Northrop Grumman's RQ-8A Fire Scout unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) could fulfill the Army's need for a heavier vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) UAV for use in urban combat, according to Forecast International/DMS weapons analyst Larry Dickerson. Army Col. William Johnson, Future Combat Systems (FCS) program manager for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, said last week the Army is considering whether to take over the Fire Scout program from the Navy.
PRAGUE - The United States Embassy in Prague confirmed Nov. 1 that the U.S. will provide F-16 air cover for the Nov. 21-22 NATO summit in Prague, after finally reaching agreement with Czech officials. Talks had been stalled for several weeks over what officials called "technical details," such as the command structures and the number of aircraft to be deployed. The agreement will go to parliament for ratification, expected this week.
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. - Gen. Ed Eberhart, commander of U.S. Northern Command, said the sniper case showed the importance of technology in preventing or blunting such incidents. "There is an increasing role for technology to combat, to search out, to find and capture this kind of perpetrator," Eberhart said in response to a question after a speech here Nov. 1.
PRODUCT DEMAND: The military programs in which Rockwell Collins participates should be fully funded in the fiscal year 2004 defense budget, according to senior aerospace and defense Byron Callan of Merrill Lynch. Some details of that budget, scheduled to be officially released in January or February, could come out as soon as November or December, he says. "We expect the programs on which Rockwell Collins has content will be supported in the upcoming budget request, namely the Joint Strike Fighter and contracts for the Future Combat Systems," he says.
Democrats likely will try shifting missile defense funds from early development efforts to mature programs if the Nov. 5 elections give them control of both the House and Senate, according to congressional sources.
Next year, scientists from California-based Microwave Sciences Inc. and the University of California at Irvine hope to be the first to push an orbiting solar sail using microwave energy beamed from the ground.
DOCKED: A Soyuz TMA-1 spacecraft docked to the International Space Station one minute after midnight EST on Nov. 1, where it will replace the older emergency return vehicle already there. Soyuz crewmembers will perform 34 science experiments before returning on the older Soyuz on Nov. 10, making a night landing, a rarity for the Russian space program.
Armored vehicle manufacturers in the United States are unlikely to benefit significantly if the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence (MOD) decides to move forward with the development of the Future Rapid Effects Systems (FRES) program, according to a senior U.S. weapons analyst. FRES, which is the conceptual stage, involves the replacement or upgrading of 5,000 to 8,000 combat vehicles. The program could be worth as much as 2.5 billion pounds ($3.9 billion).
BOOSTER YEAR: A top missile defense official official is designating calendar year 2003 as "the year of the booster." The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) will test Lockheed Martin's BV-Plus and Orbital Sciences Corp.'s Orbital Boost Vehicle next year, and Lt. Gen. Ronald Kadish says he is looking forward to selecting one. "I am very confident with the two opportunities we have to do this right," Kadish says.
WAR RESERVE: The Defense Department is lobbying Congress to attach a $10 billion war reserve fund to "omnibus" spending legislation that lawmakers could take up after the Nov. 5 elections, a Capitol Hill source says. Eager to complete its unfinished fiscal 2003 non-defense appropriations bills, Congress may combine at least some of them into a single, or omnibus, package. Although Congress declined to provide the reserve fund in the newly enacted FY '03 defense appropriations act, Pentagon officials insist they still need the fund to continue the war on terrorism.
Calling it evidence that acquisition reform is working, Australia's defense minister said Oct. 31 that the Wedgetail production program is six months ahead of schedule and remains under its potential $1.32 billion budget.
NASA's plasma rocket project is pursuing several potential sources of funding to ensure it does not have to shut down when its current funding runs out by the end of November, according to a NASA document obtained by The DAILY. A peer review panel chartered by NASA's Office of Space Flight (OSF) is considering whether the rocket, formally called the Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket (VASIMR), should receive funding from OSF, the Oct. 28 document says. Results of the review are due before Nov. 30.
Nov. 4 - 5 -- SMI's Second Annual Anti-Ship Missiles - The Hatton, London. For more information call +44 0 870 9090 711 or visit www.smi-online.co.uk/asm.asp. Nov. 5 - 7 -- AAAA Aviation Electronics and Survivability Symposium, Sheraton Eatontown Hotel & Conference Center, Eatontown, N.J. For more information call (203) 268-2450 or email [email protected].
