No-frills short-haul carrier ValuJet finally launched McDonnell Douglas' MD-95 revival of the DC-9 yesterday in an order for 50 firm aircraft worth more than $1 billion with options for 50 more. The decision ends a nearly two-year wait to launch the new airplane program, and is expected to generate nearly 2,000 new jobs at Douglas - 400 in development and another 1,500 once production starts.
The Defense Dept. plans to pay for Bosnia operations with money from congressional add-ons in its fiscal 1996 budget if Congress demands that a supplemental to pay for the operation include rescissions, Defense Secretary William Perry said yesterday. "In order to do this operation we will have to request a supplemental appropriation," Perry told reporters at the Pentagon. "The supplemental appropriation will be on the order of $1.5 billion." Perry said the figure could change as the details of the peacekeeping operations are hammered out.
RANGE SCHEDULING conflicts have delayed the planned first launch of EER Systems' Conestoga, originally set for 6 p.m. EDT tomorrow. The rocket is now scheduled to lift off at 6 p.m. EDT Monday, to give time for the Space Shuttle Columbia and an Atlas II carrying a Navy communications satellite to clear the range. Both the Shuttle and the Atlas were delayed by bad weather.
RUSSIA'S Dept. of Air Transportation has chosen the Honeywell/Pelorus Satellite Landing System for installation at the Zhukovski air base outside Moscow, according to Pelorus Navigation Systems of Canada. It said the system will be used to establish certification and operational procedures for Differential GPS and Differential Glonass use in Russia and neighboring states.
Four enginemakers, including Pratt&Whitney Canada and International Aero Engines, are looking seriously at adopting a new combination target- type thrust reverser/variable exhaust nozzle configuration developed by Calcor Aero Systems of Whittier, Calif.
Defense Secretary William J. Perry responded angrily yesterday to a Republican assertion that "paper thin" readiness of U.S. forces would be weakened by the Bosnia peacekeeping operation, declaring U.S. readiness today is "at a high level." It was one of Perry's few displays of annoyance during two days of skeptical questioning about the Administration's plans to send 20,000 troops to Bosnia as part of a NATO operation to monitor a peace agreement. "It is not true that we have devastated our military readiness," Perry snapped.
Senior officials from the Defense Dept. and the nation's largest defense contractor cautioned Congress yesterday against placing too much emphasis on small satellites to meet future intelligence needs. While small satellites could play a larger role, the demands placed upon the intelligence community will require the continued use of larger satellites, Pentagon acquisition chief Paul Kaminski and Lockheed Martin Corp. President Norman Augustine told the House Intelligence Committee.
The U.S. Air Force said it expects a draft RFP for the projected Miniature Air Launched Decoy (MALD) to be released in February. A competition for an Advanced Concepts Technology Demonstration (ACTD) of the vehicle is being planned by the AF's Aeronautical Systems Center and the Pentagon's Advanced Research Projects Agency.
China does not pose a sufficient nuclear threat to justify a U.S. anti-ballistic missile system, but uncertainties remain regarding how much additional military capability it will seek with its rapidly expanding economy, Assistant Secretary of Defense (International Security Affairs) Joseph S. Nye Jr., said yesterday.
Defense and space profits jumped 15% on 22% stronger sales at TRW in the third quarter, as volumes rose on existing contracts and the company continued to notch key wins in new area. "I am very much encouraged by our strong awards to date, which have provided us with the opportunity to hire about 1,000 new employees in 1995 while continuing to improve productivity and return on assets employed," said Chairman Joseph T. Gorman in a prepared statement detailing the financial results this week.
President Clinton's top advisers are urging him to veto the science authorization bill passed by the House last week, Presidential Adviser John Gibbons said yesterday. Gibbons told reporters that all of the president's cabinet members, senior advisers and science and technology staff have urged veto of the bill, formally known as the Omnibus Civilian Science Authorization Act.
PRATT&WHITNEY'S thrust-vectoring fighter engine nozzle, the pitch- yaw/balanced beam nozzle, or PY/BBN, will be installed next year on the Air Force's VISTA F-16 after being selected to continue with integration efforts for the Variable Stability In-Flight Simulator Test Aircraft program, P&W said yesterday. The dual-redundant actuation system makes it fully compatible for single- and dual-engine operation, and should allow the modified F-16D to fly at lower altitudes, something it couldn't do with the General Electric vectoring nozzle.
