this year. During a press conference in Washington May 9, Mike Kostelnik, deputy associate administrator for the space station and shuttle, said NASA offered Parsons the position after an extensive search for candidates inside and outside the agency.
APOLLO: A crew return vehicle (CRV) and crew transfer vehicle (CTV) for the International Space Station (ISS) could be derived from the Apollo Command Module (CM) and Service Module (SM) spacecraft, according to a team chartered by NASA to study the possibility. An Apollo-derived CRV, with a crew of four to six people, appears to have the potential of meeting most of the Level 1 requirements for NASA's Orbital Space Plane (OSP), according to the team.
ABL REVIEW: The Airborne Laser (ABL) program, which plans to put a chemical oxygen iodine laser (COIL) on a Boeing 747-400 to intercept ballistic missiles, is undergoing a review to make sure its chemicals can be safely stored and used for testing at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., the Air Force says. The ABL chemicals are expected to arrive at Edwards in June.
COMANCHE COMPANION: Although the Army hasn't decided what the companion unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) for the RAH-66 Comanche helicopter will be, it probably will have vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) capability, according to Col. Gregory Williamitis, TRADOC system manager for the Comanche at the U.S. Army Aviation Center. "Ideally, we would like to have a UAV that can go down and operate in our environment," Williamitis says. Studies indicate that Comanche pilots will be able to manage at most two UAVs at a time, he says.
The Senate Armed Services Committee announced May 9 that it has approved a fiscal 2004 defense authorization bill that merges the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) and Medium Extended Air Defense System (MEADS) programs, adds an intercept test to the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system and cuts two F/A-22 Raptors from the Bush Administration's request.
SLAMRAAM CHOICES: The U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command says four companies are eligible to respond to a request for proposals for the Surface-Launched Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (SLAMRAAM) development and demonstration program. They are Boeing Co., Huntsville, Ala.; Northrop Grumman Corp., Carson, Calif.; Raytheon Co., Bedford, Mass.; and Teledyne Brown Engineering, Huntsville, Ala. AMCOM says the companies' concepts "demonstrate probability of success in executing the program. ..." The RFP was slated for release May 9, and proposals are due July 7.
BAE SYSTEMS PLATFORM SOLUTIONS will develop a Modernized Flight Control Computer and Spoiler Control Electronic Flap Computer for U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster IIIs under a $34.7 million contract from Boeing Integrated Defense Systems. The systems, slated to go into service in 2005, will improve aircraft reliability, increase functionality and cut down on parts obsolescence problems by using commercial components, the company said. The company also said its open-architecture, real-time operating system, CsLEOS RTOS, will be used in those computers.
COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS: Defense companies trying to develop commercial applications for defense technologies will face difficult challenges, according to ITT Industries President and CEO Lou Giuliano. "I personally have a long background where I have proven to myself over the last 30 years that that's not a high-value creating strategy," he says. ITT has commercialized some its defense technologies in the past, but did so by hiring commercial companies to help develop the applications and marketing strategy, he said.
NEW DELHI - India launched an experimental communications satellite May 8 on the second flight of the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV). As in the first flight of the GSLV in 2001, the second developmental GSLV (GSLV-D2) used a Russian-built cryogenic engine for its third stage, said an official with the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). India is developing its own cryogenic engine and has successfully test-fired it but hasn't flown it.
ENGINE CONCERNS: Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.), whose state is home to aircraft engine maker Pratt & Whitney, says he is "extremely disturbed" by recent reports that European governmental pressure may have led France-based Airbus to drop plans to have Pratt & Whitney Canada supply engines for the A400M military transport aircraft. The engine work will instead go to Germany's EuroProp.
PRAGUE - The United Kingdom Ministry of Defence (MOD) will present its final package of proposals on temporary protection of Czech airspace in about a month, a senior British defense official told The DAILY May 8. Czech defense officials, whose mandate is to ensure the sovereignty of Czech airspace as it prepares to decommission its aging supersonic fleet of Mig-21s in early 2005, have been discussing bilateral cooperation with Britain for several weeks.
GREEN LIGHT: The European Space Agency's Mars Express is ready for its June 2 launch after passing a flight readiness review last week, ESA says. The spacecraft was to launch this month, but engineers discovered a fault in one of its electronics modules and had to bump the launch to fix it. Mars Express is to be launched on a Soyuz booster from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan for its six-month journey to Mars. The spacecraft is slated to enter martian orbit on Dec. 26.
NEW YORK - Although it's still too early for definite conclusions, one of the lessons from the war with Iraq appears to be that speed is more important than mass, according to William Swanson, president and future CEO of Raytheon Co. Swanson will become CEO on July 1, when current Chairman and CEO Daniel Burnham steps down. Swanson has been with Raytheon for nearly 31 years.
May 12 - 15 -- 2003 Joint Services Small Arms System Section Annual Symposium, Exhibition and Firing Demonstration, Hyatt Regency Crown Center, Kansas City, Mo. For more information go to www.ndia.com. May 13 - 15 -- National Aeronautical Systems and Technology Conference 2003 (NASTC), Dayton Convention Center, Dayton, Ohio. For more information email [email protected], or go to www.nastc2003.org. May 14 - 15 -- EO/IR Conference, Army Research Lab, Adelphi, Md. Call (888) OLD-CROW or go to www.crows.org.
IMPROVED RELATIONS: Relations between BAE Systems and its principal customer, the British Ministry of Defence (MOD), have improved as a result of the fallout over the Nimrod aircraft and Astute submarine programs, according to Mark Ronald, president and CEO of BAE Systems North America. The company and the MOD agreed to restructure the contracts of the over-budget programs earlier this year (DAILY, Feb. 20). BAE Systems was able to show MOD officials that its program management structure is providing "value for the money" despite the program setbacks, Ronald says.
MPA CONTRACT: The U.S. Coast Guard has awarded Integrated Coast Guard Systems (ICGS) a contract worth $130 million for two EADS-CASA CN-235-300M-based Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA). The contract is the first of a planned multi-year, multi-aircraft acquisition for the Deepwater program, the Coast Guard said. EADS North America said it is "extremely pleased" by the selection of the CN-235 as the MPA. The aircraft are produced by Spain's EADS-CASA but include "substantial" U.S. content, EADS North America said, including avionics, propulsion and subsystems.
Alliant Techsystems (ATK) announced May 8 that Paul David Miller, the company's chairman and CEO, would step down from his post on Oct. 1. Miller, who will remain as board chairman, will be replaced by Dan Murphy, the current group vice president of the company's Precision Systems unit.
NEW YORK - BAE Systems North America would be willing to acquire a company the size of the former Lockheed Martin Aerospace Electronics Systems (AES) business, according to a senior company executive. The AES business, which consisted of the former Sanders, Fairchild Systems and Space Electronics & Communications businesses, was purchased by BAE Systems North America in November 2000 for $1.67 billion in cash. Those businesses are now part of BAE Systems' Information & Electronic Systems Integration Sector.
The U.S. Defense Department is resisting a call to rewrite the rules that set aircraft availability goals despite a new General Accounting Office (GAO) report showing most military aircraft types failed to reach their objective over a five-year period.
