Ft. MONMOUTH, N.J. — Airborne intelligence and surveillance is now becoming a major, perhaps indispensable, tool for network and electronic attack. The U.S. Army has grasped the idea that to give digital weapons a chance for success in the battlefield, ISR (intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) must be available to find emitters, identify them, map the networks they operate with, and precisely locate the nodes of importance for digital or electronic attack or exploitation.
FORCE RESTRUCTURE: The U.S. Air Force’s proposed force realignment starting in Fiscal 2011 will be driven by so-called insourcing initiatives — targeted at reining in contracting spending — and evolving missions. Program-related actions previously announced make up more than 90% of the changes, with a third of the total revolving around contractor-to-civilian conversions, first unveiled a year ago.
Mergers and acquisition (M&A) activity in the aerospace and defense industry is bouncing back to pre-recession levels as lower prices and a better economic outlook lure buyers off the sidelines. PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) counted 68 aerospace & defense (A&D) transactions in the first quarter of 2010 worth $5.1 billion.
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, India — India’s BrahMos Aerospace Thiruvananthapuram Ltd (BATL) is ready with the first prototype of an indigenous airborne launcher developed for the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile. The air-launched version of the missile will be fitted to the Su-30 MKI aircraft. BATL Executive Director N.R. Vishnu Kartha tells AVIATION WEEK, “This is the first time a mobile launcher for [the] BrahMos missile is being manufactured. We are ready with the first prototype.”
LONDON — Liam Fox’s opening gambit as the U.K.’s secretary of state for defense includes the warning that “resources will be tight” and that the “organization and the structure” of the defense ministry will need to be re-examined. Fox was appointed May 12, the day after the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties agreed to a deal covering the formation of a coalition government. Conservative leader David Cameron replaces Labour’s Gordon Brown as prime minister, while the Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg becomes the deputy prime minister.
Managers at NASA headquarters are “pursuing” a robotic landing on the Moon or “other planetary body” within about four years to test precision landing and perhaps other technologies that will be needed to enable deep space exploration under the Obama administration’s emerging space policy. Before that, they will use vehicles developed for the Centennial Challenges lunar lander contest as flying testbeds for the technology, according to the official in charge of the effort.
BROUGHTON, Wales — Moisture-sensitive strain gauges on the propellers of the A400M’s TP400D turboprop engines that have slowed flight testing will likely be removed soon, opening the door for an increase in the pace of flight trials. The strain gauges are needed to measure stresses on the blades in flight. But because of poor weather at the primary flight test centers in Seville, Spain and Toulouse, the A400M in many cases could not fly, setting back the pace of flight trials.
The aerospace and defense (A&D) industry saw profits and backlog decline in 2009, but weathered the brutal economic downturn better than many other industries, a new study finds. Deloitte LLP’s May 11 analysis of 91 A&D companies and units worldwide found that the industry’s operating earnings decreased by 15% last year, to $47.9 billion. But the decline was mainly driven by large program write-offs at Boeing, EADS and BAE Systems.
WRIGHT-PATTERSON AFB, Ohio — U.S. Air Force officials are working to reduce the number of undefinitized contract actions (UCAs) used by the service to procure weapon systems as a result of some criticism that this procurement tool has been used too often.
U.S. military cyber-defense forces will be pulled into managing cyber-attack-triggered catastrophes just as they support large-scale natural disasters, former CIA chief James Woolsey predicts.
SECURE BORDERS: The Indian government is expediting efforts to upgrade flagging infrastructure in border areas, Defense Minister A.K. Antony assured members of the Parliamentary Consultative Committee that overlooks defense-related programs. “The government has authorized the Border Roads Organization (BRO) to outsource the job of airlifting machinery and material to difficult terrain, as assets of the Indian Air Force are overstretched,” Antony said in a statement from the defense ministry.
Deferred funding for maintenance and upgrades has left NASA’s laboratories ill-prepared for the work they are likely to face if Congress accepts the new emphasis on technology development for space exploration in the agency’s Fiscal 2011 budget request, a panel of the National Research Council has found.
LONDON — Iran is likely outgrowing the level of ballistic missile technology it can secure from North Korea, though previous worst-case fears about the speed of development of an intercontinental system have proved unfounded. The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) contends in its May 10 report, “Iran’s Ballistic Missile Capabilities,” that Tehran is unlikely to be able to field a liquid-propellant-based ballistic missile “capable of targeting Western Europe before 2014 or 2015.”
KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — The countdown for what is planned to be the last launch of space shuttle Atlantis began at 4 p.m. EDT on May 11 here at Kennedy Space Center, with liftoff targeted for 2:20 p.m. EDT on May 14. The ship’s payload bay doors were closed for flight following a final inspection of the primary cargo for the STS-132 mission — the Russian-made Mini Research Module 1, or Rassvet, and the Integrated Cargo Carrier holding batteries, a space-to-ground antenna and other equipment for the International Space Station.
LCS PROGRESS: Manufacturer Lockheed Martin says its second Littoral Combat Ship — the USS Fort Worth, or LCS 3 — is about 40% complete and is on cost and on schedule. The ship is under construction at the Marinette Marine Shipyard in Wisconsin. “We’ve been able to bring down the cost” on the production of LCS 3 over LCS 1, says Paul Lemmo, vice president of business development for Lockheed Martin Mission Systems and Sensors.
PARIS — Intelsat engineers continue to pursue efforts to disable the payload on Galaxy 15, which has been drifting away from its orbital slot at 133 deg. W. Long. since it went out of control on April 5 and is threatening to interfere with surrounding satellites.
The labor union that represents workers on Boeing’s Long Beach, Calif., manufacturing line is now on strike after rejecting a company contract offer. The strike, which went into effect at 12:01 a.m. May 11, has brought production to a standstill and “could potentially” force delays of deliveries of the massive strategic airlifter to customers, a company spokesman says.
BRITISH RULE: After days of post-election uncertainty, leaders of the Conservative Party and the Liberal Democrats agreed to a deal May 11 that sees the conservative’s David Cameron become the British Prime Minister, replacing the Labour government that was led by Gordon Brown. The Conservatives won the largest number of seats in the May 6 election, with 306, though this fell 20 short of an overall majority. The Labour party won 258, and the Liberal Democrats 57.
ARMY AM General, LLC, South Bend, Ind., was awarded on May 5 a $54,264,735 firm-fixed-price contract to add 500 Humvees. The work is to be performed in Mishawaka, Ind., with an estimated completion date of Dec. 31, 2010. One bid was solicited with one bid received. TACOM Warren, CCTA-ATA-C, Warren, Mich., is the contracting activity (DAAE07-01-C-S001).
The upshot of closed-door talks between top NASA officials and various congressional and academic opinion leaders will get a public airing this week, when the Senate Commerce Committee hears testimony on “the future of U.S. human space flight.” The May 12 hearing will include testimony from NASA Administrator Charles Bolden; John Holdren, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy; Apollo astronauts Neil Armstrong and Eugene Cernan; and Norm Augustine, chair of the U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee.
