BENGALURU, India — India’s Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) is developing a range of protective clothing that includes jackets, vests, shoe insoles and heated gloves for pilots. “Though the majority of our soldiers and pilots are acclimatized to hostile terrains in the frontier areas and battle zones, it is pivotal to protect them from head to foot,” says a senior scientist with DRDO’s Bengaluru-based Defense Bio-Engineering and Electro-medical Laboratory (Debel).
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INDIAN RADIO: India’s indigenously developed software-defined radio (SDR) is currently undergoing advanced trials with the Indian armed forces, according to Jayaram Pillai, managing director of manufacturer National Instruments. “It can perform multitasking jobs including transmitting voice, video, text and images,” Pillai says. “We are confident that the Indian armed forces will benefit from our next-generation SDR. We developed the SDR in the shortest time with around 10-15 engineers involved with the program.”
Boeing plans to start assembly of the first of six low-rate initial production (LRIP) P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft by midyear, following the award of a $1.6 billion U.S. Navy contract. The LRIP-1 contract includes spares, logistics and training devices, and comes as Boeing continues to make rapid progress with the first batch of flight and ground test aircraft under the P-8A System Development and Demonstration (SDD) contract awarded in 2004.
SAN FRANCISCO — Boeing’s fourth-quarter and full-year results for 2010 declined for both its commercial airplanes and defense units on lower-than-expected revenues from the 787 and 747-8 programs, flat military returns and lower volume in network and space systems.
JOLLY ROGERS: New tactics being employed by pirates off the cost of Somalia are forcing the U.S. Navy to take stronger measures against the maritime terrorists. Pirates have begun to commandeer large merchant ships and use them as “mother ships” to deploy smaller boats from the coast and beyond the reach of U.S. Navy and other forces, Navy Vice Adm. Mark Fox, commander of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command and the U.S. 5th Fleet, told a group of defense reporters in Washington Jan. 26.
LONDON — Airbus Military now believes last week’s incident in which the refueling boom detached from one of its KC-30As occurred because the contact with the Portuguese F-16 was mistakenly made outside the boom’s required operating envelope.
Analysis of far-infrared data collected during the Hubble Space Telescope’s Ultra Deep Field observations has turned up what scientists believe to be the earliest galaxy ever spotted, pointing the way for more discoveries with the planned James Webb Space Telescope. According to a scientific paper on the discovery to be published in the journal Nature, the compact galaxy of blue stars — merely one one-hundredth the size of the Milky Way — existed only 480 million years after the Big Bang.
FRANKFURT — As expected, Germany is further reducing the number of Airbus A400M military airlifters slated for its air force. The parliamentary budget committee on Jan. 26 approved of an order for 53 of the aircraft, but 13 are to be remarketed for exports (Aerospace DAILY, Jan. 26).
PARIS — French space leaders believe that bringing all the nations involved in the Ariane launch system into the shareholding structure of Arianespace will help ensure the long-term stability of the system, following a recapitalization last month.
The Pentagon expects to increase its purchase of U.S. Army Enhanced Medium-Range Surveillance System (Emarss) aircraft in the forthcoming Fiscal 2012 budget request, according to a defense official. The original procurement of Emarss platforms was expected to be six aircraft in low-rate initial production. The Pentagon will propose an additional 12, for a total of 18, this official says.
PARIS — Eurocopter reported a 6% rise in revenues in 2010 to €4.8 billion ($6.6 billion), despite another drop in unit deliveries to 527 aircraft, from 558 a year earlier, thanks to continued strong demand for high-cost medium and heavy-lift models and sustained service growth. However, bookings slid to €4.3 billion, from €5.8 billion in 2009, even though unit orders remained virtually unchanged, reflecting a drop-off in military demand and the continued poor health of the commercial market.
SUPER TRIAL: Northrop Grumman Corp.’s Aegis-equipped guided missile destroyer William P. Lawrence (DDG 110) successfully completed a combined super trial last week in the Gulf of Mexico, the company says. Northrop expects to deliver the ship — the final DDG 51 Flight IIA ship currently under contract — to the Navy in the next six weeks. It is the company’s 28th destroyer.
CUTBACKS: An influential group of anti-spending House Republicans last week proposed a plan to cut $2.5 trillion in U.S. outlays over a decade. Among several items, their proposal calls for scrapping the U.S. Trade Development Agency, the Essential Air Service program, the Technology Innovation Program, the Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program, the Economic Development Administration, Applied Research at the Department of Energy, ending “prohibitions on competitive sourcing of government services” and repealing the Davis-Bacon Act.
FRANKFURT — Germany plans to further reduce the number of Airbus Military A400Ms its air force will operate. The Bundestag’s budget committee is expected to follow a proposal made by the ruling coalition to use only 40 of the 53 A400Ms the country plans to order. The issue is on the committee’s Jan. 26 agenda. Juergen Koppelin, a high-ranking member of the liberal Free Democratic Party, says 13 aircraft will be returned to Airbus for export sales.
There are no direct military benefits within the next decade from using alternative fuels, and the Pentagon should cut back efforts to certify biofuels in aircraft and ships as they far outpace commercial availability, concludes a congressionally directed study by Rand Corp.
PARIS — Russia and France have concluded an intergovernmental agreement to cooperate in building Mistral-class helicopter carriers for the Russian armed forces. The agreement, signed Jan. 25 by French Defense Minister Alain Juppe and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin, follows a Russian decision on Dec. 24 to award construction of two 20,000-metric-ton-class helicopter carrier/assault ships to France’s DCNS-STX and St. Petersburg-based OSK.
BENGALURU, India — A former director of the Tejas Light Combat Aircraft program is recommending that India focus its energies on cutting costs and development times in its future aircraft programs. “Today the aviation market has shifted from North America and Europe to Asia and in particular India, so what we need is [to manufacture aircraft that are] cost-effective with the best operational capabilities,” said Kota Harinarayana during his keynote address at the India Defense and Aerospace Symposium 2011 here Jan. 25.
PARIS — Researchers at the University of Surrey in England and Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL) have developed a nanosatellite equipped with a smartphone avionics payload that could help reduce the cost and lead time of developing satellites.
PARIS — Saab has handed over the central and forward fuselage section for Europe’s Neuron unmanned combat aerial vehicle, marking a major step forward in the French-led, six-nation stealth demonstration program. The Saab subassembly will be mated to the rear fuselage section, which was delivered by Helenic Aerospace Industries (HAI) in mid-January.
European Space Agency (ESA) engineers have upgraded the Large Space Simulator (LSS) at the European Space Research and Technology Center (Estec) to prepare for the upcoming BepiColombo mission to Mercury, where the spacecraft will encounter temperatures much hotter than those found at planets further from the Sun. Mercury’s orbit takes it within 46 million km. (29 million mi.) of the Sun, while Earth averages about 150 million km. (93 million mi.).
PARIS — Eurocopter will start development this year of an all-new replacement for its venerable 4-5-metric-ton Dauphin/Panther helicopter and is poised to launch a new hybrid helicopter model as well.
