ENGINEER NAMED: NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe named Theron M. Bradley Jr. as the aerospace agency's chief engineer, responsible for the overall review and technical readiness of all NASA programs. Bradley, 55, is a former nuclear engineer for the U.S. Navy, serving in the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program. "As this agency explores next-generation technology and propulsion alternatives, it's important to have someone who can provide an independent technical review of our programs and projects," O'Keefe said in a statement.
MOSCOW - The roof of one of the largest buildings at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan collapsed May 12, leaving eight workers presumed dead and raising doubts about the Russian space program's future. The workers were preparing Building 112, a nearly 40-year-old structure, to serve as a launch assembly complex for Soyuz spacecraft. In the 1980s, the building was the assembly building for the Buran shuttle, which flew only once.
ITT Industries and Northrop Grumman have received contracts from the Army for additional aviator and ground forces night vision systems. The contracts were awarded under the Omnibus VI program for third-generation image intensification devices.
The Senate Armed Services Committee rejected a proposal to block the Air Force from leasing 100 new Boeing 767 aerial refuelers because it did not want to "pre-judge" negotiations on the potential tanker deal, according to committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.).
TOKYO - The Japan Meteorological Agency will pay nearly $6 million to use a reserve U.S. weather satellite to make up for the loss of its Multifunction Transport Satellite (MT-SAT). The MT-SAT was lost during a failed 1999 launch. Since that loss, Japan has relied on its aging GMS-5 satellite, which is beyond its service life. The substitute satellite will be available next spring, according to Japanese officials. The second MT-SAT is scheduled to be launched next year and become operational by the end of 2003.
NEW YORK - B/E Aerospace could be outmuscled by larger firms if the Federal Aviation Administration requires that both the bulkhead and cockpit doors of aircraft must be secured, said Robert Khoury, the company's president, CEO and co-founder. Speaking May 13 at Aviation Week's Aerospace Finance and Defense Conference here, Khoury said the FAA has yet to reach a decision on what constitutes a secure cockpit cabin.
SATCOM SYSTEMS: Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. will supply 23 Satcom On-the-Move (SOTM) systems to the U.S. Marine Corps, the company announced May 13. The systems will be used on vehicles like Light Armored Vehicles to give them worldwide mobile satellite communications capabilities, even at speeds over 50 miles per hour.
The Defense Department's Defense Planning Guidance document, which provides instructions to the military services on how to plan their budgets, considers possible changes to the number of F-22 aircraft to be bought, according to a senior Defense Department official.
GPS CONTRACT: Trimble, of Sunnyvale, Calif., will supply Global Positioning System technology to Raytheon Co. for its Miniature Airborne GPS Receiver (MAGR) 2000 program. The $2.1 million contract calls for Trimble to incorporate its Selective Availability Anti-Spoofing Module (SAASM) in its Force 5 GPS Receiver Application Module (GRAM-S), for use in Raytheon's MAGR 2000. GRAM-S is a dual-frequency GPS receiver, according to the company.
Senate Republicans are debating whether to try to restore some or all of the $812 million that the Democrat-led Senate Armed Services Committee cut from the Bush Administration's fiscal 2003 missile defense budget. Republicans would like to secure the Administration's entire $7.6 billion request when the full Senate considers the bill. A partial restoration might be easier to accomplish, especially if it involved theater missile defense systems, which generally are less controversial than those designed to protect the U.S. homeland.
NEW DELHI - An Indian air force Jaguar fighter crashed after it hit a fence on a runway and caught fire during a May 9 takeoff from Ambala, in the state of Haryana. The pilot was killed, according to press reports. Officials are investigating the crash. About 30 Indian air force Jaguar aircraft are still equipped with outdated first-generation navigation and attack systems because of a delay in an upgrade program, according to a senior air force official. The aircraft was among those without upgraded systems.
NEW YORK - EDO Corp. will continue to seek acquisitions aggressively as part of its growth strategy, Jim Smith, the company chairman and CEO, said May 13. Those acquisitions will be targeted and must grow the company's business substantially within the first year, he said. "We don't do well at auctions because we will not buy anything that will not be accretive during the first full year of operations," Smith said during a presentation at Aviation Week's Aerospace Finance and Defense Conference here.
Global Hawk's costs should be cut in half, according to an Air Force official. Northrop Grumman officials have said the Air Force has asked the company to cut the production costs for the high-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicle by 25 percent (DAILY, April 25). Lt. Col. Douglas Boone, deputy chief of the reconnaissance system division for Air Force acquisition, told The DAILY May 10, "we've actually asked them for 50 percent as the goal."
Suppliers across the country are getting a chance to participate in large weapons programs like the Joint Strike Fighter as a result of the changes brought about by performance-based contracting, according to a Lockheed Martin JSF program official. Art Price, director of subcontractor management for the JSF program, said in an interview with the DAILY that many of today's first-tier suppliers do what prime contractors previously did.
May 13 -- National Defense Industrial Association presents U.S.-India Defense Industry Seminar - U.S. Chamber of Commerce, 1615 H Street, NW, Washington, DC. For more information contact Jim Linden at (703) 247-9464 or email [email protected]. May 13 -- Aviation Week presents Fast-Track Growth Conference, Hyatt Regency, New York, NY. For more information go to www.AviationNow.com/conferences
STATION STUDY: The findings of the Research Maximization and Prioritization Task Force (REMAP) will influence debate in NASA over whether the International Space Station should be expanded to support a crew of more than three people, according to NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe. O'Keefe created the independent task force to recommend research priorities for the station (DAILY, April 1). The panel's report is due in June.
SUPPLEMENTAL ACTION: The House Appropriations Committee hopes to finish consideration of its fiscal 2002 supplemental appropriations bill May 14 after marking up the legislation most of the day May 9. The bill includes $15.8 billion for defense, including $377 million to speed up production of Boeing Joint Direct Attack Munitions (DAILY, March 25). The Senate Appropriations Committee has not announced when it will consider its version of the bill.
NO WORKAROUND: The Navy had no role in the House Armed Services Committee's recent decision to allocate additional money for a third DDG-51 destroyer and does not "work around the president's budget," Navy Secretary Gordon England says. "I repeat, we do not work around the president's budget," England says of the HASC's decision to allocate $800 million for a third DDG-51 destroyer in the proposed fiscal 2003 defense budget. The allocation is contingent on the Navy, the Boeing Co.
APPOINTMENT: NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe appointed Charles T. Horner III to be NASA's liaison to Capitol Hill on May 10. Horner's appointment to be assistant administrator for legislative affairs is effective immediately, according to NASA.
Competition over funds from the Defense Department's 2002 supplementary funding requests is holding up money for the Air Force's High-Band signals intelligence (SIGINT) system, according to sources familiar with the program. Congress directed the Air Force in March to use funding from the 2002 emergency supplemental to fund its High-Band SIGINT system, which is expected eventually to go on the Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle. The Air Force never saw that money, according to sources.
AUTOROTATION: An inability to perform an autorotative landing is not the "fatal flaw" of the V-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft, according to Chief Test Pilot Tom MacDonald. In an autorotative descent, a helicopter that has lost engine power uses the natural pinwheel-like spinning of its rotor to provide a cushion for landing. "The autorotation is a big issue with people that don't understand the V-22 ... and consider that to be a fatal flaw, and it really is not," MacDonald says.
