MOSCOW - Khrunichev Center said May 25 that it has signed a contract with Russia's defense ministry to conduct research, development and flight-testing of the Angara launch vehicle.
The U.S. Navy is looking to award dual contracts to Northrop Grumman Corp. and General Dynamics Corp. to have each build a lead DD(X) destroyer simultaneously in the hopes that the service can compete the shipbuilders for a future round of DD(X) orders. Meanwhile, the Navy also is considering boosting the number of Flight 0 orders for its Littoral Combat Ships (LCS), John J. Young Jr., the assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition, told reporters at the Pentagon May 25.
Lockheed Martin C-130E aircrew training simulators have been given a Level C certification, allowing the Air Force to train pilots on all tasks up to the final check flight, the company said May 25. The simulators are located at Little Rock Air Force Base, Ark. The certification was given by the United States Air Force Air Mobility Command. Simulators are categorized from A to D, with Level D the highest. In a Level D simulator, a pilot can earn a rating without ever flying the aircraft.
Metal Storm Ltd. said May 25 that it will sell its ProCam Machine LLC business to Monroe Machined Products Inc. of Seattle, and will reposition itself as a "systems integrator" to sell its innovative electronic ballistics technology. Metal Storm, which is headquartered in Brisbane, Australia, and has an office in Arlington, Va., bought the precision-machined parts company in late 2003, saying the buy would help it get a strategic position in the U.S. defense market (DAILY, Dec. 12, 2003).
FULL HOUSE: If the May 24 debate before the House Rules Committee is a taste of what's to come, the full-chamber discussion over the fiscal 2006 defense authorization bill (H.R. 1815) likely will center around women in combat, the base realignment and closure process and military health care efforts. House Armed Services Committee members appeared before the Rules Committee to prepare their bill for House consideration on May 25, as well as to lobby one more time for amendments that did not make it through the HASC last week.
Simulation and modeling technologies provider CAE Inc. of Montreal has purchased Terrain Experts Inc., which develops software tools for simulation database generation and visualization, for about $10 million in CAE shares. Terrain Experts produces the Terra Vista and SOFViz applications used for real-time 3-D image generation, battlefield visualization, and mission rehearsal. Known as Terrex in the military market, the company is based in Tucson, Ariz., and has about 40 employees.
The primary barriers to commercializing nanotechnology lie in transitioning innovation into a productive and cost-effective technology, an industry executive told congressmen looking to boost nanotechnology initiatives. Scott Donnelly, senior vice president for Global Research at General Electric Co., said transitioning is even more difficult with high-risk, emerging technologies.
The U.S. Air Force is studying a possible replacement for the aging Bell UH-1N Huey helicopters used by intercontinental ballistic missile wings, a general said May 24.
Foreign contractors who do business with the United States would face blacklisting on a Defense Department list if they sell certain defense goods and services to China under a provision that a prominent member of Congress plans to push in the House. The provision, championed by Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, is included in the House's version of the fiscal 2006 defense authorization bill (H.R. 1815), which the chamber is scheduled to take up May 25.
DD(X) CONTRACT: Raytheon Co.'s Integrated Defense Systems, Tewksbury, Mass., has been awarded a contract worth up to $3 billion by the U.S. Navy for DD(X) ship system integration and detail design associated with specific DD(X) ship systems, the company said May 23. Besides the Raytheon unit, work also will be performed by Lockheed Martin Maritime Systems and Sensors, Moorestown, N.J.; United Defense LP, Minneapolis; Northrop Grumman Mission Systems, King George, Va.; and Ball Aerospace & Technology Corp., Westminster, Colo.
Air Force Space Command (AFSPC) head Gen. Lance Lord met with Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. John Jumper May 24 to brief him on the results of an AFSPC study on the potential of near-space, and believes that an operational deployment of near-space communications balloons could be imminent.
CWID RESULTS: Brig. Gen. Thomas Verbeck, director of command, control, communications and warfighting integration for U.S. European Command (EUCOM), hopes to improve upon the historical track record of the Coalition Warrior Interoperability Demonstration (CWIDs) when EUCOM hosts the event in 2006. In the past, the services have had little success in fielding the interoperability innovations arising from CWID, he says, which formerly was known as the Joint Warrior Interoperability Demonstration (JWID). "In fact, JWID, now CWID, has been going on probably for 10 years.
NASA would get $15 million more than President Bush requested for its fiscal year 2006 budget, or $16.5 billion, according to a budget approved May 24 by the House Appropriations Committee's science panel. The bill would fund the space exploration program at $3.1 billion, restore the aeronautics research program to the FY '05 level of $906 million, and give $40 million to "partially restore NASA's science programs," a committee statement said.
NASA's Voyager 1, launched in 1977, has become the first spacecraft to enter the heliosheath, its final step before leaving the solar system, the aerospace agency said May 24. "Voyager 1 has entered the final lap on its race to the edge of interstellar space," Ed Stone, the Voyager project scientist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., said.
Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp. have been chosen to proceed to the next stage of the Innovative Space Based Radar Antenna Technology (ISAT) program, according to an Air Force spokeswoman. Northrop Grumman was also competing for the program, which is to develop and demonstrate a 325-foot-long satellite antenna. Boeing and Lockheed Martin were given the go-ahead, said Connie Rankin, a spokeswoman for the Air Force Research Lab's Space Vehicles Directorate at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M.
MAINTENANCE, INSPECTIONS: Lockheed Martin Services Inc. Aircraft and Logistics Center of Greenville, S.C., has been awarded an $81.2 million contract modification to exercise an option for P-3 phased depot maintenance, special structural inspections, and enhanced special structural inspections, the company said May 20. The work will be done in Greenville. It is expected to be finished in May 2006. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Md., awarded the contract.
To overcome the challenges of maintaining continuous real-time satellite communications with hypersonic vehicles, the DARPA/Air Force FALCON (Force Application and Launch from the Continental U.S.) program is planning a communications demo for the second of its three hypersonic test vehicles.
P-3C DELIVERED: Lockheed Martin has delivered the U.S. Navy's 65th P-3C aircraft to be modified as part of the Anti-Surface Warfare Improvement Program, the company said May 24. The AIP upgrades use commercial-off-the-shelf software and nondevelopment technology to improve the P-3C's capabilities.
VEHICLE ARMOR: Armor Holdings Inc. of Jacksonville, Fla., has been awarded a $12.2 million contract to provide heavy vehicle armor to the U.S. Army, the company said May 24. Armor Holdings will produce armor panels, ballistic glass and gun turret assemblies and provide product support for the family of medium tactical vehicles, the heavy expanded mobility tactical truck and palletized loading system vehicles. The work will be done in 2005 at Armor Holdings Aerospace and Defense Group facilities in Fairfield, Ohio and Phoenix, Ariz.
