Friday, April 19, 2024
Although the Marine Corps has finished an analysis of alternatives for the Amphibious Combat Vehicle, the head of the service told reporters at the Pentagon today that it is taking a second look at the results before taking the requirements to Navy leadership and eventually the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Amos told reporters at the Pentagon today that he is meeting with the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program office less frequently than last year because the most pressing issues for the program have been solved.
The Pentagon has signed an acquisition decision memorandum on the long-awaited VXX presidential helicopter program, and the new effort -- still many years from reaching the field -- will place a premium on affordability, Navy spokeswoman Capt. Cate Mueller said today.
The Navy announced plans today to base 51 V-22 Osprey tiltrotors and H-1 helicopters in Hawaii to support III Marine Expeditionary Force, according to a notice in the Federal Register.
The Army, on behalf of the Navy, is conducting research and testing on the GQM-163 Supersonic Sea-Skimming Target to see if it would be a viable option for the Japanese Navy, according to an Army spokesman and a recent notice posted on Federal Business Opportunities.
NAVAL AIR STATION PATUXENT RIVER, MD -- The Navy will take a second look at the numerous unmanned assets that will soon fly missions for the Navy once they reach the field to determine whether the way they are used should be tweaked, the service's incoming head of unmanned aircraft said here recently.
The Navy is participating in a variety of efforts to determine the best way to process the vast amounts of data flooding in with the proliferation of unmanned systems and sensors in general, according to the service.
The Navy's decision to award engineering study contracts for Increment 3 of the P-8A Poseidon aircraft to four contractors who already work on the plane has chafed some in industry who believe the program's pledge to open up competition for work on the aircraft hasn't come to fruition, according to industry sources.
NAVAL AIR STATION PATUXENT RIVER, MD -- The navigation system on the MQ-8B Fire Scout is to blame for the loss of an aircraft in Afghanistan earlier this year, leading officials to institute "improved maintenance procedures" to keep it from happening again, the program manager said here today.
The Navy is greatly underestimating how much it will cost to build ships in the coming years, although the service is not off by as much as last year, according to the Congressional Budget Office's latest annual report on shipbuilding.
A Marine pilot made the first non-test flight in an F-35B short-takeoff, vertical-landing variant of the Joint Strike Fighter this week.
The Navy selected a Textron-led team to build the Ship-to-Shore Connector and awarded the team a contract worth $212 million for detail design and construction of the craft, the Defense Department announced today.
Pentagon acquisition chief Frank Kendall certified the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program for continued development by waiving a requirement for the services to set a target for each variant of the aircraft to reach initial operational capability, which they should have by the end of the year, according to a recent report to Congress.
The Navy will hold an exposition this week as a consortium of service and industry member organizations draw up a new contract guide to help solve the vexing problem of how to avoid reinventing the wheel every time an aviation program needs new software, a service official told Inside the Navy in a recent interview.
The Senate Appropriations Committee has cut the $93.4 million targeted for Guam construction in the administration's fiscal year 2013 defense-spending request, demanding a revised strategy for relocating 8,500 Marines and their families, according to military-construction report language approved
The average unit cost of Littoral Combat Ships, not including their mission modules, is $420 million, which is $118 million under the congressional cost cap for the program, LCS Program Executive Officer Rear Adm. James Murdoch told reporters in a teleconference today.
The service chiefs will settle on new initial operational capability targets for each F-35 Joint Strike Fighter variant when the program finalizes its development plan around September, the program head told reporters today.
NATIONAL HARBOR, MD -- While the Navy plans to place the P-8A Poseidon aircraft in a traditional anti-submarine warfare role, the aircraft could be effectively used as the P-3C Orion is today as an over-land surveillance aircraft, the program manager said here.
The Navy has awarded a $262.3 million contract to Northrop Grumman to build eight MQ-8C unmanned helicopters -- essentially MQ-8B Fire Scouts with Bell 407 airframes -- just a few months after the Office of the Secretary of Defense approved the idea, the Pentagon announced late yesterday.
NATIONAL HARBOR, MD -- The Navy will cut back on traditional surface warfare ships operating near Latin America, Africa and Europe as the service shifts its focus to the Asia-Pacific region in the coming years, with Littoral Combat Ships and Joint High Speed Vessels taking their place, Navy Under