Defense Procurement News » thirty years

Lockheed To Begin Production Of New Radars For E-2D Hawkeyes

Matthew Potter — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:00:33 +0000

The Navy awarded Lockheed Martin a contract to begin Low Rate Initial Production (LRIP) of the new radar for the E-2D carrier based Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft. The E-2D is an upgrade of the venerable E-2C system that has been in use for thirty years. The contract has a value of over $170 million for four radar systems.

The E-2D has begun production recently. The APY-9 has longer range and better discrimination then the previous radars on the aircraft. Once LRIP is complete with the necessary exit criteria demonstrated the system will enter Full Rate production with seventy-five systems planned.

More Foreign Sales Of The F-16

Matthew Potter — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:00:12 +0000

Fresh off of a recent sale of F-16 fighters to Morocco Lockheed Martin announced a further deal with a North African country. Egypt through the U.S. Air Force will go ahead and purchase up to twenty-four of the aircraft. These two deals will help keep the production line open for several more months. The U.S. and many of its allies are moving out with the F-35 JSF as a replacement for the F-16 Falcon which has been in use for thirty years.

Buying Some Meals Ready To Eat For The Troops

Matthew Potter — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:00:42 +0000

The U.S. Department of Defense placed an order worth over $170 million with AmericaQual Group LLC for the standardized, packaged Meals Ready to Eat (MRE). These are used by all parts of the U.S. military and also include humanitarian ration versions. The MRE has been produced for the U.S. military for over thirty years and is considered a vast improvement over more traditional rations used by soldiers through the ages. This was an option on a contract previously awarded and is good for the next year.

The MRE is a self contained kit with an entree and other food and drinks. It includes self heating food as well. One MRE is supposed to fee one person and they come packaged in cases of twenty-four normally. With the large numbers of U.S. troops deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan over the last eight years the demand for MRE has been high. Especially with many of the soldiers deployed in smaller units at bases scattered across the two countries there normally cannot be fixed housekeeping services like kitchens, canteens or restaurants as there are on bigger U.S. bases.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/williamd/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

With Cancellation of E-10 Air Force Moves to Modernize E-8

Matthew Potter — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 11:00:23 +0000

The US Air Force has been using the E-8 Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS) aircraft for almost thirty years. Originally the Air Force planned to supplement it with the new, E-10 Multi-Sensor Command and Control Aircraft (MC2A); but that program was canceled last year. The new sensor for that system was the Multi-Platform Radar Technology Insertion Program (MP RTIP) which also is to go on the Global Hawk long range UAV. As MarketWatch.com reports the Air Force is now moving to insert the MP RTIP sensor onto the E-8 airframe. A contract was awarded to Northrop Grumman to begin that process.

Since the MP RTIP will continue for Global Hawk it makes sense to add this system on to the existing E-8 aircraft. The Air Force operates almost 20 of those aircraft and they proved their worth in Desert Storm and in supporting operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

USAF awards satellite support contract

Matthew Potter — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 01:38:33 +0000

The US Air Force awarded Northrop Grumman a contract worth over $200 M to support the DSP constellation of satellites. Northrop-Grumman will make sure the satellites are working and provide analysis of the data they collect. The company manufactured the infra-red sensors installed on them. DSP primary mission is to detect the launch of missiles and rockets. They have been used for over thirty years and will eventually be replaced by the SBIRS system.

See the press release at MarketWatch.com.