Archive for November, 2009
Nov 23, 2009, post by awatrobski
Flow Mobile has big plans to revolutionize wireless and broadband access in rural America, and plans to start in Cass County. The project has support from some influential people, but also has its share of critics.
Flow Mobile is a small company with a bold plan to bring the next wave of mobile wireless communications to a large swath of rural America.
The Bismarck-based firm claims to have “game-changing” technology that makes it economically feasible to cover sparsely populated areas of 12 states in the Midwest and West.
The launching pad for Flow Mobile’s proposed wireless network is North Dakota, with a pilot project expected to start soon in Cass County to demonstrate its technology, which has drawn skepticism.
To help build its wireless empire, Flow Mobile has applied for $52 million in federal stimulus grants, including $29.1 million for projects in North Dakota.
And although few people outside of the wireless communications industry have heard of the startup company, Flow Mobile’s cast of characters includes a handful of prominent North Dakota names, as well as Silicon Valley technology entrepreneurs originally from India and Hong Kong.
The central figure is Bill Owens, a retired Navy admiral and No. 2 Pentagon official, who grew up in Bismarck and became a technology executive after retiring from the military.
Owens is an investor in Flow Mobile and is also chairman of its board, which also includes Rich Karlgaard, another Bismarck native who is publisher of Forbes magazine.
Flow Mobile’s key players not only have their roots in North Dakota. They also have political connections.
Gov. John Hoeven wrote a warm letter of support earlier this year offering to have several state public safety agencies use Flow Mobile’s demonstration network – and possibly use state-owned towers and poles for base stations.
Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., wrote two federal agency heads to support Flow Mobile’s request for stimulus grants, which are still pending.
But North Dakota’s early backing of Flow Mobile, which also involved collaborative filings with federal communications officials, drew strong protests.
That’s because Flow Mobile also has its homegrown rivals: a consortium of 19 rural telecommunications cooperatives with a combined investment of $1 billion in North Dakota.
The companies have their own interest in a partnership with the state in a new public safety communications network.
The static generated by Flow Mobile’s ambitious proposals takes place amid a high-stakes competition by companies jockeying for access to a valuable asset: airwaves made available by the conversion of television signals from analog to digital.
Those airwaves will be in great demand for the next generation of mobile wireless devices – 4G, shorthand for the emerging fourth-generation technology that will make today’s 3G smart phones smarter, faster and more versatile.
Finally, Flow Mobile has a past. The company, first formed more than a year ago, is an offshoot of Extend America, a now-defunct company based in Bismarck that provided Internet service and cellular telephone service to rural areas. Extend America received $11.2 million in federal loans in 2004.
In fact, Flow Mobile is the trade name for a company called New EA Inc., as in New Extend America, originally incorporated in North Dakota but dissolved and reincorporated in Delaware in September 2008.
Extend America’s chief executive once was Ed Schafer, in between his time as North Dakota governor and U.S. agriculture secretary. He has no involvement in Flow Mobile, company officials said.
Red carpet, not red tape.
Flow Mobile got the red carpet instead of red tape when it approached North Dakota about its plans for a mobile broadband wireless network to serve public service agencies.
The wireless public safety network – as well as mobile broadband services the company plans to sell to commercial and residential customers – is based on “smart antenna” Wi-Fi technology Flow Mobile claims is dramatically cheaper than other wireless technology.
Hoeven eagerly signed off on a Flow Mobile demonstration project in a Feb. 9 letter of support sent to Owens.
“We are pleased to have New EA, Inc. serving communities in North Dakota with wireless mobile broadband access using wireless technologies,” the letter began.
“As their respective operating budgets allow, several State of North Dakota public safety agencies will participate in the project,” the governor’s letter said in part.
After suggesting that several state agencies, including the Highway Patrol, state radio and homeland security, could use Flow Mobile’s network, Hoeven’s letter went on to offer that the state “will, where possible and practical, help identify potential locations” for Flow Mobile’s base stations on state-owned towers and poles.
The letter was written by a Hoeven aide in consultation with officials of the state’s Information Technology Department and Department of Emergency Services, with input from a Flow Mobile employee, Hoeven spokesman Don Canton informed.
That Flow Mobile employee is Bill Sorensen, a former Bismarck mayor who was an investor in Extend America and now handles government relations for Flow Mobile.
