.S. Navy expects finally to release its draft request for proposals (RFP) for a new unmanned combat air system designed for carrier use within the next few weeks. The forthcoming draft RFP has been long awaited by Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing and General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, who all are under contract with the Navy to review their design bids for the forthcoming program.
Saab and Pilatus have signed a memorandum of understanding under which the two companies will offer the Pilatus PC-21 trainer to the Swedish air force as a replacement for the Saab SK 60. The announcement comes less than two months before a close-fought Swiss referendum affirms or rejects the government’s decision to buy 22 Saab JAS 39E Gripen fighters, and Saab CEO and president Håkan Buskhe linked the deals:
PARIS — French space agency CNES has advanced plans to develop and launch the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission with NASA, and is also starting work on an operational constellation of electromagnetic intelligence satellites. The agency’s board of directors met March 31 to assess the status of SWOT and authorized CNES to sign an agreement with NASA defining the agencies’ respective roles.
Key members of the team that developed and flew Qinetiq’s record-setting Zephyr solar-powered high-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aircraft have joined Facebook’s project to deliver basic Internet services to everyone around the world. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has revealed that the social media company’s Connectivity Lab is working on using unmanned aircraft, satellites and laser links to expand Internet coverage. Search-engine giant Google is experimenting with stratospheric balloons for the same mission, under its Loon project.
NEW DELHI — The test launch of India’s heaviest rocket, the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) Mk. 3, anticipated to take place in April, has been put off by two months, a senior scientist says. On March 28, scientists at the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) moved the rocket’s core stage, weighing more than 110 tons, from the Liquid Propulsion Systems Center at Mahendragiri in Tamil Nadu to the spaceport in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh in south India.
With the Indian navy acquiring advanced warships, the country plans to buy about 12 boom defense systems (BDS) to be used as a means of preventing sabotage and clandestine attacks by surface craft and divers against ships in harbor and anchorage. “We have issued a global tender to buy the BDS, which would also be capable of tangling the running gear of boats entering restricted areas,” a defense ministry official says. The navy also seeks to determine whether the system can foul propellers and rudders on small boats entering restricted waters.
Boeing has revealed the first details of the air-launched microsatellite launcher it is developing for the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency’s (Darpa) Airborne Launch Assist Space Access (Alasa) program. Conventional boosters comprise a stack of stages, each with its own engines and fuel tanks. Usually of decreasing size, these stages are discarded sequentially as the payload is boosted into orbit.
The U.S. Navy had some success mating Littoral Combat Ships and DDG destroyers with helicopters and a vertical takeoff and landing tactical unmanned aerial vehicle (VTUAV) in late-March LCS wargames, says Rear Adm. Thomas Rowden, director of surface warfare.
BEIJING — South Korea’s Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) will ask Lockheed Martin to invest up to 20% in the development of the proposed indigenous KF-X fighter, local media report. DAPA, which approved purchase of the Lockheed Martin F-35 on March 23, will begin negotiations next week with the U.S. Air Force on prices of the aircraft, to be supplied under the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) process, and with the manufacturer on offsets.
ASTEROID ALTERNATIVES: The chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology is criticizing the Obama administration for continuing to “push” its proposed Asteroid Retrieval Mission, “without any connection to a larger exploration road map and absent support from the scientific community or NASA’s own advisory bodies.” Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) points instead to a “promising” proposal for a flyby mission to Mars and Venus in 2021 that his committee recently heard testimony on.
No matter the audience, U.S. Navy officials are making one thing clear: there is nothing more important to them than securing the nation’s program to build submarines to replace the SSBN Ohio-class fleet of nuclear-armed submarines. “The Ohio-class replacement is our priority,” says Sean Stackley, Navy assistant secretary for research, development and acquisition. “We are doing everything we can to protect the funding.”
SANTIAGO, Chile — Chile’s armed forces are looking at a requirement for around 11 small transport aircraft, potentially kicking off yet another dual between the Alenia Aermacchi C-27J and the Airbus Defense & Space C295. The army here is looking for roughly three aircraft, with the air force considering as many as eight, industry officials say.
BEIJING — Full-scale development of Japan’s next major space launcher will begin on April 1, following the formal, and expected, selection of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) as prime contractor.
While the U.S. Navy plans to put a higher percentage of its ships in the Pacific as part of the Pentagon’s rebalancing of forces to the region, financial constraints are cutting into the actual number of ships being sent, causing concern among Senate Armed Services Committee members. The rebalance called for the percentage of ships to increase to about 60% from about half of the overall fleet, notes Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla). But thanks to sequestration and related cuts, there are fewer ships available. “It’s 60 percent of a smaller number,” he says.
