14 mai 2018 | Local, Aérospatial

RCAF change of command marks new era

Against a backdrop of a Douglas DC-3, a Bombardier Challenger 604, a McDonnell Douglas CF-188B and a Boeing CH-113 Labrador, LGen Michael Hood passed command of the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) to LGen Al Meinzinger on May 4, 2018.

The ceremony was conducted at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa and included an honour guard parade from 8 Wing Trenton, Ont., which Hood led from 2007 to 2009, and a Colour Party from 429 Tactical Airlift Squadron, the last squadron he commanded.

It also featured the central band of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) and the pipes and drums of 8 Wing. A planned flyover of two CH-146 Griffon helicopters, two CF-188 Hornets and one CC-130J Hercules was cancelled due to poor weather.

The transfer of command from Hood, an air combat systems officer, to Meinzinger, a helicopter pilot, marked the first time the new RCAF colours were paraded since they were presented by the Governor General in September. The former colours were passed to the custody of the Toronto Maple Leafs in a ceremony in February.

The setting of historic Air Force and Canadian airframes was a fitting reminder of the importance of the RCAF legacy, a history both commanders referenced in remarks to an audience of several hundred personnel, families and dignitaries, including seven former commanders, three former Chiefs of the Defence Staff (CDS), and three former deputy commanders of NORAD.

The change of command is more than passing a torch, “it's poignant,” said CDS Gen Jonathan Vance. “[It] marks the very cadence of life in the armed forces.”

Hood assumed command of the RCAF in July 2015, culminating a 33-year career that included many years in a CC-130 Hercules as well as staff tours with the Governor General, the United States Air Force, and in senior positions with the CAF and RCAF.

He praised the “exceptional people” of the Air Force and their skill on operations. “You are inheriting a great team you helped build,” he told Meinzinger.

Hood's one lament, he said, was the pace and lack of political agreement on vital procurement programs, in particular the replacement of the CF-188 Hornets.

“While I'm happy [the new] defence policy has a lot of great opportunity for the Air Force, and we have a vision moving forward for an open and transparent competition for the replacement of the fighter, I can tell you it is not happening fast enough,” he said.

“And I am going to continue to encourage, in my role as a civilian, the government to try and accelerate the acquisition of that replacement fighter.”

Vance thanked Hood for his “sound and clear” advice on a number of complex files, including acquisition projects such as fighter jets and fixed-wing search and rescue aircraft, “ferocious advice” that was delivered in private and “honest execution delivered in public.”

He also commended Hood for his efforts to instill a new generation of innovators within the RCAF by seeking out ideas from across the Air Force and seconding non-commissioned and junior officers to an entrepreneurial environment in a technology hub in Waterloo, Ont. “It speaks to your care for the future ... of the RCAF,” said Vance.

Meinzinger, who served as deputy commander of the RCAF for two years under Hood, also applauded the innovation agenda and said he would, “continue to focus on innovation as we look to the future.”

A CH-135 Twin Huey and CH-146 Griffon pilot with four flying tours, Meinzinger has served in a variety of senior staff roles in the CAF, RCAF and NORAD, most recently as director of staff in the Strategic Joint Staff under Gen Vance.

He commanded the Joint Task Force Afghanistan air wing in Kandahar in 2011, overseeing air wing support to combat operations, and has led both the training and education systems as commanding officer of 403 Helicopter Operational Training Squadron in 2006 and later, in 2013, as commandant of the Royal Military College of Canada.

His experience taught him the importance of “flying in formation” and working “as one team,” said Meinzinger. Born in Trenton and raised on the base, he said he was “indentured for life” and learned at an early age “what it means to be part of a military family.”

His father, a chief warrant officer, served 36 years in the CAF.

Meinzinger said he intends to maintain the RCAF reputation for excellence on operations.

“Our ability to deliver air power effects in an integrated manner with precision, agility and professionalism is our true calling card.”

But he also emphasized people as a personal priority at a time when the Air Force is wrestling with recruitment and, perhaps more challenging, retention.

“In my view, the RCAF can only be successful ... if we have well-led, healthy, robust and inclusive squadrons and tactical units. I firmly believe that if we can get it right within our 39 flying units and 85 tactical units, our future will be all that brighter,” he said, pledging that decisions would be made with the understanding that squadrons “remain the life blood of the RCAF.”

