CORPS MISSION: U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has indeed chosen Marine Corps Gen. James Amos to be the next commandant and Lt. Gen. Joseph Dunford to be the next assistant commandant, as expected. “I am convinced that Gen. Amos and Lt. Gen. Dunford are the right team to lead the U.S. Marine Corps at this time, especially as it balances the capabilities needed to support current operations, its unique maritime heritage and its future role defending America,” Gates said in a Pentagon statement. The announcement was leaked to several news organizations a week before.
PARIS — The Eumetsat council has given a provisional green light for development of the Meteosat Third Generation (MTG) constellation, clearing the way for the space segment to be put on contract.
Boeing has shifted the second P-8A to the Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md., to support the U.S. Navy maritime patrol aircraft’s development program, and the company also is finishing up work on the third and final flight test aircraft. The second P-8A, designated T-2, is the first with the primary mission system. The aircraft, which first flew with the mission equipment installed on June 8, was shifted to Pax River on June 19.
The Pentagon shift in focus from Iraq to Afghanistan last year did little to blunt the military’s appetite for ground vehicle acquisition. The Defense Department shelled out about $19.3 billion for tracked and wheeled vehicles in 2009, making ground vehicles the leading Pentagon expense for the second consecutive year, according to an exclusive Aerospace DAILY analysis of contracting data provided by the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting.
2009 PENTAGON SPENDING ON TRACKED COMBAT, ASSAULT AND TACTICAL VEHICLES 2009 PENTAGON SPENDING ON TRACKED COMBAT, ASSAULT AND TACTICAL VEHICLES CONTRACTOR NUMBER OF CONTRACTS AND MODIFICATIONS TOTAL AMOUNT FOR CONTRACTS AND MODIFICATIONS AVERAGE AMOUNT PER TRANSACTION BAE SYSTEMS 317 $5,054,821,783 $15
NEW DELHI – The delayed launch of the Indian Space Research Organization’s (ISRO) Cartosat-2B 0.8-meter resolution remote-sensing satellite from Sriharikota spaceport is now expected in mid-July, Aerospace DAILY has learned. Previously scheduled for May 9, the flight was delayed following the discovery during routine pre-launch checks of a marginal drop in pressure in the second stage of the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (Aerospace DAILY, April 30).
INTEL LEADS: The U.S. Defense Department is expected to offset a “dip” in its total research, development, test and evaluation spending with more money toward ground forces supplies, services and technologies, according to consultancy Frost & Sullivan.
ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. Navy is reimagining certain aspects of naval power, but if new capabilities proposed for procurement do not “come from the sea,” Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary Roughead says he is not interested in them.
A majority of U.S. aerospace and defense (A&D) executives surveyed by Accenture said they had no confidence in their companies’ abilities to develop future leaders, underscoring other worries about the state of the A&D industry’s workforce.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — An Obama administration proposal to use $100 million from a revamped NASA exploration program budget to mitigate the effect of upcoming layoffs in the aerospace industry would be particularly generous to Florida, which will begin disbursing more than $31 million in state funds for space industry initiatives on July 1.
PARIS — French defense armaments agency DGA has selected Thales’s Network & Infrastructure Systems unit to define an IP-based satellite communications ground network that could complement the ground segment built for France’s Syracuse III secure satcom constellation.
2009 PENTAGON SPENDING ON WHEELED VEHICLES 2009 PENTAGON SPENDING ON WHEELED VEHICLES CONTRACTOR NUMBER OF CONTRACTS OR MODIFICATIONS TOTAL AMOUNT OF CONTRACTS OR MODIFICATIONS AVERAGE AMOUNT PER CONTRACT OR MODIFICATION OSHKOSH 57 $1,847,753,033 $32,416,720 AM G
Boeing is assessing the future of its popular Delta II launcher, but plans to offer the vehicle to customers for another year before a decision is made on whether to pull the plug on the program. Roger Krone, Boeing Network & Space System president, says there are still five “uncommitted” launchers in the current production block — vehicles that are not yet under construction. Discussions are now underway to match the commitments with actual launches.
VOTE OF CONFIDENCE: NASA has picked Orbital Sciences Corp. of Dulles, Va., to launch the Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) satellite in February 2013 aboard a Taurus XL 3110 rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The estimated total cost for the launch services is $70 million. Designed to create a global map of carbon dioxide emission sources in support of climate change research, the first OCO was lost in February 2009 when the fairing failed to open on its Taurus XL. Orbital also built the OCO satellite, and is building OCO-2.
GROUND BASES: The U.S. Air Force has chosen Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo., and Ellsworth Air Force Base, S.D., for the MQ-1 and MQ-9 ground control stations. The MQ-1 station will be the first squadron and the MQ-9 will be the second, according to a USAF statement. Each base will have an addition of 280 people, both military and civilian. Initial operational capability for the first squadron at Whiteman is expected by February 2011, while the second squadron at Ellsworth is planned by May 2012.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — NASA managers this week plan to request new launch dates for the final two shuttle flights to accommodate preparations on space station equipment slated to fly on the STS-133 mission, originally targeted for September. If approved, NASA would postpone until Oct. 29 the launch of shuttle Discovery on STS-133, which includes installation of the modified Multi-Purpose Logistics Module Leonardo cargo carrier for long-duration flight on the station and delivery of spare parts for several key station systems.
AIR FORCE General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc., Poway, Calif., was awarded a $24,044,533 contract which will provide for a quantity of four MQ-9 Reaper aircraft (two production aircraft and two ground maintenance trainers). At this time, the entire amount has been obligated. 703 ASG/PK, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, is the contracting activity (FA8620-05-G-3028).
Boeing is betting that it will able to expand its already sizeable role in the satellite communications market by offering “hosted payload” capacity to military or commercial users.
NAS PATUXENT RIVER, Md. — Lockheed Martin and its teammates plan to add resources to F-35 Joint Strike Fighter flight testing to ensure the program stays on a revised schedule that extends development by 13 months. At the U.S. Navy’s test center at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md., where four short-takeoff-and-vertical-landing (Stovl) F-35Bs are now based, the industry team is set to add 80 engineers, maintainers and test operations personnel to step up the pace of flying.
The Boeing 747-400-based Airborne Laser (ABL) Test Bed for the U.S. military is now firing its high-power chemical laser at three to four times the range seen in the original shootdown exercise, according to Boeing.
PARIS — EADS Astrium has orbited a second commercial X-band radar satellite, Tandem-X, that in combination with TerraSAR-X, launched in 2007, will provide 1-meter resolution three-dimensional radar imagery.
NEW DELHI — India is expected to release a request for proposals soon for outsourcing maritime air surveillance of the country’s coastline. “We are hoping the Request for Proposal will be out soon,” says Lee Griffiths, head of Cobham in India, which plans to bid on the work with an Indian partner.
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. — There is a huge hole in U.S. ballistic missile defenses that air-to-air weapons — fired from fighters or unmanned aircraft fitted with long-range sensors — may soon be able to fill.
