LANGKAWI, Malaysia — Indonesia, which will soon become a manufacturer and marketer of the Airbus Military C295, is considering off-loading its unwanted Indonesian air force Fokker F27s by offering the Dutch-made aircraft in conjunction with the sale of new C295s.
THE PENTAGON — While U.S. Navy and media reports continue to surface questioning the survivability and combat capability of the service’s Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) fleet, the service’s leading admiral now overseeing the program says the vessel’s survivability is a package deal that combines aspects of ship design, operations and even paint scheme.
U.S. and Russian astronauts, strapped in Russia’s Soyuz TMA-08M spacecraft, lifted off late March 28 on the first “expedited” rendezvous and docking with the International Space Station, a four-orbit, 6-hr. transit that mission managers will evaluate as a replacement for the standard two-day voyage.
LONDON — The U.K. Royal Air Force is exploring the possible use of a new Boeing C-17 Globemaster simulator opened by FlightSafety International at Farnborough. The new and yet-to-be-announced simulator, which was completed by the company in conjunction with Boeing at the end of 2012, is the second C-17 flight simulation facility outside the U.S. The other is owned by the Royal Australian Air Force and is located at Amberley, Queensland.
NEW DELHI — BAE Systems is looking at new joint programs with India’s Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. (HAL) beyond the ongoing Hawk advanced jet trainer. “Our business relationship with HAL should go beyond Hawk to work on new projects in 17 countries across the world where we have our presence,” BAE Chairman Dick Olver says. HAL currently produces the Hawk Mk. 132 under license from the British aerospace firm. Of the 123 Hawks that India is buying, 24 were delivered in a fly-away condition by BAE, while the remaining 99 are being manufactured by HAL.
Aviation Week MRO Military April 17-18, 2013 Atlanta, GA Reduce costs through partnerships and better forecasting, sustainment, and product support strategies Briefings will cover: -- GFY 2013 and 2014 budget reviews and their impact to MRO business -- Global defense sustainment market forecasts -- Industry perspectives on sustainment and sequestration
The U.S. Air Force could clear the Delta IV rocket for flight as soon as May as investigators work to finish a mishap investigation for the Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne RL10B2 upper stage.
LONDON — With the signing of the U.K. government’s search-and-rescue (SAR) helicopter deal on March 26, Bristow is set to become the launch customer of the AgustaWestland AW189 medium helicopter.
LOS ANGELES — European Space Agency (ESA) researchers evaluating a hypersonic concept demonstrator called Hexafly are studying the potential of flight testing two different scaled versions of the same Mach 8 vehicle.
NASA’s fiscal 2014 budget request will include $100 million for a new mission to find a small asteroid, capture it with a robotic spacecraft and bring it into range of human explorers somewhere in the vicinity of the Moon.
LANGKAWI, Malaysia — Indonesia’s Air Chief Marshal Ida Bagus Putu Dunia, who was appointed in December, is open to the government’s decision to allow more commercial access to Jakarta’s Halim Perdanakusuma Airport, which is a base for military transports. “We are supportive of the government’s decision. They are still working on that. There are some decisions [still to come] regarding operations at Halim. But we are happy for airlines to use Halim,” Ida Bagus told Aviation Week on the sidelines of this week’s LIMA Airshow in Malaysia.
Global climate change, increasing population and development are growing as national security issues, a U.S. State Department official said March 20. Kerri-Ann Jones, assistant secretary of State for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, says she is “seeing these issues now become more and more threats to stability. They’re foreign policy issues.”
CYBER GUARD: To counter the mounting number of cyber attacks, a group of senators led by Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) are working on legislation urging the Pentagon to train members of the National Guard to respond to cyber threats. The bill would establish Cyber Guard units in every state that could be activated by state governors or the Defense Secretary and would draw on the private-sector information technology expertise of National Guard members. The bill is aimed at offsetting a shortage of cyber experts across government.
TILTROTOR DOWNWASH: Financial analysts at RBC Capital Markets recently met with Textron management and came away sensing “frustration” concerning the multiyear procurement (MYP) deal with the U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) for V-22 tiltrotor aircraft. “If agreed in the currently proposed form then [subsidiary] Bell will see volumes come down from [around 40/year to about] 20 as the MYP procures 99 V-22s over a five-year period,” the analysts told investor clients.
Defense budget cuts in the U.S. and Europe have not crimped planned attendance at the 2013 Paris air show, according to show officials. The defense downturn is being offset by two key factors: an increase in the commercial market and an “economic war” to export defense products since domestic budgets are declining, says Paris air show Chairman Emeric D’Arcimoles. The U.S. Air Force is still planning to attend the show, but NASA, the U.S. Army and the Navy have canceled their participation, show officials say.
An International Launch Systems Proton rocket orbited Satmex 8 in a 9-hr., 13-min. mission flying from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan late March 26, putting the big Russian rocket back in business after a Dec. 8 anomaly left a Russian telecom satellite in a low orbit. Liftoff of the Proton/Briz M stack came at 3:07 p.m. EDT, and the upper stage placed the Space Systems/Loral bird in a geostationary transfer orbit after its standard five-burn flight profile.
The U.S. Air Force needs to improve the ways it justifies and manages its cost-reimbursable contracts, according to the Pentagon’s Inspector General (IG). “Of the 156 contracts reviewed, valued at about $10.5 billion, Air Force contracting personnel did not consistently implement the interim rule for 75 contracts, valued at about $8.8 billion,” the IG says in a report released earlier this month.
While most of the defense community has been expecting the U.S. Navy to reap the majority of the harvest from the nation’s Pacific Pivot and shift to Asia, Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter says all Pentagon forces will benefit. Speaking recently as part of a global panel at the third Jakarta International Defense Dialogue, or JIDD, Carter ticked off a series of programs and capabilities from the range of U.S. forces that will be needed to successfully accomplish the shift, the American Forces Press reports.
