SARLUPE LAUNCH: Launch of the second of five SARLupe radar reconnaissance satellites has been set for July 1, says German prime contractor OHB-System. Like the first unit, orbited on Dec. 19, the new spacecraft will be sent aloft atop a Cosmos 3M booster from Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia. The system, being procured by the German armed forces, is to enter initial operation in the fall, once the second satellite has been brought into service. Full operating capability is expected by the end of next year, following launch of the three remaining spacecraft.
DNEPR-1 BACK IN SERVICE: Chances for a late May/early June launch of Germany's TerraSAR-X 1-meter resolution commercial radar imaging satellite look better following the successful April 18 orbiting of an Egyptian remote sensing/scientific satellite, EgyptSat-1, by a Russian Dnepr-1 rocket, the intended TerraSAR-X launch vehicle. Dnepr-1 had been sidelined since a July 2006 failure caused by a premature first-stage engine shutdown.
The U.S. Air Force's attempt to become the executive agent for all high-flying military unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) operations is not a power grab by the service, according to Gen. Michael Moseley, service chief of staff. "This is about the joint fight," he said April 24 during a breakfast roundtable meeting with reporters.
NAVAL AVIATION LASERS: QPC Lasers announced April 25 that the U.S. Navy has awarded it two contracts totaling $1 million to deliver high-energy laser engine prototypes for naval aviation directed-energy weapons applications. The goal is semiconductor laser technologies that achieve a tenfold reduction in cost, size and weight compared with conventional lasers.
CSAR-X RFP: Despite defense analysts' predictions that the U.S. Air Force would release its revised request for proposals (RFP) for the combat, search and rescue (CSAR-X) helicopter replacement by this week, the service announced April 25 it would not do so until the coming month. "The Air Force expects to release a draft [RFP] amendment to the CSAR-X offerors in May, and will conduct meetings with the offerors to address comments and answer questions prior to the release of the official RFP amendment," the service said.
As the U.S. Air Force reviews the Boeing and Northrop Grumman proposals for the service's new KC-X tanker replacement fleet, the two companies are putting their marketing campaigns into high gear. Boeing's KC-767 entry uses the KC-135 as a baseline template, offering enhanced capability on the existing fleet. The company boasts of fuel savings of about $10 billion over 25 years for the required 179 aircraft compared to the Northrop Grumman KC-30 Airbus variant.
The major requirement for the U.S. Air Force's new KC-X tanker is building, delivering and deploying an effective fleet to replace the aging KC-135 refueler, service Chief of Staff Gen. Moseley says, and cargo carrying remains a secondary consideration. "Give me the 'A' model," Moseley said April 24, referring to the basic refueler. After that, then the service can start to consider more of a "floors-and-doors" capability for carrying cargo and passengers, he said.
China has developed extensive space and air warfare capabilities that make the country a greater force to be reckoned with, according to Gen. Michael Moseley, Air Force chief of staff. The recent Chinese anti-satellite demonstration shows how vulnerable major commercial and military satellites - American and foreign - are to attack, Moseley told reporters April 24 during a roundtable breakfast meeting.
The U.S. Marine Corps Systems Command has tapped Force Protection Industries for 1,000 more Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles, launching the incumbent favorite over several other competitors for the major new program this year. The United States will buy 300 Category I MRAPs and 700 Category II MRAPs under the competitively awarded $481.4 million contract announced April 23 by the Pentagon. Manufacturing work will take place in Ladson, S.C., and should be completed by May 2008.
AIM LAUNCH: Orbital Sciences Corp. and NASA are in the final stages of preparation for launching the agency's Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere (AIM) satellite aboard an Orbital-built Pegasus rocket during a seven-minute launch window opening at 1:23 p.m. Pacific time April 25. Orbital also built the AIM spacecraft, which is slated to spend two years studying polar mesospheric clouds. The spacecraft program is being overseen by Hampton University of Hampton, Va., assisted by the University of Colorado and Virginia Tech University.
