MOSCOW — Russia’s advanced S-500 air defense system could be developed in the next few years, according to the Russian Air Force commander, Col. Gen. Alexander Zelin. Development has already begun at the Almaz-Antey company, Zelin said, and the system is expected to be rolled out in 2012. The S-500 radar will have a detection range 150-200 kilometers longer than the S-400 (SA-21 Growler). The new complex is designed to attack up to 10 targets simultaneously. Each mobile complex will have bundle of six missiles, versus four with the S-400.
The U.S. Marines will soon deploy their new UH-1Y, or Yankee, to Afghanistan, and the service is banking on the increased capabilities of the upgraded helicopter. Afghanistan will present its own “unique challenges,” according to the H-1 Upgrade program manager, Col. Harry Hewson, who expressed confidence the Yankee would do well in the rugged environment.
ASIASAT ONLINE: AsiaSat 5 has begun commercial service operations at 100.5 deg. East longitude following its in-orbit checkout after an Aug. 12 launch on an International Launch Services Proton from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The Space Systems/Loral 1300 satellite, with 26 C-band and 14 ku-band transponders, is taking over pan-Asian services currently provided by the 13-year-old AsiaSat 2 from the same location. The traffic transfer is to be completed in a few weeks, Hong Kong-based Asia Satellite Telecommunications said Sept. 21.
The U.S. Army has opened a new office at Dugway Proving Ground, Utah, that consolidates the testing of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) payloads to allow for faster integration and fielding. The Rapid Integration and Acceptance Center (RIAC) is run by the U.S. Army Unmanned Aircraft Systems Project Office at Redstone Arsenal, Ala.
NATO faces a “deteriorating” situation in Afghanistan, with the next 12 months key to the outcome of the conflict, according to U.S. Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the force commander in theater. McChrystal warns in an assessment paper obtained by the Washington Post that there is an “urgent need for a significant change to our strategy and the way we think and operate.”
After years of insisting that payloads are more important than platforms, a series of proposed cuts in U.S. military intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) programs seem to indicate the Pentagon has changed its mind. But while the cuts and delays are real, the reasons seem more technology related than budget driven. There are in fact a number of interrelated technology improvements, all of them involving advanced radar designs, which will be affected by budgets for fiscal 2011 and beyond, according to military and industry sources.
PARIS — The Australian defense ministry is cancelling work to put the ALR-2002 radar warning receiver on its helicopters, apparently owing to concerns that doing the modification would impinge on the number of operationally available rotorcraft.
GREAT INVENTION: The U.S. Army will honor the top ten inventions of 2008, recognizing the best technology solutions for soldiers at a ceremony Sept. 21. Soldiers from three active duty divisions chose the winning inventions, which were fielded in 2008.
KNOT TIED: Intelsat General, the Intelsat unit specialized in government services, has picked EADS Astrium Services’ Paradigm unit as its preferred U.S. distributor for X-band and UHF services. The deal follows a $48 million agreement with DRS Technologies in 2008 to supply X-band capacity to the U.S. military using Paradigm’s Skynet satellites, and a contract later the same year to provide Skynet UHF capacity to the U.S. Navy.
Telesat’s Nimiq 5 telecommunications satellite was orbited by an International Launch Services (ILS) Proton Breeze M rocket Sept. 17 from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan. The Khunichev-built rocket launched from Pad 39 at Baikonur at 3:19 p.m. EDT (1:19 am Sept. 18 local time). The Breeze M upper stage deployed the five-ton satellite into geostationary transfer orbit after a 9 hour, 15 minute mission. This was the fifth commercial mission of the year for ILS and the seventh successful Proton launch of 2009.
MOTION MINING: With full-motion video streaming down from aircraft, manned and unmanned, and the Pentagon beginning to field wide-area airborne surveillance systems with multiple cameras, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is planning a program to develop software that can sift through hours and days of motion imagery in forensic mode to identify threat activity, and in near real-time to alert the user to developing threats. An industry day for the Persistent Stare Exploitation and Analysis System (PerSEAS) program is planned for Oct. 15 in Washington.
SATCOM STRATEGIES: Telesat CEO Dan Goldberg says the Canadian satcom operator has until the end of October to exercise an option to secure capacity on ViaSat-1, an 80-100-Gbps Ka-band satellite to be orbited by ViaSat in 2011. Goldberg notes that the broadband market in both Canada and the U.S. is strong and there is little unused Ka-band capacity available. Telesat supplies Ka-band capacity from its Anik F3 satellite to WildBlue, which is also mulling use of ViaSat-1, and is providing ViaSat-1’s orbital slot.
