With enhanced sensors, communications links and engine power, Apache helicopters will make ideal aircraft for deep-strike missions, Army aircraft program managers said Oct. 9 during the Association of the U.S. Army's (AUSA) annual symposium in Washington. "This is an optimized system," said Col. Mark Hayes, Training and Doctrine Command system manager for reconnaissance and attack. "The mission for deep strike still exists."
AWARD NOMINATIONS: Nominations for the 2007 Charles B. Ryan MRO Award are due Nov. 15. The award is presented annually by Aviation Week and Overhaul & Maintenance in two categories: outstanding airline or military operator, and leading MRO supplier. The Ryan Award recognizes those industry leading companies and organizations that are finding new ways to improve operations and service, profits, products, efficiency and effectiveness, while sustaining or improving safety and technical proficiency.
The presidential Bush family and Northrop Grumman Corp. christened the nation's 10th and final Nimitz-class aircraft carrier, the George H. W. Bush (CVN 77), on Oct. 7. At 1,092 feet in length, the nuclear-powered flattop is nearly as long as the Empire State Building is tall. When delivered to the U.S. Navy as expected in late 2008, it will weigh 97,000 tons and carry more than 80 combat aircraft, officials said at the ceremony in Newport News, Va.
Reactions on Oct. 9 to North Korea's claim of conducting a successful underground nuclear test ranged from calls to bolster U.S. missile defense efforts to underpinning naval and air capabilities, although President Bush and politicians from both parties continued to prioritize weapons proliferation as the main threat.
Research and development work for the Army's Future Combat Systems (FCS) and upgrades to ground vehicles to make them more relevant to current conflicts are likely to continue for some time, said Raj Rajagopal, vice president and general manager of BAE Systems - Ground Systems Division. The Army spent about $2.3 billion this year through the end of August for FCS research and development, according to a DAILY analysis of Pentagon contracts, ranking it in the top five DOD programs for contractual obligations.
NASA and the FAA aren't worried about operating under a continuing resolution, at least for now. NASA Administrator Michael Griffin says the agency expected the CR and is prepared to continue living at fiscal 2006 levels. FAA CFO Ramesh Punwani sees no serious problems unless the CR continues into January. Congress left town for the November elections without passing either agency's fiscal 2007 appropriation - or any of the others except defense and homeland security.
FACILITY CLOSING: Raytheon is laying off personnel at its Santa Barbara Remote Sensing (SBRS) operation in Goleta, Calif., in anticipation of transferring the remaining personnel and projects to the company's civil space headquarters in El Segundo before closing SBRS in early 2008. The company so far has given 25 of the facility's 250 employees their 60-day notices, and expects to winnow the remainder down further through more layoffs and attrition.
ACQUISITION ISSUES: Federal work is increasingly being performed by contractors, including emergency and large-scale logistics operations such as hurricane response and U.S. operations in Iraq, according to the Government Accountability Office. Many federal agencies rely "extensively" on contractors to carry out their basic missions, the GAO said, yet acquisition concerns weigh heavily on the nonpartisan congressional agency's list of high-risk issues.
PLAYING NICE: After months of Army-Air Force wrangling over whether they should buy the same variant of the Predator unmanned aerial vehicle -- the senior Pentagon civilian leadership says they must, to curb costs -- Defense Department sources say the Air Force is agreeing to buy the Army version. This variant has a heavy-fuel engine, enabling Army operators throughout the battlefield to use the same type of fuel used for ground vehicles rather than jet fuel. This reduces logistics requirements and costs.
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover "Opportunity" is beginning to explore the half-mile wide Victoria Crater, with assistance from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, after spending 21 months and traveling nearly six miles to reach it. Victoria is roughly 200 feet deep, exposing layers of rock that provide scientists with "a window on the past of the planet," according to Principal Investigator Steve Squyres of Cornell University.
KEEP IT SIMPLE: "Learning to live and work in space" is a long-established, never-questioned reason for building the International Space Station, and one lesson learned so far is not to try it again in the same way.
SBIRS DECISION: Lockheed Martin officials are proposing to accelerate a decision whether to go ahead with procurement activities for a third Space-Based Infrared System (SBIRS) High satellite. In December 2005, after SBIRS' fifth major cost overrun, Pentagon acquisition chief Ken Krieg delayed a decision on the third geosynchronous satellite and launched risk-reduction activities for an alternative system. A decision between the two will come in 2008. But that schedule opens up a production gap should the Air Force opt for SBIRS over alternatives.
ARMORED VEHICLES: General Dynamics Land Systems says it has been awarded a $189 million contract modification to provide the Marine Corps with 151 new eight-wheeled light armored vehicles. The company will produce armored personnel, anti-tank, command and control, logistics and mortar variants, with delivery starting in in July 2007. The work will be done in Sterling Heights, Mich.; Woodbridge, Va.; and London, Ontario, Canada. It is expected to be finished by December 2008.
Oct. 9 - 11 -- Association of the U.S. Army's Annual Meeting and Exposition, Washington Convention Center, Washington, D.C. For more information call (703) 841-4300 or go to www.ausa.org. Oct. 17 - 18 -- Ninth Annual New Zealand Defense Industry Association Seminar, Te Papa, Wellington. For more information email [email protected] or go to www.defencetech.co.nz.
Facing an annual $20 billion budget shortfall starting this year and running through the next five years or so, the U.S. Air Force is looking for tried, true and even novel ways of closing the gap between what the service can afford and what it needs to do its job, said Maj. Gen. Raymond E. Johns Jr., director of programs, Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Strategic Plans and Programs.
A team of experts at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston is performing a "C.S.I.-type" analysis of a small orbital debris impact hole discovered in shuttle Atlantis' right-hand payload bay door during a routine post-flight inspection last week, according to a NASA spokesman.
Lawmakers want defense officials to settle on more traditional contract vehicles when authorizing system development and demonstration or a similar stage, reflecting some concern within Washington that more flexible contracts such as "other transaction authority" (OTA) had been misapplied.
UNKINDEST CUT: Marine Corps Gen. James Jones, NATO's supreme commander, says taking the Joint Chiefs of Staff out of the command loop was an unintended consequence of the 1986 Goldwater-Nichols Act that he'd like to fix. The law concentrated authority in the combatant commanders, leaving the Joint Chiefs of Staff and their chairman off to the side, says Jones, a former JCS member.
Funding for shorter-term, conceivably less antagonist prompt global strike alternatives -- compared with the Defense Department's desire to refit some Trident nuclear intercontinental ballistic missiles -- could be funded in the next supplemental request or fiscal 2007 reprogramming efforts.
From counter-improvised explosive device (IED) patrols in Iraq to monitoring the Mexican-U.S. border, lightweight manned surveillance aircraft are getting notable earmarks in recent legislation.
