UAVs ordered by Special Operations

July 4, 2008 by Dagpotter · Comment
Filed under: Contract Awards, Heckler Koch, Military Aviation, US SOC, production program 

The US Special Operations Command awarded a contract to buy small UAVs. See an article here. AeroVironment will provide their small Puma AE to the command. This illustrates that the USSOCOM is a separate entity within the DoD and can do its own acquisition. In the past they would have to rely on the main services to procure their equipment, but they now have their own development and procurement funds. The most recent key split between USSOCOM and the Army was the decision to go with a different rifle then the M4/M16. The Special Ops guys bout HK’s SCAR. For more on that see this.

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Poorly written contract grounds UK CH-47

June 3, 2008 by Dagpotter · Comment
Filed under: Boeing, Contract Awards, England, Military Aviation, production program 

In 2001 the British military purchased 8 CH-47 Chinooks to support special operations. Unfortunately the contract did not buy access to the aircraft source code for the software. This meant that the UK military could not certify the aircraft for any but day operations. See a story here. This has meant that the aircraft have sat for seven years not being used. At one point the UK government planned to convert them to regular cargo CH-47 aircraft but used the money for other things in the end. Obviously a clause to allow access to the technical data would have driven up the price a bit, but it would have allowed the military to certify the aircraft for night and bad weather operations. As it is there has been little gained by buying these aircraft, at really no fault of Boeing.

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