In the wake of recent pilot breathing problems in the U.S. Air Force’s F-22 Raptor cockpits, the U.S. Navy says there are no spikes in similar issues with its F-18 aircraft, even though an Air Force report cites such incidents. “The F-18 has experienced a significant number of hypoxia-like events over the past few years,” says the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) Report on Aircraft Oxygen Generation completed earlier this year and released last month.
KUALA LUMPUR — Malaysia’s navy is still lobbying the government for budget approval to buy six anti-submarine (ASW) helicopters, and also wants more submarines. The deputy chief of the navy, Vice Adm. Mohammed Noordin bin Ali, says the service still has to get government budget approval for the helicopter buy.
China is focusing on sea-centric ballistic missiles and nuclear warhead-hiding tunnels because the country lacks the kind of robust deterrent and warning systems to thwart a missile attack that the U.S. possesses, says Linton Brook, a former ambassador and retired U.S. Navy captain who was chief negotiator for the START treaty.
The U.S. UAV commercial market could very well take off as the Afghanistan war cools and new federal mandates spur business interest in the platforms, according to a leading aviation law firm.
NASA is considering a prize challenge to accelerate the integration of unmanned aircraft into civil airspace. Two competitions of increasing complexity would be run in late 2013 and 2014 with a combined prize purse of $1.5 million. Under its Centennial Challenges program, NASA has previously staged competitions designed to engage the public in advancing technology for space elevators, electric aircraft, lunar landers and regolith excavation.
KUALA LUMPUR — Australia’s navy, which has 24 Sikorsky MH-60R anti-submarine warfare helicopters on order, will start sending crews to the U.S. in January for training on the new type. Cmdr. Grant O’Loughlan, commander of the squadron that will operate the helicopter, says the navy is buying two full-flight mission simulators, but it will take time before the service is ready to start conducting its own MH-60R training courses.
After publicly pledging to bring back the F-22 Raptor, and then having campaign surrogates adjust his message in favor of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is now keeping “any and all options on the table” when it comes to the Air Force’s future fleet of tactical fighters.
The U.S. Navy continues to expand the mission envelope for its destroyer and cruiser fleets, proving in a recent exercise the vessels can handle evacuation operations normally done by much bigger ships. Guided-missile cruiser CG-64USS Gettysburg took part in a simulated, non-combatant evacuation operation (NEO) Oct. 8 off the coast of Scotland. The exercise included evacuating 11 Royal Navy midshipmen posing as citizens in simulated danger from Mallaig, Scotland, to the Gettysburg on two rigid-hull inflatable boats (RHIBs).
Textron has taken a $14 million third-quarter charge to cover increased costs on starting up unmanned aircraft fee-for-service operations for the U.S. Defense Department. In April, Textron company AAI Corp. won a contract to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) services for U.S. Special Operations Command (Socom) using the Aerosonde small unmanned aircraft system.
F-35 MILESTONES: The F-35 program achieved two milestones this week. AF-1, an F-35A conventional takeoff-and-landing aircraft, jettisoned its first munition, a 2,000 lb. Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) Oct. 17 during a flight test at Edwards AFB, Calif. This is the second weapons drop for the program. While weapons testing continues, the U.S. Marine Corps is continuing to prepare for standup of its first operational F-35B squadron.
An information technology trade group foresees Pentagon spending declining about 3% in inflation-adjusted dollars during the next decade. TechAmerica Foundation’s latest annual forecast, highlighted in an Oct. 16 Washington briefing, sees base spending following a gradual downward slope from $525 billion in fiscal 2013 to $506 billion in fiscal 2023, as measured in constant 2013 dollars. Current projections from Pentagon planners and the White House Office of Management and Budget project a slight upward slope to $553 billion in the same period.
Poland has recently announced plans to replace some of its Soviet-built fighter aircraft with armed UAVs. “By 2018, we should have three squadrons [of armed UAVs],” says Waldemar Skrzypczak, Poland’s vice minister of defense. He adds that the country’s armed forces might purchase up to 30 combat UAVs.
A research advisory group is cautioning the FAA “to avoid the temptation to compromise safety” as the agency attempts to meet a congressionally mandated 2015 deadline to integrate unmanned aircraft into the national airspace system (NAS). The observation highlights what appears to be growing frustration with the FAA over a range of research and organizational issues as the mandate nears.
Given a second chance to compete for a U.S. Air Force air defense radar program, Northrop Grumman is proposing a system based on an active, electronically scanned array (AESA) mobile radar under development for the U.S. Marine Corps. The company re-entered the Three-Dimensional Expeditionary Long-Range Radar (3DELRR) competition in August, when the Air Force awarded contracts each worth around $35 million to Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Northrop Grumman.
CYBER BILL: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has pledged to bring up cybersecurity legislation that was previously blocked by Republicans during Congress’s lame-duck session. The question remains, however, whether the bill has any better chance of passing than it did when blocked this summer by Senate Republicans and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Bill co-sponsor Sen.
Neither of the two men running for Virginia’s open U.S. Senate seat this November — Republican George Allen and rival Democrat Tim Kaine — can match the military experience of their predecessors. The state has been represented by former Navy secretaries since 1979 and is one of the nation’s most defense-rich states. Prime contractors in Virginia earned more than $54.85 billion in 2011, according to the Center for Security Policy’s study of defense contracting dollars, making oversight of the federal defense procurement process a key issue for the job.
Guatemala’s congress has approved the purchase of six Embraer A-29 Super Tucano light-attack aircraft for counter-narcotics missions, funded by a $170 million loan from banks in Argentina and Brazil. According to local reports, the deal will include the aircraft, a tactical command and control center and radars, including three supplied by Argentina, for a project to build a system to monitor and protect the Mayan biosphere.
