FROM RUSSIA: Indonesia has started taking delivery of a new tranche of advanced Sukhoi fighters. Sukhoi says two Su-30MK2s were delivered in late December from the KnAAPO production facility at Kosomolsk-on-Amur. In 2007, Indonesia agreed to buy three dual-seat Su-30MK2s and three single-seat Su-27SKMs. The third Su-30MK2 is due for handover soon, with the Su-27 deliveries scheduled to start later this year and run into 2010, according to Sukhoi.
A key provider of electronic warfare (EW) technology for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter anticipates a complicated environment when it comes to export sales of the stealthy strike aircraft.
NORTHROP REDUX: Northrop Grumman said Jan. 7 it reorganized its business into five units from seven. The company’s Integrated Systems and Space Technology units were combined to form a new Aerospace Systems sector that will be led by Gary Ervin. The Information Technology and Mission Systems units were combined to form a new Information Systems sector led by Linda Mills. Northrop also appointed Alexis Livanos as chief technology officer, a position that will focus on development of new technologies.
As the transition team for President-elect Barack Obama gets set to study possible plans for the second increment of the VH-71 presidential helicopter, contractor Lockheed Martin says the program is on schedule to have mission systems flying on the first increments by March or April.
ORLANDO, Fla. – Preliminary findings of an investigation into the August 2008 loss of NASA’s HyBOLT (hypersonic boundary layer transition) rocket-boosted experimental project suggest a software fault was to blame. HyBOLT was aimed at gathering data on transition flow physics – one of the fundamental areas of mystery in the high-speed atmospheric flight regime – but was cut short 20 seconds after liftoff from NASA’s Wallops Island, Va., test site when the ATK-provided ALV X-1 booster went out of control (Aerospace DAILY, Aug. 25, 2008).
British government support to help U.K. industry secure work on the next-generation of narrow-body aircraft was high on the agenda in a Jan. 7 meeting between industry lobbyists and Peter Mandelson, the government minister for business. Society of British Aerospace Companies (SBAC) President Alex Dorrian (and CEO of Thales UK), and SBAC Chief Executive Ian Godden met with Mandelson to “discuss the U.K.’s position...in propulsion (aero engines) and aero structures, especially wing manufacture,” according to the SBAC.
U.S. supremacy in aerospace is being threatened, according to a new study issued by the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA), and the organization is proposing solutions and pressing the incoming Obama administration to help.
INDIAN UPGRADES: India said it has completed the avionics upgrade of its MiG-27 aircraft. The Defense Avionics Research Establishment (DARE), under the Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO), claims “the effort was realized using entirely indigenous expertise at a fraction of cost.” The project was initiated in 2002 through a deal between DARE, Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. and the Indian air force. The avionics system is built around a modular mission computer called the Core Avionics Computer (CAC), developed by DARE.
SAT CHAT: Boeing has proclaimed that it reconfigured an on-orbit U.S. Navy satellite, adding 30 percent more communications capability. The satellite, the 11th in the Ultra-High Frequency Follow-On (UFO) series built by Boeing, was launched in 2003 and supports the Navy’s global communications network, serving ships at sea and a variety of other U.S. military fixed and mobile terminals. According to Boeing, UFO 11 has the most sophisticated digital signal processor in the constellation.
The head of the U.S. State Department’s counterterrorism office says Leon Panetta, President-elect Barack Obama’s reported pick to head the CIA, “comes with the right skills.” While Obama has yet to officially announce his choices for top intelligence positions, Democratic officials have been widely reported as saying Panetta, a former California congressman, White House chief of staff and head of the Office of Management and Budget in the Clinton administration, will get the director of central intelligence position.
Boeing has responded to a U.S. Army call for sources sought for its restarted Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter (ARH) program with two alternatives: Boeing’s newly named AH-6S Phoenix and an aircraft the company has loosely nicknamed an Apache “Lite.”
