Loral Space & Communications and Canada's Public Sector Pension Investment Board (PSP) have completed the acquisition of Telesat Canada for CAD 3.25 billion ($3.45 billion) and the assumption of CAD 160 million in Telesat debt.
Raytheon predicted a potential market for over 1,000 fighters and systems to be upgraded with its advanced active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar system over the next 20 years, as it announced the selection of the system for Boeing's F-15E.
TEL AVIV -- Moshe Keret, long-serving chief of Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI), says he now feels vindicated by what he considers an extremely fast end to the government's investigation of him for corruption charges.
To list an event, send information in calendar format to Donna Thomas at [email protected] Nov. 5 - 8 -- Tenth Annual Directed Energy Symposium, Von Braun Center, Huntsville, Ala. For more information call (505) 998-4910 or go to www.deps.org. Nov. 5 - 8 -- California Space Authority's Conference and Spotbeam Awards Dinner, Sheraton Gateway Los Angeles International Airport Hotel. For more information call (805) 349-2633 or go to www.californiaspaceauthority.org.
HURRICANE HUNGER: NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) sent an unmanned aircraft into hurricane-force, 80 mph winds for the first time Nov. 2, to give researchers a real-time, low-altitude look at the storm. The five-foot-long, 10-foot wingspan Aerosonde from AAI Corp. was launched at 2:08 p.m. from NASA's Wallops Island, Va., facility and was expected to penetrate the center of Hurricane Noel at 10 p.m. In September 2005, the Aerosonde was flown from Wallops into Tropical Storm Ophelia on a 10-hour mission.
Rescheduling forced by the major power-generating problems on each end of the International Space Station (ISS) threatens to delay delivery of the pressurized ISS laboratory modules long awaited by Europe and Japan.
President Bush vowed Nov. 1 to veto a Democratic effort to combine short-term war funding, annual Defense Department and other domestic spending into packaged appropriations. Reiterating his opposition to such a "three-bill pile-up," Bush said Congress should pass his budget requests instead, starting with the $196 billion off-budget bill for Iraq, Afghanistan and other supplemental spending.
URBAN CHALLENGE: Eleven finalists will compete in the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA) Urban Challenge robotic race Nov. 3. The teams include Team Cornell, Honeywell/Intelligence Vehicle Systems, MIT, Team Oshkosh Truck, and the Stanford Racing Team, whose "Stanley" vehicle became the first DARPA Grand Challenge winner in 2005. The team's robotic vehicles will perform simulated supply missions at a military urban training facility in Victorville, Calif.
The U.S. Army estimates that the total program cost for the Bell Armed Reconnaissance Helicopters (ARH) will be about $3 billion, following cost increases due to problems at Bell's manufacturing facility as well as the Army's decision to increase its buy to 512 of the Bell-407 derived aircraft. The per-aircraft cost now is expected to be about $9 million, up from just under $5.5 million before management issues arose, according to Brig. Gen. Stephen Mundt, director of Army Aviation.
Japan's Selene moon explorer successfully stretched out its Lunar Magnetometer (LMAG) and its Lunar Radar Sounder's (LRS) dipole antennas, and positioned its Upper Atmosphere and Plasma Imager (UPI) between Oct. 28-31. Selene is in the middle of checking out all 14 instruments aboard the satellite, which is expected to take until mid-November. LMAG has a sensor attached on the tip of its 12-meter (39-foot) mast, capable of measuring magnetic fields 1/100,000 weaker than Earth's. The mast was folded to 60 centimeters (2 feet) before launch.
Following similar action last spring with Lockheed Martin, the U.S. Navy said it is canceling construction of the second of two expected Littoral Combat Ships (LCS) from General Dynamics' industry team. According to a Nov. 1 Pentagon statement, the Navy worked "closely" with General Dynamics to try to restructure the deal for LCS 4 to "more equitably" balance cost and risk, but the two sides could not come to terms and conditions that were acceptable to both parties.
