To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected]. (Bold type indicates new calendar listing.) Nov. 30 - Dec, 1 — Military Airlift & Rapid Reaction Operations 2009, Hilton Frankfurt, Frankfurt, Germany. For more information go to www.smi-online.co.uk Dec. 1-2 — Aerosolutions’ Business Convention for Aeronautics, Space and Defense, Palais de Congress, Bordeaux, France. For more information go to www.aerosolutions-bordeaux.com
LAYING ODDS: Look for a huge sigh of relief in Seattle and Chicago now that Paddy Power, which helpfully informs us it is Ireland’s largest bookmaker, is rating the Boeing 787 as the best bet to fly before the Airbus A400M. It puts the odds of the 787 flying first at 1-2; the 400M comes in at 6-4. The fact that the 787 is a passenger aircraft and the A400M a military transport makes no difference to the bookies. Paddy Power notes that all prices remain subject to fluctuation.
KOREAN AEGIS: Lockheed Martin Maritime Systems and Sensors, Moorestown, N.J., is being awarded a $41.1 million foreign military sales contract add-on for installation and test of the U.S. Navy/Lockheed Martin Aegis Combat System on a new South Korean destroyer. These requirements also include systems engineering, computer program development and ship integration to deliver a variant of the Aegis Baseline 7 Phase I computer program and equipment to support the construction of the second Korean ship in the KDX-III class. Work is expected to be completed by December 2010.
RUSSIAN HELOS: The Afghan National Army Air Corps (Anaac) soon will be flying its four new Russian-made Mi-17 helicopters following their recent delivery from U.S. Naval Air Systems (Navair). The order for the aircraft was placed July 30. The Navy International Programs Office was a key partner in acquiring the Mi-17s for Anaac, according to Navair. The aircraft, each of which has less than 10 hours of flight time, will provide the Anaac with combat airlift, logistical and medical evacuation support.
LONDON British technology company Qinetiq is aiming for a 14-day duration flight next summer using the initial production standard of its Zephyr high-altitude long-endurance solar powered unmanned aerial vehicle. The structure for the latest version of the UAV, the Zephyr 7, has now been put together. Several design refinements have been introduced to increase efficiency, with the intent of allowing the air vehicle to maintain a higher cruise altitude at night.
WEAPONS HANDLING: By 2011, the U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center will have a brand new, $19.1 million Weapons Armaments Packaging, Handling, Storage and Transportation (PHS&T) facility at the Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey. Under BRAC (Base Realignment And Closure) recommendations, the Navy is transferring PHS&T functions from Earle Naval Weapons Station to Picatinny as part of an integrated weapons and armament specialty site for guns and ammunition. The 46,100 square foot facility will have room for 65 engineers and scientists.
SHOW AND TELL: The U.S. Office of Naval Research plans to demonstrate a prototype autonomous collision avoidance system (ACAS) for the RQ-7B Shadow and MQ-8B Fire Scout to meet FAA demands for a sense-and-avoid system enabling the tactical unmanned aircraft to access civil airspace. The system must detect all cooperative and non-cooperative targets within 10-15 kilometers of the UAV, but cannot weigh more than 10-15 pounds or consume more than 300 watts average power.
BATTERY SWAP: The U.S. Navy expects its submarine fleet will enjoy extra months of submarine operational availability after the early completion of a battery installation aboard the USS Hampton. The Valve Regulated Lead Acid (VRLA) battery installation was completed in 103 days, a significant improvement over the previous best of 122 days aboard the USS Boise, according to the service.
NAVAL CONTROL: The U.S. Navy will eventually introduce its MQ-8B Fire Scout vertical takeoff unmanned aerial vehicle (VTUAV) aboard its entire fleet of Littoral Combat Ships. In the meantime, Fire Scout is being put through its paces aboard the USS McInerney. Recently, the Navy deployed Raytheon’s Tactical Control System aboard the ship to operate Fire Scout as it performs counternarcotics missions in Central America. Raytheon noted its system provides the government unlimited rights to develop UAV control across missions, applications and air vehicles.
The U.S. commercial space industry is now at a point in its development at which the computer and personal electronics industries were about 10 years ago, says Mark Sirangelo, chairman of Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) Space Systems and the Commercial Spaceflight Federation. Ten years ago, a lack of broadband connectivity prevented consumer electronics companies from rolling out new products and services, but once broadband penetration reached about 30 percent in the U.S., markets for devices such as the Apple iPod took off, Sirangelo said.
