India launches first private-sector howitzer facility

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  23 mai 2023 | International, C4ISR

  NATO hunger for info driving deals for commercial satellite imagery

  The U.S. and U.K. are leading contributors to NATO joint ISR, with “everybody else” tailing, an official said at the GEOINT Symposium.

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  29 mai 2020 | International, Aérospatial

  US Air Force looks to up-gun its airlift planes

  By: Valerie Insinna WASHINGTON — Humble airlift planes like the C-130J Super Hercules and C-17 Globemaster III could become heavily-armed weapons trucks capable of airdropping large bundles of munitions that deliver a massive blast. So far, the Air Force has conducted two successful tests of “palletized munitions” from the C-130 and C-17, said Maj. Gen. Clint Hinote, the deputy director of the service's Air Force Warfighting Integration Capability cell. “We are in discussions right now about how do we proceed to prototyping and fielding,” he said during a May 27 event held by the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies. Like the name suggests, palletized munitions are a collection of weapons strapped together onto a smart pallet, which would feed the munitions tracking and targeting information as they are dropped from an airlift platform. A request for information released in February characterized the technology as “a bomb bay in a box” that could allow mobility aircraft to stay out of a threat zone and launch a mass of standoff weapons. “It's all about capacity,” Hinote explained. “You've got to create enough capacity so that a long-range punch is really a punch. What we see is that no matter how big our bomber force is, the capacity that the joint force needs is always more and more. And so this is why we think that there is a real possibility here for using cargo platforms to be able to increase the capacity of fires.” Air Force Special Operations Command conducted one demonstration of the technology on Jan. 28, when a MC-130J performed three airdrops of simulated palletized munitions at at Dugway Proving Ground, Utah. “In this case, munitions stacked upon wooden pallets, or Combat Expendable Platforms (CEPs), deployed via a roller system,” the Air Force Research Laboratory said in a May 27 release. “AFSOC aircrew released five CEPs rigged with six simulated munitions, the same mass as the actual weapons, including four Cargo Launch Expendable Air Vehicles with Extended Range (CLEAVERs) across a spectrum of low and high altitude airdrops." In response to questions from Defense News, AFRL clarified that simulated long-range cruise missiles were deployed from an off-the-shelf pallet system as well as an Air Force designed crate system. CLEAVER is a new weapon under development by the lab as part of a separate effort, though it may be used in palletized munitions in the future. On Feb. 27, Air Mobility Command conducted a similar demonstration with a C-17, which conducted two airdrops of simulated palletized munitions, AFRL said. In future demonstrations, AFSOC plans to release more advanced forms of simulated munitions as well as full-up weapons vehicles that can be configured with a warhead and terminal guidance system. However, the Air Force is looking for other technological options. Through its request for information, which closed in April, the service sought data about new or existing palletized munitions concepts. The service hopes to use that information to inform future experimentation efforts, operational assessments or the acquisition palletized munitions systems. Five companies responded to the RFI, AFRL said. If the effort moves forward, one big question will be figuring out which entities in the Air Force have command over a mobility asset that is playing a combat role more similar to a fighter jet or bomber. “Some kind of extremely streamlined command and control is going to be necessary, or else you must have an integrator somewhere,” said Hinote, who added that cultural barriers inside the Air Force could be harder to overcome than the technological challenges of creating palletized munitions. Hinote also acknowledged that it currently may be hard to find the funding to move forward with a new program. “We're in the last year of an administration. We've had to turn in the budget early with not too many changes, and we're looking at the possibility of a continuing resolution where new starts are going to be difficult to do,” he said. However, “that is all temporary,” he said. Updated 5/28/20 to add more information from AFRL about past palletized munitions experiments. https://www.defensenews.com/air/2020/05/27/air-force-looking-to-up-gun-its-airlift-planes/

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  29 avril 2019 | International, Aérospatial

  CAE Wants to Help the Pentagon Train Pilots Through Data Analysis

  By Brian Garrett-Glaser Canadian simulator and training provider CAE is in talks with the U.S. Navy to add its new high-tech data analysis tool suite, CAE Rise, to existing and future programs, including aircrew training services for the T-44C Pegasus, according to the company. Launched for the civil aviation market in 2017, CAE Rise allows instructors to objectively assess pilot competencies using live data during training sessions, accessible via iPad interface. CAE pitches the system as a means of using big data analysis to reduce subjectivity in pilot assessment, allow instructors to focus more on teaching and help create more efficient training programs. The CAE Rise system can "detect everything for a maneuver, and it's able to tell the instructor what parameter went out of whack, where [the pilot] did not do according to standards,” said Terry Constantakis, CAE's director of civil aviation training solutions. “So in terms of key benefits for CAE Rise, we often use the term ‘better than the naked eye' in terms of detecting errors and helping the instructor provide assessments,” he added. “It also allows the instructor to focus more on soft skills. For example, when we look at things like grading, we noticed that when instructors have RISE they spend more time providing comments on soft skills like teamwork, communication and workload management — things that are not necessarily performance-based or technical skills.” CAE Rise has been adopted by a number of airlines in Asia, including a five-year agreement with AirAsia to train its long-haul pilots to fly for affiliate airline AirAsia X on the Airbus A330. More recently, in late 2018, CAE released its RISE data suite for the defense market, with key features like development on Microsoft Azure Government for cloud computing to meet government cybersecurity and compliance requirements. The company is offering CAE Rise to the Pentagon as an enhancement to its current contract for T-44C aircrew training devices, which the company began delivering in 2014. “As far as what branches of the U.S. military have expressed an interest, I will say we have had ongoing discussions with the U.S. Navy,” said a company spokesperson. “We have briefed and demonstrated to the Navy how CAE Rise could be used to enhance and improve naval aviator training.” “There are no other CAE Rise customers on the defense side that we can disclose currently,” the spokesperson added. CAE hopes the platform will, in addition to improving the quality of aviation training services, help address the global civil and military pilot shortage that is expected to worsen in coming decades. The company's analysis on pilot demand published in 2016 estimated a need for 180,000 new captains globally within the next 10 years. Drivers of that shortage differ regionally but include aging populations of pilots reaching retirement, expected growth in air travel and falling supply from universities, business aviation and military training compared to previous decades. https://www.aviationtoday.com/2019/04/25/cae-wants-help-pentagon-train-pilots-data-analysis/