During a Capitol Hill hearing Sept. 8, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) urged NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe to quickly deliver cost estimates of the damage done to Kennedy Space Center (KSC) by Hurricane Frances so the agency can get its share of the emergency relief bills being drafted by Congress.
SEEKING SOURCES: The U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command is seeking sources capable of manufacturing and integrating full-rate production systems and performing design and development upgrades to the Airborne Command and Control System (A2C2S). The request for information (RFI) was posted Sept. 1, with responses due by Oct. 15.
Northrop Grumman Corp. is trying to convince the U.S. Defense Department to develop a battle management system to integrate a host of future electronic warfare (EW) platforms. Company officials said at a Sept. 8 press briefing that they believe some sort of manned system will be needed to coordinate the growing number of EW platforms that DOD plans to field in the coming years.
PAC-3 EXPORT: Japan plans to buy 20 Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) interceptor missiles from Lockheed Martin Corp., the U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said late Sept. 7. The deal, if finalized, will include support equipment and services and be worth up to $79 million. The sale would make Japan one of the first foreign buyers of the PAC-3 missile, which already is in use by the U.S. Army.
The Marines of Fox Battery, 2nd Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment recently tested 19 M198 howitzers at the Prospect Range on the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, Calif., the Marine Corps said Sept. 7. The tests were conducted on Aug. 27. The M198s are used by Marine Air Ground Task Forces for indirect and direct artillery support. They 155mm M198s are towed pieces of artillery.
The U.S. Department of Defense has awarded a $144 million Foreign Military Sales program contract modification to General Dynamics' Electric Boat Corp. The contract provides design support services for the United Kingdom's Asute-class Submarine. It provides for U.S. submarine design and production expertise, assistance with using computer-aided design tools for submarine design and production processes, and exchanging of expertise on submarine design techniques.
A prototype of the U.S. Air Force's Multi-Platform Radar Technology Insertion Program (MP-RTIP) radar has finished its first set of tests. Northrop Grumman Corp. and Raytheon Co., which are developing MP-RTIP, said Sept. 8 that the prototype met or exceeded key design specifications during the recent test program. Installed on a building near Los Angeles International Airport in California, the radar detected targets simulated on another facility about a mile away.
WELCOMED: Tina W. Jonas was officially welcomed Sept. 8 as the Department of Defense's new comptroller, the DOD said. Jonas, previously the chief financial officer of the FBI, was nominated to succeed Dov Zakheim on March 11, confirmed by the Senate on July 22 and sworn in on July 28.
The government of Pakistan hopes to purchase High Frequency/Very High Frequency Radio Systems and related equipment and services worth up to $78 million from Harris Corp. of Rochester, N.Y., the Defense Security Cooperation Agency said.
SCRUBBED: For the second consecutive day, NASA has scrubbed a planned captive-carry flight for the "Hyper-X" X-43A hypersonic demonstrator due to a hydraulic problem on its B-52 carrier. In a dress rehearsal for the X-43A's third and final flight attempt next month, the B-52 was to take off from NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center in California and carry the X-43A and its modified Pegasus booster to their release altitude of 40,000 feet during a two-hour flight. Originally scheduled for Sept.
MILESTONE: Lockheed Martin Corp.'s A2100 communications satellite fleet has reached 100 years of successful accumulated in-orbit operations, the company said Sept. 3. The A2100 satellite series has 900 transponders and 24 satellites with more than 4,000 years of accumulated orbital operations. The fleet is manufactured and designed at Lockheed Martin Commercial Space Systems in Newtown, Pa. The first A2100 satellite, AMC-1, was launched Sept. 8, 1996. AMC-15, a hybrid Ku/Ka-band satellite, is scheduled for launch later this year.
Irvine Sensors Corp. has been awarded a $1.3 million follow-on contract to develop an improved version of its Personal Miniature Thermal Viewer (PMTV), the company said Sept. 7. The PMTV gives soldiers the ability to see in adverse battlefield conditions or total darkness. The thermal video viewer weighs less than half a pound and is battery-operated and handheld. It also features an eyepiece and display. The PMTV uses Irvine Sensors' Cam-Noir infrared uncooled camera technology.
PARTNERS: The Boeing Co. and CEA Technologies, an Australian radar and communications company, have signed a memorandum of understanding to cooperate on global missile defense, Boeing said Sept. 7. The cooperation could lead to future joint research and development of missile defense technologies, Boeing said.
NASA's Genesis spacecraft completed its final course correction on Sept. 6 in preparation to release its sample capsule containing solar particles into Earth's atmosphere on Sept. 8. The Lockheed Martin-built spacecraft spent two years trapping solar atoms on delicate wafers of gold, sapphire, silicon and diamond. The samples will shed light on the composition of the sun and the origins of our solar system, according to Don Burnett, Genesis principal investigator at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif.
Responses to a U.S. Army request for proposals that aims to show how small unmanned aerial vehicles can work together to perform the duties of a single pointman for soldiers in an infantry company are due Oct. 1, a slip from the original date of Sept. 17. The Army Aviation Technology Directorate at Fort Eustis, Va., announced the change in a Sept. 3 notice.
MBDA signed an initial production contract with Eurocopter to equip all versions of the Tiger assault and NH90 multirole helicopters with the advanced SAPHIR-M decoy self-protection system, the company said. MBDA is jointly owned by BAE Systems, Finmeccanica and the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. (EADS). Eurocopter is wholly owned by EADS.
U.S. Marine Commandant Gen. Michael Hagee said he is disappointed in defense contractors charged with developing new technologies and equipment for the military's movement toward jointness and interoperability. Hagee said defense companies promise that their products will be interoperable, but that isn't always the case. "What disappoints me about industry is their focus on their product," Hagee said. "We're told, 'don't worry, it will work, and if it doesn't we'll fix it.'"
Defense and aerospace companies are required to follow the first data management standard, recently released by the Government Electronics and Information Technology Association (GEIA), the organization said Sept. 3. "Through military specifications, the government told defense contractors how to deal with acquiring and delivering data, but this [standard] goes beyond that requirement to specify an integrated process throughout the product and data life cycles," GEIA spokesman Chris Denham told The DAILY.
Raytheon Co. expects to enter low-rate production of its new extended range Standard Missile-6 sometime in mid-2009, according to Jeff McKeel, the company's director of air and missile defenses. McKeel said the numbers of the Extended Range Active Missile (ERAM) that will be produced will be in the "low double digits," with some of the projectiles used in early tests at White Sands Missile Range, N.M.
Israel's attempt to launch a reconnaissance satellite was unsuccessful Sept. 6 after a third-stage rocket malfunction, the Israeli government announced in a statement. A special team is being established to investigate the Ofek-6 satellite's failed launch, which cost Israel $50 million, the Jerusalem Post reported.
The U.S. Army's Tank-automotive and Armaments Command (TACOM) is conducting a market survey to determine the availability of nondevelopmental tactical navigation systems for integration on Stryker vehicles, the Program Management Office Stryker Brigade Combat Team (PM-SBCT) said in a Sept. 1 Federal Business Opportunities notice. Survey documentation is due by Sept. 30, and a solicitation is expected to be issued between fiscal 2006 and fiscal 2008, if funding is available, the program office said.
Northrop Grumman and NASA have completed a nine-month series of tests to test the viability of a reusable cryogenic fuel tank made from composite materials, the company announced Sept. 7.
