US Army’s next-gen protection system for helos cleared for full-rate production

On the same subject

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  February 24, 2023 | International, C4ISR

  When it comes to network innovation, we must protect the data ‘pipes’

  Because encryption has a shelf life, military networks still need to protect the data pipes that support the warfighter.

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  January 28, 2021 | International, Aerospace

  Lockheed Overtakes Boeing as Largest US Aerospace and Defense Firm

  Boeing, which saw no defense revenue growth last year, takes another financial hit from the tanker program. Boeing ceded its long-held top spot as America's largest aerospace and defense firms to Lockheed Martin after reporting financial results from an abysmal 2020 on Wednesday. The Chicago-based company also said it would lose another $275 million building Air Force KC-46 tankers because of “program primarily due to production inefficiencies including impacts of COVID-19 disruption.” The company has lost more than $4 billion on the project. The company closed 2020 — a year that saw the collapse of passenger air travel from the coronavirus pandemic and the return to flight of the 737 Max airliner — with just under $58.2 billion in revenue, down 24 percent from the previous year. While Lockheed — which on Tuesday reported $65.4 billion in 2020 sales — has long been the world's largest defense contractor, revenue from Boeing's commercial airplane business has combined with its military work to keep it atop the defense-and-aerospace category for decades. Boeing's defense and space sales were flat year-over-year at just shy of $26.3 billion. Its services business, which includes defense work, made $15.5 billion, down 16 percent as thousands of aircraft remain grounded due to the pandemic. “Overall, the government services and defense and space businesses remain significant and relatively stable and we continue to see solid global demand for our major programs,” CEO David Calhoun said on the company's quarterly earnings call Wednesday. “Nevertheless, the scale of government spending on COVID-19 response has the potential to add pressure to global defense spending in the years ahead.” U.S. defense spending is expected to flatten or decline in coming years as the Biden administration and a Democrat-controlled Congress focus more on domestic issues. Calhoun said the company expects its defense business to grow in the “lower end of the single digits” in coming years. “It's hard to commit to a big uptick in any way on growth rates anytime soon, in light of what I think are the pressures,” he said. Calhoun, who became CEO of the firm one year ago this month, said the coronavirus would continue to delay international defense contracts. “The order activity in those international markets has pushed to the right, somewhat of an almost entirely because of COVID-related stuff, not because of any competitive issue one way or the other,” he said. Like many of his colleagues in recent years, Calhoun touted Boeing's classified military work as being “incredibly encouraging and incredibly important to us.” Despite the continued problems with the KC-46, the Air Force has purchased 94 of a planned 179 aircraft. Just this month, it placed two orders totaling $3.8 billion for 27 aircraft. The FAA last month cleared the 737 Max for passenger flights in the United States. Some airlines have already resumed flights across North and South America. European regulators on Wednesday said the plane can resume flights across the continent. Boeing also disclosed Wednesday that it would not deliver its first 777X, a larger, more efficient version of the popular 777 jetliner, until late 2023. https://www.defenseone.com/business/2021/01/lockheed-overtakes-boeing-largest-us-aerospace-and-defense-firm/171684/

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  July 30, 2019 | International, Aerospace

  RAF Retiring Reaper In 2024, Paving Way For Protector

  By Tony Osborne LONDON—Britain is planning to retire its General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aircraft systems in 2024 as the Royal Air Force transitions to its new Protector platform. Although Royal Air Force (RAF) officers have not detailed when the first of the new Protector aircraft will arrive, there will be a transition as crews retrain from Reaper onto Protector, with the Reaper complementing the Protector on operations, Wing Commander Judith Graham, the RAF's Protector Program Manager, told Aerospace DAILY at the Royal International Air Tattoo earlier this month. “Reaper is an extraordinarily valuable capability for the UK government, so we don't want there to be a capability gap,” Graham said. The plan for avoiding a capability gap between Reaper and Protector suggests that a significant number of Protectors will have entered service by the time the Reaper is retired. The UK currently has 10 MQ-9 Reapers that it purchased as an urgent operational requirement for operations in Afghanistan. Today, they operate over Iraq and Syria, but none are destined for use in UK airspace. Work also is underway to select the site for a new facility at RAF Waddington, UK, from which the Protector fleet and the UK's new E-7 Wedgetail airborne early warning aircraft will be operated. Graham said the facility needs “to be ready for Protector by the end of 2021,” suggesting that first Protector deliveries could take place in 2022. Britain plans to centralize its Protector operations from Waddington, resulting in the UK presence at Creech AFB, Nevada being scaled down. Because of the Protector's ability to self-deploy and perform autonomous landing and take-off, there also is a significantly reduced need for forward-based personnel to land the aircraft at forward-operating locations, further reducing the personnel burden. The UK currently is planning to buy 16 Protectors, a derivative of General Atomics' self-developed, certifiable SkyGuardian platform, which has been redesigned to pave the way for it to meet military airworthiness requirements. As a result, the aircraft now features an all-weather capability with an electro-expulsive de-icing system that blows the ice off the leading edges of the wings and Y-stabilizers. General Atomics also has increased the fatigue life and damage tolerance of the aircraft and produced flight-critical software certifiable to the DO-178 standard. British Protectors will be armed with the Raytheon Paveway IV laser-guided-bomb and MBDA Brimstone air-to-ground missile. There also are plans to fit it with Leonardo's Sage Electronic Support Measures system. The aircraft will also be equipped with General Atomics' Lynx synthetic aperture radar, but there are studies to look at installing a larger radar, such as Leonardo's Seaspray surface-search radar. Work on the integration of such a radar, which could allow the Protector to support the UK's new P-8 Poseidon in the maritime patrol role, is being scoped but is not yet funded. RAF officers are working alongside General Atomics at its San Diego, California, facility as part of a combined test team to pave the way for the platform's certification by the UK Military Aviation Authority, which the RAF hopes will allow the aircraft to fly in non-segregated airspace for training and support to national authorities. They are hoping to do this even without the immediate installation of General Atomics internally developed sense-and-avoid radar. The RAF's Protectors will be compatible, but not immediately equipped, with the active electronically scanned array radar, but Graham said work was underway with the UK's newly renamed Strategic Command (formerly Joint Forces Command) to understand the requirement for the radar, and test and evaluation work was underway. Officials state that the radar likely will be introduced as part of the full operational capability for the platform. The UK also will use the General Atomics Advanced Cockpit ground control station, which uses a similar flight management system to the Beechcraft King Air 350. Under current plans, the British Protectors will be flown by a crew of three—a pilot, a sensor operator and a mission intelligence coordinator. Rather than flying the aircraft from inside transportable containers, the seven ground control stations will occupy a permanent building with room for expansion. There also will be scope to add an additional mission specialist, should a particular mission require it, officials say. https://aviationweek.com/defense/raf-retiring-reaper-2024-paving-way-protector