Germany has launched its third SARLupe X-band radar satellite, further expanding Europe's new SAR (synthetic aperture radar) reconnaissance capability. The spacecraft was launched atop a Cosmos 3M booster from Plesetsk in northern Russia on Nov. 1, joining the first two units, launched in December 2006 and July 2007 (DAILY, Aug. 7).
RSRM TESTED: NASA and ATK successfully fired a four-segment space shuttle reusable solid rocket motor (RSRM) at 1 p.m. mountain time Nov. 1 at ATK's Utah test facility. The 123-second static fire provided important information for continued launches of the shuttle and for development of the shuttle-derived Ares I rocket (DAILY, Oct. 29). Early indications are that all test objectives were met, according to NASA.
Israel bombed Syria by using a chain of new technologies stretching from satellite observations to precision bombing of the target, which was suspected of being a nuclear facility.
James Acton, analyst and lecturer with the U.K.-based Centre for Science and Security Studies, thinks it's unlikely that Iran has finalized any designs for a nuclear weapon, although there is no question that Tehran has begun early weaponization work.
HOUSTON - Astronaut Scott Parazynski is preparing for his fourth extravehicular activity (EVA) of the STS-120/10A International Space Station assembly mission, an "extremely challenging and complex" attempt to repair the solar array torn right after his last spacewalk. Derek Hassmann, lead ISS flight director for the mission, said Nov. 1 the repair required another day of preparations in space and on the ground, pushing it back from Nov. 2 to Nov. 3.
The Lockheed Martin Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) conducted a successful live-fire test Oct. 31 after a series of mishaps earlier this year brought flights to a halt. The missile's reliability dipped to 58 percent after four tests revealed a Global Positioning System dropout problem, sending missiles more than 100 feet from their targets (DAILY, July 31). The test last week at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., was successful, according to Lockheed Martin officials, with JASSM striking and destroying its target.
The Eurofighter Typhoon consortium has begun flight trials with a new set of avionics. The equipment is part of the Tranche 2 build of the multirole fighter, which flew Oct. 31 for the first time at BAE System's Warton, England, facility. Eurofighter test pilot Mark Bowman was at the controls of IPA6 (an Instrumented Production Aircraft). The next milestone for Tranche 2 aircraft comes in April, when the so-called Block 8 aircraft are to complete type acceptance.
The European Space Agency (ESA) has transmitted its first-ever commands to a Chinese satellite, sending signals to China's Chang'e-1 moon mission through the agency's Maspalomas 15-meter ground station in Spain. The first receipt of telemetry from the mission occurred at ESA's 35-meter deep space antenna in New Norcia, Australia at 4:35 central European time Nov. 1, two hours and 39 minutes prior to signal transmission. An hour later, signals were picked up and transmitted by the ESA station in Kourou, French Guiana.
FISCAL IT: The majority of the large federal information technology (IT) procurements slated for fiscal 2008 will be recompeted programs, according to a Washington-area consultancy. "Coupled with an increasingly strong-willed Congress, continued war spending and the Bush administration entering into its lame duck phase, FY 2008 is shaping up to be a year of the status quo," said Arash Ardalan, senior federal analyst for Input.
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) believes there is $25 billion-$50 billion in waste, fraud and abuse in Defense Department spending and says that a related inspector general report is due out next year. The conservative earmark and spending critic told Washington reporters at a National Press Club meeting Nov. 1 that there is as much as $200 billion in similar misspending across the federal discretionary budget - enough to pay off President Bush's off-budget fiscal 2008 supplemental request without borrowing the funds against future generations.
The White House and Congress should simplify and reduce requirements and restrictions that make it hard for the Pentagon to recruit, vet and secure Senate confirmation for top political appointees, the legal committee of the Aerospace Industries Association said Oct. 31. In an attempt to pluck what chairman Paul "Whit" Cobb, Jr. called the low-hanging fruit of a cumbersome process, the panel called for changes in nomination and confirmation procedures, executive compensation, financial disclosure requirements and restrictions on post-government employment.