https://www.skiesmag.com/news/rcaf-change-command-marks-new-era/

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29 mars 2019 | Local, Naval

SNC-Lavalin's legal woes are putting a $500M federal defence contract at risk
Murray Brewster · CBC News A SNC-Lavalin contract with the Department of National Defence (DND) worth half a billion dollars comes up for renewal next year — when the Montreal-based engineering giant is expected to be on trial over corruption charges. The pending expiry of the $507 million contract to support the servicing of minor warships and auxiliary vessels, signed in 2011, sharpens the debate over what a guilty verdict would mean for the Quebec-based engineering giant and whether a conviction actually would mean subjecting the company to a 10-year ban on bidding for federal contracts. The stakes are high for DND. In addition to holding an important defence contract, SNC-Lavalin has access to a range of secret military drawings, equipment and intellectual property. Although its agreements are periodically reopened to new bids, the embattled corporation has been a reliable contractor for National Defence. A survey of active federal government contracts shows DND and Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) were the two biggest users of SNC-Lavalin services and construction during the current fiscal year. Across the whole of the federal government, SNC-Lavalin holds 53 'active' federal government contracts — 25 of them with DND — with a combined value of $670 million. A company with a big federal footprint The firm signed roughly $68 million in new or renewed agreements with the federal government ($23.7 million with DND and PSPC alone) in the current budget year up to the end of December. That figure excludes what could be a large number of smaller contracts worth less than $25,000 — contracts the federal government can award without competition. An inventory of those agreements is extremely difficult to track down, but PSPC acknowledged it awarded $146,522 in minor work to SNC-Lavalin in the current fiscal year. The RCMP laid corruption charges against SNC-Lavalin and some of its units in February 2015. All the charges relate to the company's operations in Libya. The charges allege that the company offered officials in that country $47 million in bribes and accuse SNC-Lavalin and two of its subsidiaries of defrauding various Libyan public agencies of approximately $129.8 million over 10 years, starting in 2001. The company has been at the centre of a political firestorm since early February, when The Globe and Mail reported that former justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould felt pressured by the Prime Minister's Office to grant the company a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) — a legal tool which would have allowed the company to avoid a criminal trial by acknowledging fault and paying a fine, among other conditions. In defending their interest in a DPA for SNC-Lavalin, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and others in his government have pointed to the scale of the engineering firm's business, the possibility it could be banned from federal government work and the number of people it employs. Scott Newark, a former Crown prosecutor who teaches at Simon Fraser University, said it's been clear from the outset that avoiding the federal contract ban has been SNC-Lavalin's main objective. The question of what would happen to those federal contracts should the company be convicted is a subject of debate, however. There are policy provisions that allow federal officials to cancel existing contracts and ban future bids from a company convicted of serious crimes, such as bribery. PSPC would only say the federal government would "assess the situation" if "a supplier becomes ineligible during the life of a contract" due to a conviction. The power to terminate or suspend a contract rests with federal bureaucrats, according to PSPC's Ineligibility and Suspension Policy. A company convicted of serious crimes can avoid being fired by the feds by signing an undertaking stating "that it will conduct business with Canada in an ethical and responsible manner." But there's never a guarantee that such an undertaking will be offered to a convicted company. Just three companies are currently banned from carrying on business with the federal government — all relatively small firms in Ontario, Quebec and Newfoundland. No ban on bidding during trial A spokesman for DND said there's nothing stopping SNC-Lavalin from continuing to bid on federal contracts as they appear, even during its trial. "These contracts were issued pursuant to Government of Canada contracting regulations, particularly as it concerns open, fair and transparent competitions," said Dan Le Bouthillier in an email. "Those regulations also stipulate that any company eligible to bid on Government of Canada contracts may continue to do so, so long as they meet the necessary requirements for the work." In an analysis piece for the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, Newark said PSPC is working on a revision of its 'integrity regime' policy to give federal officials more discretion to waive bans of individual companies contracting with the federal government. Public Services Minister Carla Qualtrough has said her department is looking at eliminating fixed bidding disqualification periods and replacing them with a wholly discretionary determination — which would include the option of imposing no contracting ban at all. Even under the current system, Newark said, an order cancelling a company's federal contracts and banning it from future contracts following a conviction is far from a slam-dunk. "I checked on the Criminal Code and the Corruption of Public Foreign Officials Act and, of course, it's not in those statutes. It's not a mandatory consequence." he said. The integrity regime review has been underway in Qualtrough's department since 2017. Newark said he's amazed that nobody with the company or the federal government seems to have realized that a conviction for SNC-Lavalin could lead to something other than a 10-year contracting ban. "Why didn't anybody say, 'Hey wait a minute. We know what about this. We're changing our policy,'" he said. The head of procurement at DND attempted to reassure members of the all-party House of Commons defence committee during a hearing last month that SNC-Lavalin's "secret" work for the federal government does not pose an unacceptable risk. "We hold the intellectual property, the drawings and everything," Pat Finn testified on Feb. 28. "Irrespective of the circumstances in which the contract is terminated, we hold the material." https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/snc-lavalin-s-legal-woes-are-putting-a-500m-federal-defence-contract-at-risk-1.5073996
12 août 2019 | Local, Aérospatial

