GUARD UP: Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Kit Bond (R-Mo.), co-chairs of the Senate National Guard Caucus, are requesting an additional $870 million for National Guard and reserves equipment upgrades. The Caucus request was sent to Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) and ranking Republican Thad Cochran (Miss.), who are beginning their panel’s annual lawmaking process for Fiscal 2011.
GALILEO CONTRACT: Ruag Space has been awarded a contract to supply central control computers for 14 satellites earmarked for the Full Operating Capability phase of the Galileo satellite navigation program. Ruag also will supply internal system communications and processor boards for satellite digital radio receivers under the €35 million ($42 million) award. Prime contractor OHB System says 26 subcontracts have been issued to date including one to Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. for payload integration.
Japan’s solar power sail demonstrator Ikaros has deployed its sail and begun generating power from the thin-film solar cells on the 200-sq.-meter membrane. Ikaros was launched on May 21 along with the Venus climate orbiter Akatsuki onboard an H-IIA rocket from Tanegashima Space Center on May 21. It began unfurling its sail on May 26 and completed deployment on June 10 (Japan time), according to the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).
Dassault Aviation and Thales say they would be open to cooperation on BAE’s Mantis medium-altitude long-endurance (MALE) UAV if it could ensure European independence in this rapidly growing segment. French armaments agency DGA recently indicated that it was entering discussions with General Atomics to acquire a number of Predators to complement its fleet of EADS Harfangs in Afghanistan. The DGA says it also received a firm offer from EADS for four additional Harfangs, and admits that a Predator purchase would depend on what sort of strings might be attached.
September 29-30, 2010 ExCeL • London, UK Learn to maintain military assets longer; sustain aircraft beyond forecast; recover from budget cuts, delays and program cancellations, and develop new strategies required to deliver and support equipment. Learn more at www.aviationweek.com/events
INITIAL OFFERING: Loral Space & Communications says its wholly owned affiliate Space Systems/Loral (SS/L) has filed for an initial public offering for up to 19.9% of SS/L’s common stock. Funds will be used to finance further growth and expansion, as well as to cover working capital and other general expenses. Loral also has a majority economic stake in satellite operator Telesat.
LEMV WIN: Northrop Grumman will build an unmanned surveillance airship to be deployed with the U.S. Army in Afghanistan, according to sources familiar with the program. The Long-Endurance Multi-intelligence Vehicle (LEMV) is a hybrid airship capable of staying aloft for at least 21 days above 20,000 ft., providing 16 kw. of power to a 2,500-lb. payload of electro-optical/infrared, radar and signals-intelligence sensors. Northrop Grumman has teamed with U.K.
SPACE SUIT: NASA is facing allegations in federal court it improperly withheld subcontracting reports from United Space Alliance (USA) that might show the agency funneled contracts counted toward its federal small business goals to USA, a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin. The suit by the American Small Business League charges NASA violated the Freedom of Information Act by “repeatedly” refusing to release the USA subcontracting reports.
CIVIL SIGNAL: The first GPS IIF navigation satellite, launched on May 27, is testing its new civil safety-of-life signal, L5. The new dedicated and protected frequency is designed to provide increased power and reduced interference, making the signal more robust for civil navigation. The Boeing-built GPS IIF-1 satellite (designated SVN-62) is the first with L5 designed in. The U.S. Air Force launched an L5 demonstration payload in March 2009 on the Lockheed Martin-built GPS IIR-20 satellite (SVN-49).
Twelve of the nineteen U.S. Coast Guard cutters that were sent to Haiti to respond to January’s devastating magnitude 7.0 earthquake required emergency maintenance while en route, and two had to be recalled from operations for emergency dry-dock repairs, according to a new report from the Center for American Progress (CAP).
The Afghan Air Corps is morphing into a functional airlift organization with Russian-made Mi-35 combat support helicopters and an initial force of five Alenia-refurbished C-27 light transports. A total force of 20 C-27s is to replace six aging and less capable Russian-made An-32 light airlifters.