PASADENA, Calif. — The U.S. Air Force is about to enter the most intense period of fielding new space systems since the height of the Cold War almost 50 years ago, says Space and Missile Systems Center commander, Lt. Gen. John Sheridan. “We’re poised to deliver six brand new space systems in the next 24 months. Nothing as ambitious as this has been attempted since the 1960s,” says Sheridan who was speaking Sept. 17 at the American Institute for Aeronautics and Astronautics Space 2009 conference here.
Pratt & Whitney says the “probable cause” of fan-blade damage during ground testing of the F135 engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter was a worn bushing — a part in the fan inlet case — causing an aerodynamic disturbance that led to a piece of the tip of a first-stage fan blade breaking off.
PURSE PRESSURE: While the U.K.’s Strategic Defense Review is to be launched immediately following the next general election — to be held no later than mid-2010 — it remains to be seen whether any elements of the near-term defense program may be caught up in the country’s savings drive. The British press was reporting at the end of last week that the government’s finance minster, Chancellor Alistair Darling, was holding meetings with other ministry chiefs to consider possible spending cuts.
CLEANUP NEEDED: With hundreds of thousands of man-made objects in space, from small particles to derelict spacecraft, posing a growing threat to the 900-odd operational satellites in orbit, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is seeking concepts for systems that could cost-effectively remove significant amounts of debris from low-Earth and geosynchronous orbits.
MULLEN’S MUDDLE: The Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, says the process the Pentagon uses to evaluate complex weapons programs is itself too complicated and needs more input from military officers. “The Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System [JCIDS] is much too complex and needs to be revised,” he says.
PEN PALS: Letters from lawmakers are flying around and out of Capitol Hill over the U.S. Air Force’s pending KC-X tanker competition. The World Trade Organization’s (WTO) preliminary decision in the U.S.-Boeing case last week spurred Boeing boosters in Congress to write executive branch officials to at least consider the matter, although the Air Force and other Pentagon leaders have said it does not pertain to KC-X. “I want to ensure the actions of the Department of Defense do not unintentionally penalize our domestic industry,” Sen.
CLOSING SHOP: BAE Systems has begun the formal consultation process with staff that will lead up to the closure of one of its four main air system sites in the U.K. The Woodford manufacturing plant was identified as early as 2003 as facing closure following the completion of the Royal Air Force’s Nimrod MRA4 program. At the same time the company also announced job cuts at its Samlesbury and Warton sites, as well as at Farnborough.
INTELLIGENT RESTRUCTURING: The Obama administration is weighing in with its own official guidance for the U.S. intelligence community under a the 2009 National Intelligence Strategy, a blueprint that will drive the priorities for the nation’s 16 intelligence agencies over the next four years. The “post-9/11 world” blueprint entails all sorts of updated elements, including a focus on cybersecurity. But old-fashioned counter-intelligence also is re-emphasized.
Boeing is treading a tightrope over the future of the C-17 as it tries to clinch international sales that could extend production by more than a year without endangering last-ditch efforts to safeguard a further batch of sales to the U.S. Air Force.
HORNET CRACKS: The U.S. Navy’s Fleet Readiness Center Southeast (FRCSE) will repair F/A-18 Hornet internal wing cracks using a solution developed by its workforce. The wings of F/A-18s are covered in a durable skin that can become damaged from corrosion, typically caused by water intrusion from condensation. Likewise, the wing’s internal structure — comprising a series of aluminum spars and held together by metal ribs — can develop cracks that require replacement of the structure. So the FRCSE has developed skin-on and skin-off repairs.
NO ALTERNATIVE: Top Pentagon civilians are still trying to ensure that the General Electrics/Rolls-Royce alternative F136 Joint Strike Fighter engine is dead. After the failure of a Pratt & Whitney F135 engine (Aerospace DAILY, Sept. 15), officials hurried to say it did not change their preference for a single engine program. “There is no wavering among anybody in a decision-making position here at the Pentagon,” says Geoff Morrell, a press aide for Defense Secretary Robert Gates. “The mishap…is unfortunate, but not unexpected.