TOKYO - The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA) Hayabusa asteroid sample return mission will officially begin its return to Earth April 25, but it faces an uncertain journey with only one of four ion engines working properly. Faced with this challenge, Project Manager Junichiro Kawaguchi said, "It will not be a sweet situation, but it doesn't mean we can't bring it home in June 2010."
The way U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael Moseley describes it, the service's budget is lot like Saran Wrap in that it covers a lot, but is stretched very thin, and he hopes to persuade the White House to increase the service's annual topline by about $20 billion. "I think it's a reasonable discussion point," Moseley told reporters April 24 during a breakfast meeting.
NAVY FMS: The U.S. Navy has awarded Raytheon Company a $184 million Foreign Military Sales (FMS) contract for radar equipment for the Royal Australian Navy's Air Warfare Destroyer (AWD) and the Spanish navy's F-105 Frigate, the company announced April 24. Under the contract, Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems (IDS) will manufacture, integrate and test AN/SPY-1 D(V) system transmitters and MK99 Fire Control Systems for the AWD and F-105 programs.
The French military is in the early stages of defining requirements for a new tactical communications jamming system. The goal is to improve the capabilities of current ground-based jamming devices to effectively thwart all types of telecommunications devices, according to the French armaments agency DGA. The architecture for the new system is supposed to allow it to be modular and reprogrammable to evolve with threats. Plans also call for marrying the system with other electronic warfare tools such as communications interceptors.
EUROPEAN MISSILE DEFENSE: U.S. officials asserted April 23 that they have been operating on the principle that U.S. and European defenses - namely, new U.S. ballistic missile defense elements - should be linked, as defense efforts have before. They said they are trying to be transparent by briefing NATO allies at the North Atlantic Council and the NATO-Russia Council. U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates arrived in Moscow April 22 to meet with Russian leaders over U.S. plans to base missile defense assets in Eastern Europe. U.S.
U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA) controllers are preparing a pair of rocket-plume characterization tests later this year now that an Orbital Sciences Minotaur I solid-fuel rocket has orbited the Near Field Infrared Experiment (NFIRE). The second Minotaur I launch from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) at Wallops Island, Va., early April 24 placed the 494-kilogram (1090-pound) spacecraft in its target orbit of 250 by 450 kilometers inclined 48.2 degrees to the equator.
The European Commission has OK'd the proposed takeover of Smiths Aerospace by General Electric. When first announced, the deal raised some eyebrows among European aerospace prime contractors about potential ramifications for them as GE gained increasing power to bundle products. But the EC says "the proposed transaction would not significantly impede competition" in its area.
U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael Moseley says he's had enough of protests on the service's combat, search and rescue (CSAR-X) helicopter replacement program.
The U.S. Army could fund its operational needs until June or even July by shifting funds from other sources, according to a recent report by the Congressional Research Service.
The U.S. Army is gearing up to test, introduce or expand use of several new precision strike munitions, including the Global Positioning System-guided Excalibur projectiles, in Iraq starting next month, Army officials said April 24. The effort comes as the Army has cut its artillery force structure in half as it tries to modernize, restructure and push down formerly division-based capabilities to the tactical brigade level, the officials told the Precision Strike Association's annual program review conference in Springfield, Va.
IT JUSTICE: The U.S. government has formally joined three whistleblower suits alleging that Hewlett-Packard, Accenture and Sun Microsystems solicited and provided improper payments and other in-kind, so-called "benefits" to favored subcontractors on information technology contracts with government agencies, the Justice Department said. The whistleblower suits, originally filed in U.S.
SARLUPE LAUNCH: Launch of the second of five SARLupe radar reconnaissance satellites has been set for July 1, according to prime contractor OHB-System. Like the first unit, orbited on Dec. 19, the new spacecraft will be sent aloft atop a Cosmos 3M booster from Plesetsk cosmodrome in northern Russia. The system, being procured by the German armed forces, is to enter initial operation in the autumn, once the second satellite has been brought into service. Full operating capability is expected by the end of next year, following launch of the three remaining spacecraft.