QUIRKS: The Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) could be integrated into the B-2 Spirit fleet's arsenal as soon as February, a B-2 maintenance worker says. B-2 weapons loaders are learning the "quirks" of installing the JASSM's wide frame into the stealth bomber's internal bomb bay, says Air Force Tech. Sgt. Jay Perkins, a weapons loading team chief for the B-2 at Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo. Perkins just finished "validating the techniques and procedures" for loading the Lockheed Martin missile, he says.
Thomas Young, former executive vice president of Lockheed Martin, is leading a panel studying the health of America's space industrial base for the Department of Defense, according to Air Force Undersecretary for Space Peter Teets. The panel, which includes members of the Defense Science Board and the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, has been asked to "assess the health of the space acquisition community and answer some specific questions," Teets said during a meeting of the Maryland Space Business Council in Greenbelt, Md., Oct. 29.
Alliant Techsystems (ATK) said net income for the second quarter of fiscal year 2003 rose 50 percent on strong sales from its Precision Systems and Ammunition groups. Net income for the second quarter, which ended Sept. 29, rose from $18.9 million a year ago to $28.5 million this year. Sales for the quarter rose 20 percent, from $428 million a year ago to $513 million. ATK Chairman and CEO Paul David Miller said in a statement he expects sales for FY '03 to grow by 6 percent.
A string of failed flight tests earlier this year for the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) interceptor missile were the result of "extremely annoying" glitches that are being solved as Pentagon leaders look to accelerate the missile defense program, the Missile Defense Agency's top official said Oct. 31. "We got a briefing from the technical teams a couple weeks ago that gives me great confidence that we found the root cause of those problems," MDA chief Lt. Gen. Ron Kadish said.
JDAM: Boeing and the U.S. Air Force completed flight testing of the MK-82 500-pound Joint Direct Attack Munition on an F-16, Boeing said Oct. 31. Integration flights are continuing on the F/A-18 and are planned for the B-2, which will be the primary Air Force aircraft for the weapon, Boeing said. The MK-82 kit uses many common parts with its larger JDAM siblings, Boeing said.
Starting next year, Textron subsidiary Lycoming, Inc. will begin replacing the crankshafts in nearly a thousand of its small aircraft engines as part of the most extensive and costly product recall in the company's 73-year history. Lycoming provides small engines for a variety of general aviation and small business aircraft. Aircraft affected by the recall include Piper's Malibu Mirage and Turbo Saratoga, as well as Cessna's Turbo 206.
NEW DELHI - The Indian navy has sent the flight recorders of two crashed Ilyushin IL-38 maritime surveillance aircraft to Russia for analysis. The Russian-built aircraft collided at an Oct. 1 air show in Goa. The loss of two of the navy's five IL-38 aircraft has severely impaired the service's maritime surveillance capabilities, according to a defense ministry official. The navy now has only three IL-38s and eight Tupolev Tu-142 maritime aircraft, which it says is inadequate for patrolling more than 4,400 miles of coastline.
LONDON - Difficulties with crew training, due mainly to delays in the development and availability of a Full Mission Simulator, are expected to prevent Britain's 67 AgustaWestland WAH-64 Longbow Apache attack helicopters from providing a brigade-level capability until February 2007, according to a report published on Thursday by the National Audit Office (NAO). NAO head Sir John Bourn told Parliament that the Ministry of Defence (MOD) is making progress toward delivering an initial operating capability for the Apache helicopter in August 2004.
Thirteen senators have written to Army Secretary Thomas White urging him to consult with Congress before adopting a proposal to privatize several Army facilities, including depots that repair helicopters and missile systems.
The Department of Defense is waiting for Congress to act on a proposal for a new slot, assistant secretary of defense for homeland security. "We haven't got that authorization yet, unfortunately," Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said last week. But, he said, "the idea is that that person would be the assistant secretary level point of contact with Gen. [Ed] Eberhard, [commander of U.S. Northern Command,] and with civilian authorities here in the United States."
