23 mars 2022 | Local, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
CANSEC Canada's Global Defence & Security Trade Show
9 décembre 2022 | Local, Aérospatial
Magellan Aerospace Corporation announced that it will continue producing F-35 Lightning II horizontal tail assemblies under an agreement with BAE Systems.
25 février 2019 | Local, Aérospatial
BERLIN (Reuters) - The German Defence Ministry is evaluating a bid from Canada to buy a high-altitude surveillance drone that has been parked at a German air base for years after the cancellation of the Euro Hawk program in 2013, with a further bid possible from NATO. Canada has submitted a formal bid for the prototype aircraft, which was stripped of key equipment and demilitarized by the United States in 2017, a ministry spokesman said on Wednesday without providing further details. Canadian media have reported that Canada could use the drone, built by Northrop Grumman, to monitor oil spills, ice levels and marine habitats in the remote Arctic region. NATO, which is buying its own fleet of Northrop drones, is also considering a bid for the mothballed German aircraft but has not yet submitted it, said sources familiar with the process. NATO had no immediate comment. There was no immediate reply from the Canadian government. A sale of the drone would end an embarrassing chapter that raised concerns about the German military's procurement process and triggered the transfer of former Defence Minister Thomas de Maiziere to another cabinet post. Berlin told lawmakers last year that it had spent about 700 million euros ($793.5 million) on the Euro Hawk prototype, and the ISIS surveillance system built by Airbus. Berlin initiated plans in 2000 to buy five Euro Hawk drones based on Northrop's Global Hawk unmanned system at a cost of about 1.2 billion euros but later canceled the program because of cost overruns and problems obtaining certification for use in civilian airspace in Germany. It had only received the one prototype aircraft that is now being sold. Berlin is now negotiating with Northrop to buy several MQ-4C Triton drones for delivery after 2025. Northrop last year said the process could take years to complete. German opposition lawmaker Andrej Hunko, a member of the radical Left party, said the government had declared the aircraft incapable of flight after the U.S. Air Force removed U.S. built radio equipment and other key systems when it demilitarized the aircraft in 2017. “The airplane has salvage value at best,” he told Reuters. “Any proceeds from the sale would be a drop in the bucket, compared with the huge amounts spent on the program.” For NATO, the drone could provide additional support to the fleet of five high-altitude unmanned Global Hawk planes it agreed to buy from Northrop in 2012 for $1.7 billion, along with transportable ground stations. Industry officials said the Euro Hawk saga underscored problems in military procurement, noting that NATO's sister aircraft regularly traverse German air space to conduct surveillance missions over the North Sea. They also have no blanket approval for use in German civilian airspace but use case-by-case permissions from air traffic authorities. It was not immediately clear what steps would be needed to return the Euro Hawk prototype to flight. Additional reporting by David Ljungren in Ottawa; Editing by Riham Alkousaa, David Goodman and William Maclean https://www.kitco.com/news/2019-02-20/Canada-bids-for-mothballed-prototype-drone-from-Germany.html
24 septembre 2018 | Local, Naval
DAVID PUGLIESE, OTTAWA CITIZEN DND officials warned that committing to a specific time to start cutting steel on the warships 'will add additional risk' Irving Shipbuilding is pushing federal officials to announce a firm date to begin construction on Canada's new fleet of warships, arguing that will help drive the project along. But the company is facing resistance from federal officials concerned about missing a publicly announced start date, as happened with the Arctic patrol ships now under construction, according to documents released to Postmedia. Federal officials have continued to say that construction of the Canadian Surface Combatant fleet would begin sometime in the early 2020s but no specific date had been set. Irving representatives tried last year to convince federal bureaucrats of the need to set a specific date to begin construction. “(Irving) noted that hard dates is what drives the work,” according to the report from the Jan. 17, 2017 meeting of deputy ministers overseeing the national shipbuilding plan. But the firm faced pushback from Department of National Defence officials. “DND cautioned against setting a hard production date to work towards, noting the challenges this approach caused on AOPS,” the report noted. DND officials warned that committing to a specific time to start cutting steel on the warships “will add additional risk.” The AOPS were announced in 2007 by then prime minister Stephen Harper and were supposed to be in the water by 2013. But construction didn't start until 2015. The first ship was launched on Sept. 15 and won't be operational until 2019. Three consortiums have submitted bids for the surface combatant program and those are still being evaluated. The project will see 15 warships buiilt by Irving Shipbuilding in Halifax. A winning bid is expected to be selected sometime this year. The ships will form the backbone of the future Royal Canadian Navy. Scott Leslie, director general of large combat ship construction at Public Services and Procurement Canada, said that a more precise construction date can't be provided now because a winning design has yet to be selected. “There are a lot of variables around it, one of the main ones being which design is chosen and how much work is required to get that design evolved and buildable at Irving Shipyards,” Leslie explained. Irving is worried about the gap after building of the Arctic Offshore Patrol Ships but before construction of the surface combatants. If the two projects are not aligned, workers could face layoffs and Irving is worried it will lose skilled personnel. The government has already faced delays and rising costs with the warships. In 2008, it estimated the total cost to be about $26 billion. But in 2015, then navy commander Vice Admiral Mark Norman voiced concern that taxpayers may not have been given all the information and predicted the cost alone for the ships would be around $30 billion. Cost estimates for the entire project are now between $55 billion and $60 billion. About half is for systems and equipment on the 15 ships, according to federal documents obtained by Postmedia through the Access to Information law. “Approximately one-half of the CSC build cost is comprised of labour in the (Irving's) Halifax yard and materials,” the documents added. Last year, Jean-Denis Fréchette, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, estimated the CSC program would cost $61.82 billion. He also warned that every year the awarding of the contract is delayed beyond 2018, taxpayers will spend an extra $3 billion, because of inflation. The first ship will be delivered in the mid 2020s. In November, in a surprise twist, a French-Italian consortium declined to formally submit a bid and instead offered Canada a fleet of vessels at around $30 billion. Officials with Fincantieri of Italy and Naval Group of France said they don't believe the procurement process as currently designed will be successful. https://ottawacitizen.com/news/canada/federal-officials-dont-want-to-be-pinned-down-on-a-date-to-start-building-new-navy-documents-show/wcm/eaace91c-ece6-4a5a-b130-e1d96b7ff261