NASA pilots, in a series of flights aimed at enhancing the performance of jet fighters and supersonic transports, are testing actuated nose strakes and a wing-mounted "glove" that produces laminar flow. The U.S. agency said tests of the movable strakes have started aboard an F-18 testbed at Dryden Flight Research Center, Calif., while the laminar flow glove has been fitted to a delta-winged F-16XL, also at Dryden. Both projects are managed by NASA's Langley Research Center in Virginia.
Rep. C.W. (Bill) Young (R-Fla.), chairman of the House Appropriations national security subcommittee, said yesterday that "there does appear to be movement" on working out abortion language that would be acceptable to both the House and Senate on the fiscal 1996 defense appropriations bill. The House rejected the $243 billion measure on Sept. 29 primarily because of the opposition of anti-abortionists.
U.S. Army and contractor officials say they will be able to cut about $1.4 billion out of the $4.7 billion total program cost of the Javelin anti-tank weapon, but the number is not yet firm. One approach is multi-year procurement, Col. Michael Roddy, the Army's Javelin program manager, told reporters yesterday during the Association of the U.S. Army's annual conference in Washington. Some 12% of the $1.4 billion figure would come from MYP savings, although final figures can't be determined until contracts are signed.
Bad weather over Florida delayed the commercial launch of a U.S. Navy satellite from Cape Canaveral Air Station yesterday and threatened Friday's planned launch of the Space Shuttle Columbia on a 16-day microgravity science mission.
Aerospace companies responding to a recent survey of hundreds of U.S. companies by Connecticut consultants The Futures Group uniformly believe rivals have used competitive business intelligence against them.
TRW Inc. has delivered to NASA the first of six satellite instruments that will determine the influence of clouds on the Earth's temperature. The instrument - Clouds and the Earth's Radiant Energy System (CERES) - was delivered to Langley Research Center, and will be integrated and tested on the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) spacecraft at Goddard Space Flight Center. Launch of TRMM is scheduled for August 1997.
Rohr's Asian and European overhaul and repair facilities won certification from U.S. and Singaporean airworthiness authorities, clearing the way for the long-struggling nacelle and aerostructures specialist to start cashing in on big growth in the commercial aircraft aftermarket. The European operation - Toulouse-based Rohr Aero Services-Europe - was launched three years ago, while Rohr Aero Services-Asia in Loyang, Singapore, was set up in February as a joint venture with Singapore Aerospace Manufacturing.
A fleet of 500 supersonic transports could spew as large a volume of aerosol particles into the upper atmosphere as a small volcanic eruption, boosting the impact of SST traffic on stratospheric ozone levels, direct measurements of the exhaust trail of an Air France Concorde has revealed.
Loral Vought is beginning to set up the production line for its Patriot Advanced Capability-3 air-defense missile program, even though it is only one year into the nearly four year PAC-3 engineering and manufacturing development effort.
LORAL's Federal Systems-Owego division, Owego, N.Y., will deliver 150 AN/ARQ-44 upgraded airborne data link subsystems and 15 AN/AAS-44 FLIR subsystems over a 30-month performance period under U.S. Navy contracts totaling $35 million. Loral said the data link subsystem "permits the presentation of FLIR video on aircraft displays and enables the downlink of FLIR video to LAMPS-capable surface ships." The AAS-44, it said, "provides a passive day/night target detection and classification capability, enhancing the LAMPS SH-60B [helicopter] surveillance set."
THE ROYAL AIR FORCE's first next-generation C-130, a C-130J-30, will roll out today at Lockheed Martin's Aeronautical Systems facility in Marietta, Ga., followed by another rollout on Friday of the first standard-length C- 130J for the U.S. Air Force, the company said yesterday. Both are slated for immediate flight test to support initial deliveries in the fourth quarter next year. The RAF-specified version is 15 feet longer than the standard -J.
Defense Secretary William J. Perry and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. John M. Shalikashvili yesterday defended plans to send 20,000 troops to monitor the cease fire in Bosnia and at the same time to upgrade the military capability of Bosnian government forces. Perry told the Senate Armed Services Committee that U.S. peacekeeping forces would have to be "well armed" because they might face attacks from paramilitary forces. "We minimize that risk by being strongly prepared," he said.
