The Boeing Co. has awarded Northrop Grumman Corp. a $3.2 billion multiyear contract to continue production work on the F/A-18 Super Hornet aircraft, Northrop Grumman said May 12. About $650 million is funded for fiscal 2005. Northrop Grumman is Boeing's principal F/A-18 subcontractor, and this is Northrop Grumman's second multiyear production contract for the Super Hornet. It covers procurement of 210 shipsets, 42 a year from fiscal years 2005-2009. Deliveries will begin in 2006.
OFFSETS: NASA plans to delay, defer or cancel a number of far-term programs to pay for cost overruns in current programs and other pressing bills such as the shuttle's return to flight and Hubble Space Telescope servicing, the agency says. Some future Mars missions will be deferred "indefinitely," according to Administrator Michael Griffin, to help pay for the successful Mars Exploration Rovers and the upcoming Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), set to launch in August.
SOLID STATE: The U.S. Defense Department's Joint High-Power Solid-State Laser (JHPSSL) program, which is developing electrically driven laser demonstrators, may expand to look at how such technology could be integrated on ground vehicles and unmanned aircraft. When the program releases a request for proposals (RFP) for 100-kilowatt laboratory demonstrators within the next few weeks, it also plans to describe two possible efforts to develop weapon system concepts.
The South Korean government has decided to go ahead with plans to design, develop and produce a military transport helicopter but has deferred a decision on producing an armed reconnaissance helicopter. The transport helicopter project had been on hold since last July, when the Korea Board of Audit and Inspection said it saw problems with the plan's feasibility. A decision on the armed reconnaissance helicopter has been deferred until the government is satisfied with the transport helicopter's development and production.
In a compromise reached late May 11, the House Armed Services Committee strategic forces subcommittee stripped nuclear warheads from the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP) program study and shifted some of its funding as part of the fiscal 2006 defense authorization process.
APPROVED: President Bush on May 11 signed into law the $82 billion fiscal 2005 supplemental act, with $75.9 billion for the Defense Department to cover the cost of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan through September. The measure includes provisions stopping the Navy from retiring the USS John F. Kennedy aircraft carrier as well as competing the construction of the DD(X) destroyer.
LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. - Army Aviation Branch Chief Brig. Gen. E.J. Sinclair expects unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to be flying missions in tandem with manned Army helicopters by 2010. At Fort Huachuca, Ariz., and elsewhere, the Army is working on the integration of UAVs into the aviation branch, "and how we train those soldiers, how we get them to the level of proficiency that we need to," Sinclair told reporters during a press conference here May 11.
Coast Guard Deputy Judge Advocate General Calvin Lederer said May 12 that Congress should expect Deepwater acceleration information, but he did not say when. "We believe we're getting close to providing data," he told the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee's Coast Guard subcommittee.
Rep. Mark Udall (D-Colo.), ranking member of the House Science subcommittee on space and aeronautics, introduced a bill May 12 that would force NASA to restore recent cuts to its aeronautics programs and renew work in hypersonic flight and rotorcraft research, among other areas.
China is aggressively marketing its FC1 jet fighters to four African countries: Zimbabwe, Egypt, Tanzania and Nigeria. The Zimbabwean air force (ZAF), which has six China-made K8 trainer aircraft, is interested in ordering 12 FC1s, a Zimbabwean military official at the embassy in Kuala Lumpur said. The official declined to provide details or discuss specifications of the aircraft.
Anglo-Italian helicopter company AgustaWestland has won a tender to supply A109 Power helicopters to the United Kingdom's Royal Air Force. The company, owned by Italian high-technology company Finmeccanica, announced May 10 that it had been chosen to provide a Civil Owned Military Registered (COMR) helicopter service to No. 32 (The Royal) Squadron.
A House Armed Services Committee (HASC) subcommittee voted May 12 to revive the Air Force's C-130J transport aircraft program, merge two heavy-lift rotorcraft programs and trim the Pentagon's fiscal 2006 budget request for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and Future Combat Systems. During consideration of the FY '06 defense authorization bill, the tactical air and land forces panel also approved measures aimed at increasing coordination among acquisition programs for unmanned aerial vehicles.
MOSCOW - The situation at RSC Energia, Russia's prime contractor for its manned space program, is "critical," Russia's Federal Space Agency said May 11 in naming Nikolai Sevastianov as a candidate for president of the company. "In the past three years the corporation is loss-making and its credit debt is growing," the agency said in a statement. No dividends were paid to shareholders in 2002 or 2003, and none are planned based on 2004 results, the agency said.
The U.S. Defense Department says it is taking several new steps to reduce aviation mishaps as part of a broad safety initiative championed by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. The Army has begun carrying out a plan to equip parachute jumpers with ankle braces to reduce ankle injuries, said Air Force Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke, a DOD spokeswoman. Initially, the braces will be issued to parachute trainees and some special forces units. Eventually, other parachute jumpers could also receive the new gear.
Major Gen. John G. Meyer, Jr. (USA-Ret.) has resigned as Allied Defense Group Inc.'s CEO and president and will be succeeded by Major Gen. John J. Marcello (USA-Ret.), the company said May 12. Meyer resigned to become CEO of the Heckler & Koch Group, a private international firearms manufacturer. He will depart after Allied Defense's annual shareholders meeting on June 17 but will remain on the board of directors.
POSTPONED: NASA has postponed the launch of the NOAA-N environmental satellite until May 13 due to continued high winds at the Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., launch site. NASA is launching the satellite for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The delay, announced May 12, was the second in as many days due to high winds. Wind on May 11 was blowing as fast as 36 knots, about seven knots above the limits at Space Launch Complex 2, NASA said.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) plans to approach software giant Microsoft to partner with it on cognitive computing, or computer learning.
NASA Administrator Michael Griffin promised that by midsummer he will provide Capitol Hill lawmakers with the results of an ongoing NASA review of various options for completing assembly of the International Space Station (ISS). The baseline assembly schedule includes 28 shuttle flights, including 18 for assembly, five for logistics and five for utilization. Completing all the necessary flights by 2010, when the shuttle is scheduled for retirement, will be a challenge, Griffin said.
Russia's arms export market, already in decline, is likely to get worse, according to a new study by Forecast International. Russian arms exports dropped by nearly 26% from 2003 to 2004, going from $5.3 billion to $3.9 billion, Forecast said, despite Russia's efforts to use offsets, debt swaps and "creative financing" to attract sales.
The downselect in the Army's Extended Range/ Multipurpose unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) program is expected in late May or early June, after the Army requests a final round of proposal revisions from competitors Northrop Grumman and General Atomics.
