India has donated the naval fast attack craft INS Tillanchang to the island nation of Maldives to encourage regional cooperation, India's defense ministry said Nov. 21. Technical, material and training assistance will also be provided for three years. The vessel will be delivered in early 2006.
Singapore's military has completed a 12-day exercise at a U.S. Marine Corps training base that tested the coordinated attack capabilities of its F-16 fighters, AH-64D Apache attack helicopters, artillery platforms and unmanned aerial vehicles, Singapore's defense ministry said Nov. 22. More than 300 members of Singapore's military took part in Exercise Forging Sabre at the U.S. Marine Corps Air Ground Task Force Training Center in Twentynine Palms, Calif. The exercise culminated with an attack on a mock armored column on Nov. 21, the defense ministry said.
Recent flight-tests showed that new technologies can help silence jet aircraft, both in the cabin and on the ground, NASA said Nov. 21. The three-week test program, called the Quiet Technology Demonstrator 2, was a cooperative effort of NASA's Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va.; Boeing; Goodrich Corp.; and GE Transportation Aircraft Engines. All Nippon Airways, Tokyo, provided a Boeing 777 for the tests.
A data-link capability has been successfully demonstrated on the Joint Air to Surface Standoff Missile-Extended Range (JASSM-ER), according to prime contractor Lockheed Martin.
Derco Aerospace of Milwaukee said it will provide two refurbished Lockheed Martin-built C-130 aircraft to the air force of the Netherlands. Derco will provide the used aircraft, which will be fully refurbished by Marshall Aerospace of Cambridge, United Kingdom. The deal allows the Netherlands air force to double its C-130 fleet for less than the cost of a single new aircraft, Derco said.
NAVY The Boeing Co., Anaheim, Calif., is being awarded a $14,198,000 cost-plus-incentive-fee letter contract to provide for Trident II Subsystem Fiber Optic Gyro Navigator Design Investigations and Test System Design. The work will be performed in Anaheim, Calif., and is expected to be completed by October 2007. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The contract was not competitively procured. The Navy's Strategic Systems Programs, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity (N00030-05-C-0063).
Lockheed Martin's Surveillance Towed Array Sensor System (SURTASS) twin-line 29A has been certified for deployment by the U.S. Navy after an eight-month evaluation program, the company said Nov. 21. The SURTASS TL-29A is an underwater passive acoustic sensor with a pair of arrays towed side-by-side by a ship.
Staff for congressional authorizers overseeing NASA now will get down to business to try to hammer out a congressional agreement, which they expect to complete in mid-December. The House Nov. 18 formally appointed its conferees from its Government Reform and Science panels to work out a final fiscal 2006 NASA authorization measure, the first in several years. Regardless of details, the agreement will endorse President Bush's moon-Mars exploration agenda, as both chambers passed bills agreeing to the massive space program (DAILY, Sept. 30).
SALE COMPLETE: Reinhold Industries Inc. said Nov. 21 that it has completed its sale of NP Aerospace Ltd., a United Kingdom-based subsidiary, to the Carlyle Group for $53.4 million. Reinhold will use $40 million in net proceeds to pay off its indebtedness of about $25.7 million. Reinhold also declared a special dividend of $6 per share to all shareholders of record on Dec. 16 and said it will discontinue paying regular quarterly dividends.
General Dynamics Canada will provide Acoustic Signal Processing systems for eight Korean navy P-3 Orion maritime patrol aircraft, the company said Nov. 18. The work will be done under contract to L-3 Communications Integrated Systems and will be performed in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Switzerland's government has canceled the sale of 93 used Leopard II tanks to Chile after the deal failed to pass a cost-benefit analysis, and will revamp its policy for similar transactions, the Swiss Information Service said. The sale also would have provided Chile with logistics material and maintenance and training equipment, as well as army staff resources over several years, the Swiss defense ministry said Nov. 20. The offer was made in April.
DARPA SRI International, Menlo Park, Calif., was awarded on Nov. 14, 2005, an $8,679,000 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for the Nightingale Research Effort. The work will be performed in Menlo Park, Calif., and is expected to be completed by Oct. 31, 2010. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. There were an unknown number of bids solicited via the World Wide Web on March 18, 2005, and 21 bids were received. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Arlington, Va., is the contracting activity (HR0011-06-C-0023).
Barring a last-minute surprise in the F/A-22 Raptor's current phase of testing, the U.S. Air Force fighter will be ready for fielding next month as planned, according to a program representative.
British air force Chinook helicopters and their crews began to greatly increase the amount of aid delivered to Pakistan earthquake victims last week as winter quickly approached, the United Kingdom defense ministry said. The effort was part of a United Nations airlift operation to deliver 900 tons of food and shelter to isolated mountain regions.
The Lockheed Martin Corp.-led team building the first Littoral Combat Ship at Marinette Marine in Wisconsin announced Nov. 21 that it has installed the ship's two main propulsion gas turbines. However, the announcement also said the LCS, named Freedom, "is on schedule" to launch in the summer of 2006 and be delivered to the U.S. Navy in early 2007 - slightly later than had been expected for LCS 1.
EDO MBM Technology Ltd., a United Kingdom-based business unit of EDO Corp., will provide F-16 pylon umbilical weapon connector systems equipped with its Field Replaceable Connector System to the Netherlands air force. The order is the first for the F-16 FCRS and "marks a significant revenue opportunity for EDO as operators worldwide adopt the new certified standard," the company said.
LIGHTS ON: Two diesel generators for the amphibious transportation dock ship USS New Orleans (LPD 18) were energized for the first time on Nov. 15 at Northrop Grumman's New Orleans shipyard, providing power for many of the ship's systems, the company said Nov. 21. The milestone "allows us to continue moving forward with the next stages of testing," Phil Woods, the LPD 18 ship director, said in a statement.
Lunar missions could be conducted in a "fraction" of the time, and for one-tenth the cost, of NASA's planned moon mission, commercial space company SpaceDev said Nov. 21. The company has completed a study of lunar missions on behalf of the Lunar Enterprise Corp., which promotes a return to the moon, and concluded that private industry could beat NASA's 13-year, $104 billion effort.
NASA has selected 300 Small Business Innovation Research and 40 Small Business Technology Transfer research proposals, the aerospace agency said Nov. 18. The SBIR projects have a total value of about $21 million and will be awarded to 219 companies in 36 states. The technology transfer programs have a value of about $4 million and will be awarded to 39 companies in 17 states. A complete list of the awards can be found at http://sbir.nasa.gov.
Following the successful launch of two satellites on its heavier-lift Ariane 5 ECA last week, Arianespace is preparing for another dual-payload mission next month. The company plans to use its regular Ariane 5 to carry the MSG-2 weather satellite and the Insat-4A satellite to orbit on Dec. 21, according to Eumetsat, which will operate the MSG-2 satellite. Insat-4A will be operated by the Indian Space Research Organisation.