However, Hoeven’s letter concluded by cautioning that the state had no binding agreement with Flow Mobile, and his intent was to express interest and make an “offer of cooperation” to enhance public safety communications.
But six months later, on Aug. 11, Hoeven sent a second letter to Owens, this time with a more aloof tone.
Hoeven noted that the state must go through a competitive bidding process when selecting services, and said the state had not yet sought bids during its evaluation of technologies for a broadband wireless public safety network.
“Any company applying for a stimulus grant should not represent that the State has selected its product or company to develop its statewide mobile broadband emergency network, only that the State wants to develop a statewide mobile broadband emergency communications network,” Hoeven’s second letter informed.
Why the difference in tone?
A lot had transpired in the time between the two letters, both in Bismarck and in Washington.
For one, beginning in late March, the consortium of rural telecommunications cooperatives met several times with state officials to express interest in working with the state to provide broadband wireless for public safety, said Derrick Bulawa, chief executive of BEK Communications, a co-op based in Steele, N.D., and consortium representative.
In an interview Friday, Hoeven said the state was not aware that other firms were interested in providing wireless broadband public safety communications when he wrote his first letter to Owens.
“At that time we weren’t aware of anybody else that was willing, able and ready to provide the service,” Hoeven informed.
The governor stressed that his letter of support only concerned a test project – not a permanent network to provide service, which would require a formal bidding process, which hasn’t happened.
“We haven’t contracted with anybody at this point,” the governor said. “We’re on the front end of it. Nothing’s been decided yet. At this point we don’t even know if the FCC’s going to allow us to use the spectrum.”
No state money has gone to Flow Mobile, officials informed.
Hoeven wasn’t the only elected official to write on Flow Mobile’s behalf.
In a letter dated Aug. 4, Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., wrote to the heads of two federal agencies involved in awarding stimulus funds for broadband communications infrastructure.
“It is a pleasure to write to you to express my support for the broadband stimulus funding application of Flow Mobile of Bismarck, North Dakota,” Conrad’s letter said.
On Friday, a Conrad aide said the letter was a courtesy extended to many state companies.
“This was a routine letter asking the department to simply give consideration to the application,” said Christopher Gaddie, a Conrad spokesman. “It was nothing beyond that.”
Compatibility problem?
In filings before the Federal Communications Commission, Flow Mobile’s proposal has drawn criticism from groups representing public safety communications organizations.
Those groups have expressed concerns – and the rural co-ops have asserted – that the company’s “Wi-Fi” broadband wireless technology will be incompatible with the emerging next generation of wireless communications.
Incompatibility could mean the radios for public safety responders from outside the area would not be able to communicate with North Dakota’s network, making the state an “island.”
Sree Tangella, Flow Mobile’s chief executive and an engineer, argues that the company’s “4G-like” wireless technology will be able to “migrate” to the new 4G standard that has emerged as the consensus choice.
It is unfair to argue that Flow Mobile’s technology won’t work with a standard that still is under development, Tangella added.
Also, public safety organizations have said Flow Mobile’s network could cause interference with wireless public safety networks in neighboring states.
The interference problem, Tangella said, can be avoided by carefully placing transmitting stations and controlling the power of the signal.
Flow Mobile’s Cass County demonstration will show the effectiveness of its “smart antenna” technology, Tangella informed.
The company has leased wireless spectrum in eastern North Dakota and will seek airwaves in the western part of the state, said Yick Chan, Flow Mobile’s chief operating officer.
“Fargo is the showcase,” he informed.
North Dakota hired a consultant to review Flow Mobile’s proposal to use Cass County as a test site for its technology.
The technology consultant, Elert & Associates, concluded that Flow Mobile’s plan represents a “unique and very viable solution for North Dakota,” but also cited a number of concerns to be resolved.
A smaller demonstration project in Dickinson, N.D., served as a “proof of concept” and was “generally successful although included some hiccups,” the Elert report found.
Using radio frequencies open to the public, Flow Mobile’s wireless system experienced a dropped connection in one of four or five signal “hand offs” between “Wi-Fi” access points, the report informed.
The bigger picture.
If Flow Mobile’s venture succeeds, North Dakota would be the first market in the world to have its new technology, said Tangella.
If fully realized, public and private investment in Flow Mobile’s 12-state territory likely would exceed $450 million, Tangella said.