BRAZILIAN BIOFUEL: Embraer and partners are planning a demonstration flight in early 2012 using a sugar-cane derived alternative fuel. The fuel, to be developed by Amyris, will be used on an Azul Linhas regional jet. Engine supplier General Electric also is part of the undertaking. The partners say the fuel has already been tested by the U.S. Air Force.
DEEP BLUE GREEN: Northrop Grumman officials announced last week that the U.S. Navy awarded it a $635 million cost plus fixed-fee/level-of-effort contract for engineering, design and modernization support for new construction, operational and decommissioning submarines through 2014. The company’s Shipbuilding sector in Newport News, Va., is the prime contractor for the work on both the Los Angeles-class and Seawolf-class submarines, which includes technical support, management of technical manuals and drawings, and design efforts to support modernization of the boats.
Engineers at Mission Control Centers Houston and Moscow are evaluating whether Russia’s new Poisk mini-module may have somehow triggered a false depressurization alarm that cost the 12 space travelers on the International Space Station (ISS) and the space shuttle Atlantis a little sleep Nov. 19.
BIG RIGS: A total of eight supercomputers housed at the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration’s national labs have made the TOP500 list of most-powerful computer systems known in the world. Amongst three computers in the top 10 were Roadrunner (#2, Los Alamos National Laboratory); BlueGene/L (#7, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory); and Red Sky (#10, Sandia National Laboratories/National Renewable Energy Laboratory). The Dawn platform at Livermore ranked as the 11th fastest in the world.
SPACE NANOTUBES: Researchers are eyeing a variety of new applications for carbon-nanotube-based semiconductor devices, following the demonstration of a radiation-resistant version of carbon nanotube-based memory on the space shuttle. Developed jointly by Lockheed Martin and Nantero, the memory was tested in May during shuttle mission STS-125. The memory was incorporated by NASA into special autonomous testing configurations and installed into a carrier at the aft end of the payload bay.
THREAT RESPONSE: A bipartisan group of senators from U.S. states home to intercontinental ballistic missiles or their support structures are trying to underpin support for the nuclear weapons as the Obama administration and the Pentagon finalize their plans for the country’s strategic arsenal, including planned and hoped-for reductions. “As members of the Senate ICBM Coalition, we feel now is the time to clearly state why we believe intercontinental ballistic missiles remain crucial to U.S. national security,” say Sens.
The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) says the U.S. Army should repay a Saudi Arabian business for the company’s expenses in protesting an aircraft operations support contract award. Alsalam Aircraft Company of Riyadh asked GAO to recommend the Army reimburse the company’s protest costs for a contract awarded to Fort Worth-based DynCorp on behalf of the government of Saudi Arabia for maintenance, training, and other related work. The procurement was conducted under the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program,
FLANKER FUTURE: Manufacture of the first production-standard Sukhoi Su-35S fighters for the Russian air force is now underway, with delivery to take place in 2010. The air force ordered 48 Su-35S fighters in August, with deliveries to be completed by 2015. Sukhoi will in 2010 also deliver the first four Su-34 strike aircraft as part of an order for 32. Five pre-series Su-34s have been provided to the air force. While eight each of the upgraded Su-27SM Flankers and Su-24M2 Fencers have been delivered this year, there are no Sukhoi upgrade contracts expected for 2010.
Complex integration and the “art” of stealth have so far eluded China’s advanced fighter projects, but in the future, any failing will not be for lack of resources or technological insight.
PARIS — Talks between European defense state secretaries involved in the A400M military airlifter program Nov. 19 have failed to come to a resolution, with the big sticking point being disagreement among some of the main buyers over whether to provide contractual relief to the EADS-dominated consortium. Government representatives have said they will endeavor to come to an agreement by year’s end. To help secure a deal, the German government has said it will invite the state secretaries for another round of talks in early December.
TOMAHAWK STRIKE: A U.S. Navy Tomahawk Block IV cruise missile launched during an operational test earlier this month demonstrated the missile’s new anti-jam Global Positioning System and use against time-critical targets, acquisition officials claim. During the Nov. 5 test, the Tomahawk was launched from the USS Princeton (CG-59), a Ticonderoga-class Aegis cruiser off the coast of southern California. The missile flew a land-attack mission into San Nicolas Island in support of a combined U.S.-U.K.
LONDON — Technology company Qinetiq has picked former high court judge Robert Nelson to lead a formal investigation into the report’s conclusions and recommendations and has suspended two of its employees named in the report with full pay during the probe. The suspensions are believed to be a procedural process