To help build support for its Talarion medium-altitude long-endurance (MALE) UAV program during Europe’s difficult budget period, EADS is offering to pre-finance the development of the system if it gets a purchase commitment from its target customers that they will buy the surveillance and reconnaissance tool.
SPACE FUNDS: The European Commission is in negotiations for 108 space and security research projects. The projects, worth €324 million ($389 million), include two space efforts — African deforestation monitoring and spacecraft landing system accuracy and robustness for exploration missions — and a maritime border security initiative. NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will be involved in the space projects.
STAYING AWARE: The European Space Agency expects shortly to award a €4-million ($5-million) contract for a radar breadboard to help prepare Europe’s planned Space Situational Awareness (SSA) system. The breadboard is part of a €50-million preliminary phase for the SSA, which is expected to be cleared for full-scale development at the agency’s next ministerial summit in 2011-12, provided data policy and governance issues are resolved.
Boeing will demonstrate the tasking and control of multiple unmanned aircraft from an airborne mothership under a three-year, $9.8 million contract from the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory. The Foxhunt demonstration program supports AFRL’s vision of extending the sensor and weapon reach of a manned mothership by the airborne launch, control and recovery of multiple small unmanned aircraft.
The U.S. government still has not established plans to fully restore the environmental sensing capabilities removed from the Npoess and GOES-R satellite programs, and gaps in coverage are expected to begin in 2015, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). “Both Npoess and GOES-R were envisioned to fulfill requirements for weather, space weather, and climate monitoring,” GAO says in its report. “However, in 2006, both of these programs were restructured due to growing costs.”
The loss of South Korea’s second KSLV-1 launch vehicle, apparently to an explosion 137 sec. after liftoff, bodes ill for Russia’s space launch plans as well. South Korean officials suggested the vehicle’s Russian-built first-stage engine was to blame for the failure. That engine — the Energomash RD-151 — is a variant of the RD-191M engine planned for the first stage of Russia’s Angara 1.1 launch vehicle now in development.
BENGALURU, India — The Indian army version of the Akash missile system, valued at Rs 12,500 crore ($2.8 billion), has been cleared for induction by India’s Defense Acquisition Council (DAC). The India military services’ combined orders of the Defense Research and Development Organization-developed Akash, including two radars, have a total worth of Rs 23,300 crore. This is an unprecedented defense order for a DRDO-developed weapons system, and the biggest order ever for DRDO’s tactical missile and radar systems.
BERLIN - The U.S. has lost its lead in vital areas of space and will continue to give up business unless its export rules are relaxed to spur more international collaboration. That’s the verdict of Elliot Pulham, CEO of the Space Foundation, which is widely regarded as the foremost international advocate for all sectors of the global space economy. Pulham noted that the global space economy has grown more than 40% over the past five years to $261 billion in 2009, of which more than 70% is in commercial activities.
BERLIN — German transport and economics/technology ministry heads met during the ILA 2010 conference here to try to iron out differences holding up approval of the Meteosat Third Generation (MTG) weather satellite system. Ministry of transport dissatisfaction with the selection of a Thales Alenia Space-led team to negotiate a contract for the space segment of the €3.3 billion ($4.4 billion) system threatens to delay the start of development. The ministry represents Germany at Eumetsat, which will own and operate MTG.
France has quietly begun operations with the hand-launched DRAC unmanned aircraft — also known as Tracker — in Afghanistan. The first of the 120 UAVs that EADS has delivered to the French army have now started to gather imagery for the intelligence squadrons of brigades deployed as part of NATO’s International Security Assistance Force, according to industry officials. French special operations forces have been using the Elbit Skylark.
PARIS — European Space Agency (ESA) head Jean-Jacques Dordain says Europe will not embark on development of a cargo return capsule to serve the International Space Station until the ISS partners agree on common transportation requirements.
ANNAPOLIS, Md. and BERLIN — A decline of more than 20% in the value of the euro against the U.S. dollar is bolstering the competitiveness of Airbus and other European aerospace manufacturers while eroding a pricing advantage that a weak dollar has provided to Boeing and U.S. suppliers for several years.