Owens said the company’s business model doesn’t hinge on government support and has significant private investment.
“We are fully funded to do whatever we need to do to get the business cash-positive,” he said. “We will do that without government subsidy.”
He added: “I believe this can make a revolutionary change in the way small communities receive their telecom broadband communications.”
A new collaboration?
Hoeven said Friday he still supports Flow Mobile’s test project.
Hoeven said he has urged Flow Mobile and the rural telephone cooperatives to consider collaborating to provide broadband wireless services. He said a possible model is Dakota Carrier Network, a fiber-optic communications network that is a partnership between rural telecommunications companies and the state.
Representatives of Flow Mobile and the rural telecoms said they have met twice to talk about a possible collaboration, but failed to reach any agreement.
“I think the governor has always been committed to an open process,” said David Crothers, executive vice president of the North Dakota Association of Telecommunications Cooperatives.
“We’ve had difficulties with the process with others – the National Guard, state radio, Emergency Services,” he said, referring to state public safety agencies. “I wouldn’t place this on the doorstep of the governor.”
Similarly, Crothers didn’t fault Conrad for his support of Flow Mobile’s stimulus grant application. New rules are being written for future rounds of stimulus grants, he said.
“There’s going to be round two of stimulus grants,” Crothers added. “We’ll just see what happens.”
Nov 23, 2009, post by awatrobski
Compass Network Management System and Monics Satellite Carrier Monitoring System Increase SATCOM Capabilities for Australian Defence Force.
Integral Systems, Inc., (Nasdaq:ISYS) informed that its wholly-owned subsidiaries, Newpoint Technologies and SAT Corporation, with support from Clearbox Systems, will deliver integrated ground station network support to BAE Systems’ Australia JP2008 Phase 3F Program. The combined contracts are valued at approximately $3M for Integral Systems.
The JP2008 Phase 3F Program supports the Australian Defence Force Satellite Communications Capability (ADSCC). BAE Systems Australia will construct and design a new satellite ground station and network management system to interface deployed forces accessing the Wideband Global SATCOM (WGS) system with the Defence Wide Area Network, and Australian Defence Headquarters and support elements. The project is due to be operational by 2013.
Newpoint Technologies and SAT Corporation are delivering critical services to ensure successful communications management for JP2008 Phase 3F. Newpoint Technologies will provide its Compass Network Management solution that allows operators to monitor and control equipment at two satellite ground stations and two operations centers. SAT Corporation’s MonicsNET Carrier System Monitoring will monitor X-band, Ka-band, and UHF antennas at two earth stations, as well as provide In Service-In Orbit Testing (IS-IOT). Compass software will work in tandem with Monics to update users regarding network status and services.
Clearbox Systems, a subcontractor to Newpoint Technologies, will automate the addition of new services using its Profile Manager by automatically establishing the equipment at the site through Compass and adding/removing carriers to the Monics Carrier Monitoring Plan through the Monics/Compass Interface. Clearbox is also providing a Redundancy Client for Compass that will allow services affected by an equipment failure to be moved to a properly working and available equipment chain, as well as delivering local program management support.
“Compass provides a mature and flexible platform upon which we can build some very sophisticated systems,” said Paul Solomon, Managing Director of Clearbox Systems. “It provides all the core functionality out of the box and allows us to focus on the key areas of customization and innovation without needing to re-invent the wheel. One of its key strengths is its extensive open API which allows us to hook into any aspect of the system.”
“We are proud to provide our integrated services and partner with BAE Systems Australia in support of Australia’s defense,” said Stuart Daughtridge, Executive Vice President of Products for Integral Systems. “The interface of our products, the ability to build out the system as needed and enable local management of operations will allow for network efficiency with the best commercially available tools.”
Nov 23, 2009, post by awatrobski
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Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE:NOC) informed the U.S. Air Force has granted the RQ-4 Global Hawk high-altitude, long-endurance (HALE) unmanned aircraft system (UAS) a military Airworthiness Certification (AWC), a significant milestone in the life of the aircraft system and a step on the path to routine unmanned flight within the United States.
The AWC process verifies an aircraft design has met performance requirements within the mission profile to safely fly in national airspace and assures operators and mission managers that the production articles conform to the design. In granting the certification to RQ-4, the next generation of Block 20 and 30 Global Hawk UAS, the U.S. Air Force has recognized the aircraft’s ability to routinely fly safely within design parameters. The certification process evaluated more than 600 airworthiness criteria.