Nuclear terrorism poses a “growing threat” to the United States, according to initial findings from a congressionally chartered commission examining the nation’s strategic posture. In an interim report, the 12-member panel also cautions that if Iran and North Korea continue unchecked in developing nuclear arsenals, it could lead to a “tipping point” in nuclear weapons proliferation.
U.S. Air Force Secretary Michael Donley has signed into effect a document the service says will function as the blueprint for its energy initiatives, especially for cutting demand, boosting supply and changing the air service’s energy usage habits.
DAGR SHOT: Lockheed Martin announced Jan. 6 it has successfully conducted the first live warhead ground test launch of the Direct Attack Guided Rocket (DAGR) guidance kit for the 2.75-inch rocket. The test, conducted at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., demonstrated DAGR’s vehicle penetration and time-delayed fuzing feature, according to the company. The DAGR-equipped rocket, armed with a live warhead, was fired at a stationary vehicle, penetrating the vehicle before detonating inside.
SATCOM SOLUTION: The U.S. Army has awarded DataPath $100 million to manufacture and integrate Ka-band conversion kits and provide spares kits that will enable satellite transportable terminals (STTs) and other systems on the battlefield to operate using the Wideband Global SatCom (WGS) system. The satellite communications terminals being converted were designed and built by DataPath and deployed by the Army for the Joint Network Node (JNN)/Warfighter Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T) program.
PARIS – Arianespace says it finished with 13 launch contracts in 2008, including a multi-launch award for one spacecraft plus four options from Intelsat announced on Dec. 30.
COLD LAUNCH: The Kinetic Energy Interceptors (KEI) industry team of Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and Alliant Techsystems (ATK) has begun testing the U.S. Missile Defense Agency program’s cold-launch system. The solid-propellant gas generator was tested Dec. 18 at ATK’s Elkton, Md., facility. KEI’s launch system is designed to eject an interceptor at about 200 feet in the air before the first-stage rocket motor ignites. For KEI, about 70 pounds of propellant is ignited in the generator to eject the approximate 25,000-pound missile.
Modern warfare – where the battlefield is a mix of actors, motivations and weapons – is in part defined by its rapidly changing threat scenarios and multiple layers of high- and low-tech on-the-fly innovations, all of which demand real-time responses.
U.S. intelligence agencies should map the “human terrain” of potential world trouble spots the way the ocean floor was mapped for Navy submarines during the Cold War, the top State Department counter-terrorism official said Jan. 6.
Potential contractors on NASA’s heavy-lift Ares V moon rocket will have until Feb. 9 to submit bids on the first procurement package of the huge launch vehicle, under a request for proposals issued Jan. 5.
AAI has begun flight testing its Aerosonde Mark 5 in preparation for entry in the upcoming competition for the U.S. Navy Small Tactical Unmanned Air System (STUAS) and U.S. Marine Corps Tier II UAS. The new design incorporates features of both the long-endurance Aerosonde and Shadow tactical unmanned air vehicles.
Boeing will upgrade the mission systems in 2,000 F/A-18s operated by eight countries through a $905.3 million system configuration set contract awarded by the U.S. Navy. F/A-18 A/B, C/D, E/F and EA-18G aircraft from the U.S., Canada, Australia, Spain, Kuwait, Switzerland, Finland and Malaysia will receive the enhancements, scheduled to be finished in December 2013. The upgrades are part of an effort to keep the fighters “in front of developing threats over the next three decades,” Boeing spokesman Philip Carder said.
AUTOMATIC IDENTIFICATION: The U.S. Coast Guard has awarded Northrop Grumman a contract potentially worth $68 million to design, integrate, install and test the armed service’s Nationwide Automatic Identification System (Nationwide AIS) core data exchange capability. The capability will serve as the foundation for Nationwide AIS, a two-way maritime digital communication system that will continually transmit and receive voiceless vessel data, including the vessel’s identity, position, speed, course and other vital details.