Aerospace, Defence and Security Expo (ADSE) marks next phase of Vision 2025
The Aerospace, Defence and Security Expo (ADSE) has wrapped its ninth annual successful conference and trade show, marking the first major gathering of Canada's aerospace sector since the release of the Aerospace Industries Association of Canada's (AIAC) industry-led Vision 2025 report. “ADSE 2019 once again attracted a broad cross-section of aerospace, defence and security industry representatives, from across Canada and around the world, with interests in ensuring Canada remains a leader in an increasingly fierce competitive global economy,” said Jim Quick, president and CEO of AIAC. “Their continued collaboration and input are vital as we move ahead with the six key priorities identified during the months of cross-country consultations that informed our report, Charting a New Course.” The six priorities are: Building the most skilled and talented workforce in the world; Ensuring small and medium-sized aerospace businesses thrive and grow; Using innovation to capture new opportunities, including carbon-neutral flight and unmanned vehicles; Investing to maintain Canada's status as a world-class regulator; Leveraging Canada's role at the forefront of space; Maximizing defence procurement and government partnerships to drive new industrial growth. ADSE 2019 featured an impressive line-up of speakers as well as industry exhibits, keynote speeches, panels and workshops, together with numerous B2B and networking opportunities. High-profile presenters included: Carla Qualtrough, Canadian minister of Public Services and Procurement and Accessibility Harjit Sajjan, minister of National Defence Bruce Ralston, B.C. minister of Jobs, Trade and Technology Dave Curtis, executive chair, Longview Aviation Capital Lorraine Ben, chief executive, Lockheed Martin Canada Bob Cantwell, managing director, Boeing Canada and Boeing Vancouver Florian Sodtke, Heat of Combat Air Systems Marketing, Airbus Defence and Space ADSE is a world-class aerospace exhibition. It is Western Canada's largest aerospace event and the only Canadian expo linked to a major international airshow. Hosted by AIAC (Pacific division) it occurs each August in Abbotsford, B.C., in conjunction with the Abbotsford International Airshow. AIAC and AIAC Pacific wish to extend special thanks to ADSE's nearly 30 sponsors in 2019 — especially presenting partners Western Economic Diversification Canada and the Province of British Columbia, and platinum partners the City of Abbotsford, Cascade Aerospace, KF Aerospace, and Lockheed Martin — for their generous and ongoing support, without which ADSE would not be possible. https://www.skiesmag.com/press-releases/aerospace-defence-and-security-expo-adse-marks-next-phase-of-vision-2025/
9 avril 2019 | Local, Aérospatial

Marinvent Announces Successful Delivery to Government of Canada of its APM Product
Montreal, Canada, April 2, 2019 – Marinvent is pleased to announce the successful delivery of its Airfoil Performance Monitor product (APM) to the Government of Canada following extensive independent flight testing by the National Research Council under the Build in Canada Innovation Program (BCIP). APM monitors and displays the margin to stall of an airfoil and detects the real-time effects of icing, contamination, and degradation on the lifting surface of any airfoil and in all phases of flight. The recently-concluded flight evaluations conducted independently by NRC-FRL conclusively demonstrated the following unique capabilities of APM: Provides stall warning and backup airspeed indications and is completely independent of all aircraft-side inputs except power. (it needs no airspeed, air data, angle-of-attack, or flap position inputs). Gives the correct stall warning margin, even with contaminated (iced or otherwise degraded) airfoils. Correctly detects compressibility stalls at high altitude. Provides tail stall warning which is particularly relevant to a number of UAV platforms. Provides correct diagnosis of contamination early during the takeoff roll (Air Florida Flight 90, Arrow Air, and Dryden, among others). Provides real-time data enabling significantly reduced fuel consumption and brake wear and enabling better predictive maintenance scheduling, helping to pay for itself by reducing aircraft operating costs. “APM is a mature product having been successfully tested on several Part 25 jet and turboprop aircraft, as well as numerous Part 23 light aircraft and business jets”, said Dr. John Maris, President of Marinvent. “It is available for installation today. The Canadian government is our first customer under the BCIP program, and we have also made our first forays into the UAV market, which desperately needs this technology particularly for Canadian winter operations”. Dr. Maris, whose doctoral thesis “AN ARCHIVAL ANALYSIS OF STALL WARNING SYSTEM EFFECTIVENESS DURING AIRBORNE ICING ENCOUNTERS” led to the final development of APM, has made his academic life's work the study of the relationship between aircrew and angle of attack/stall warning systems. He is one of the world's leading authorities on this subject, which is particularly pertinent currently, and is also a Transport Canada Test Pilot DAR. Dr. Maris is an Adjunct Professor at Concordia University in Montreal, Canada as well as being President of Marinvent Corporation and inventor of APM. In recognition of the potential impact of APM, SAE named APM as the 2017 Aerospace & Defense category winner in their Create the Future competition: https://contest.techbriefs.com/2017/entries/aerospace-and-defense/8422 About Marinvent – Marinvent is a privately held Canadian company, founded in 1983. Marinvent is headquartered on the outskirts of Montreal, the leading aerospace center in Canada and one of the largest aerospace centers in the world. Marinvent provides consulting, services, training, tools and IP to reduce customers' program/product risk, cost and schedule and to help them innovate quickly. Its engineers, experience, TCCA DARs, flying avionics test bed, research simulator and IP make it a reliable and trusted partner for the planning and management of projects, regardless of size and complexity. Marinvent's customers include aircraft OEMs, integrators, tier 1s, tier 2s and Government customers around the world. Marinvent prides itself of helping its customers bring their products to market and has a stellar track record of doing exactly that. As a result, Marinvent has won numerous awards in recognition of that fact. http://www.marinvent.com/wp-content/uploads/APM-First-Customer-April-2019.pdf

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