“This was a more rigorous and more complete evaluation than that of any other unmanned system,” informed George Guerra, vice president of HALE systems for Northrop Grumman. “With this historic accomplishment and more than 35,000 total flight hours, most of that time in combat support over the skies of Iraq and Afghanistan, Global Hawk continues to be a trailblazer in UAS certifications and a pathfinder supporting our men and women overseas in combat.”
Just as commercial aircraft are certified by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), military aircraft are evaluated against certain criteria including durability, capability to adjust to sudden changes in aerodynamic forces, and redundancies of systems and subsystems. Without this Air Force certification, the FAA cannot grant permission to fly within the United States, which is the next step in the on-going process to accept the routine flight of unmanned aircraft in the national airspace.
“This certification resulted from a large collaborative effort between the government and the contractor, agreeing on standards and verification methods and ultimately coming together on the assessment of the system. With its Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration legacy design and early push to support Overseas Contingency Operations and U-2 retirement, this was the first comprehensive assessment of the aircraft to ensure it is ready to fly in national airspace and ready for the user to train with at Beale AFB,” informed Yvette Weber, chief engineer at the 303d Aeronautical Systems Group at Wright Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio.
The certification is the latest example of success for the Northrop Grumman Global Hawk program. In 2006, the Block 10 version, or RQ-4A, made history when it became the first UAS to earn both a military airworthiness certification and a national certificate of authorization to operate in the national airspace. This airworthiness certification covers all Block 20 and Block 30 Global Hawks delivered to the U.S. Air Force thus far.
Global Hawk flies autonomously at altitudes of more than 60,000 feet, above inclement weather and prevailing winds, for more than 32 hours at a time. The first-generation experimental Global Hawks deployed overseas to the Persian Gulf less than two months after Sept. 11, 2001. Since then, Block 10 Global Hawks have been flying nearly continuously, supporting combat operations in the region. The Block 20 and 30 systems, capable of carrying 50 percent more payload with improved sensors, are scheduled to begin operations with the U.S. Air Force at Beale Air Force Base, Calif., and at several overseas locations, next year.
Recently, the Block 20 aircraft system was chosen to be modified with special communications relay equipment to support coalition combat forces in Afghanistan. The Block 30 Global Hawk carries sophisticated imaging and electronic signals sensors on missions that can exceed 30 hours. A similar certification will be granted in the near future for the Block 40 system, which is based on the same aircraft design of Block 20 and 30 but carries an advanced radar imaging and ground moving target tracking system used to track enemy movement, regardless of weather conditions on the ground.
Nov 23, 2009, post by awatrobski
Iran plans to launch a communications satellite by late 2011 with no outside help, a top Iranian official informed last Friday, after Italy and Russia declined to launch the satellite it into orbit.
This move reflected Tehran’s frustration with the two countries as it tries to push ahead with an ambitious space program, which has worried world powers as the same rocket technology used to launch satellites can also be used for military purposes.
Israeli media claim the new Iranian satellite, named Misbah, or Lantern in Farsi, is a spy satellite. Iran says the satellite, which is to be launched into a low-earth orbit, is to assist in data communication. Telecommunications Minister Reza Taqipour touted the decision to launch the satellite as a show of Iran’s progress in space technology. “Our capability to launch a satellite has increased … we hope to launch Mesbah satellite-2 ourselves” by the end of 2011, Taqipour said, according to the semi-official Fars news agency. Earlier this month, the head of Iran’s Aero Space Industries, Gen. Mahdi Farahi, informed Tehran would use Italy to launch Mesbah after waiting for years in vain for Russia to accomplish the task. But Italy’s Carlo Gavazzi Space company promptly denied the report, saying it does not have the capabilities to put Misbah in orbit. Iran launched a domestically made satellite — called Omid, or Hope in Farsi — using an Iranian rocket for the first time in February. In 2005, its first satellite was launched by Russia, which has been a partner in transferring space technology to Iran along with North Korea and China.
Nov 23, 2009, post by awatrobski
The age of Internet and satellite communications has made it easier for military families to stay in touch with their loved ones overseas.
But it hasn’t made the worry and waiting any easier.
So both the military and the private sector have tried to ease the burdens a bit.
The local Cheyenne Family YMCA, for example, will take the kids off a deployed service member’s spouse, just to give her or him a little break.
“I can tailor it to the needs,” informed Tiernan McIlwaine, director of the Cheyenne YMCA’s Learning Center.
The families fit right in.
“Military families are integrated into the programs we already have,” informed Phil McGovern, chief executive officer of the Cheyenne Family YMCA.
The Air Force has declared 2010 as the “Year of the Air Force Family.”
Bob Frohnapfel of F.E. Warren Air Force Base Airman and Family Readiness Center said the military has always offered family assistance.
The declaration of the year of the family puts new emphasis and the ramping up of a variety of programs and services.
Debbie Russell, supervises the Family Assistance Centers for the Wyoming National Guard, said that any kind of service you can think of is available, even if a spouse needs the oil changed in the family auto.
The Wyoming National Guard has created six regional Family Assistance Centers or FACs around Wyoming to assist with problems that may arise while service members are mobilized.
The centers support all branches of the military, along with civilian contractors, retirees and others as designated by the Department of Defense and the Wyoming National Guard, Russell added.
The centers provide information, referrals and assistance.
They can help with identification cards and Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System (DEERs), TRICARE, the military’s medical program, dental issues, legal problems, financial issues, referral of Employer Support to Guard and Reserve (ESGR) issues and just about any other type of problem that might arise.
All of these services are a phone call or a couple of mouse clicks away.
Where to go for assistance.
Nov 23, 2009, post by awatrobski
Iranian state TV is reporting that the country will begin large-scale air defense war games Sunday aimed at protecting nuclear facilities against any possible attack.
Gen. Ahmad Mighani, who heads an air force unit dealing with threats to Iran’s air space, says the war games will cover regions where Iran’s nuclear facilities are located, according to the report.
The official IRNA news agency says the drill will cover 230,000 square miles (600,000 square kilometers) in central, western and southern Iran.
The U.S. accuses Iran of embarking on a nuclear weapons program. Iran denies that and insists the program is only for peaceful purposes.
Israel has warned it may take military action to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.
September 17th, 2009 Russian FM says no new sanctions on IranMOSCOW — Russia’s foreign minister says Moscow firmly opposes any new sanctions against Iran. Sergey Lavrov says new tougher sanctions would ruin hopes for solving the Iranian nuclear program through talks.
Iran’s nuclear chief says his country is ready to defend itself against military strike
September 14th, 2009 Iran says it can counter military attackVIENNA — Iran’s nuclear chief says his country is ready to defend itself against any military strike. Ali Akhbar Salehi says threats of force against Iran only add to the country’s determination to protect itself.
Iran is ready for talks with world powers, rejects any deadline
September 7th, 2009 TEHRAN, Iran — President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says Iran is ready to hold talks with the world powers over global challenges including its nuclear program. Ahmadinejad said Monday Iran will initially present its package of proposals to the five permanent members of the U.N.
Top Iranian general says country has the capability to strike Israel’s nuclear facilities
July 25th, 2009 Iran: We can hit Israel’s nukesTEHRAN, Iran — The head of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard informed Saturday that his country has the capability to strike Israel’s nuclear facilities and wouldn’t be afraid to do so if it was attacked. “If the Israeli entity engages in any kind of attack on Iran, we have the capability to strike all targets in occupied Palestine,” General Mohammad Ali Jafari told the Arabic-language channel, al-Alam.
Military options against Iran would only provide temporary, ineffective fix
April 30th, 2009 Officials downplay military options vs IranWASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Robert Gates informed the military option for forcing Iran to halt its nuclear program would be just temporary and ineffective and that sanctions make more sense. Gates told Senate appropriators Thursday that a military attack on Iran would merely send that country’s nuclear program further underground.
Nov 23, 2009, post by awatrobski
If America’s less-than-rapid response to the H1N1 pandemic is an indicator of how the U.S. public health system would react in the event of a bioweapon attack, we are in deep, deep yogurt, folks.
It’s taken more than six months to ramp up production of a vaccine for a contagious disease that health officials worldwide knew was coming.
Fort Worth parents remember all too well the late April decision by school district officials to close all 144 local campuses for more than a week because of concerns about the spread of swine flu.
Wouldn’t it have made sense to vaccinate children against H1N1 before school started this fall?
“Sure it would have,” stated retired Air Force Col. Randall Larsen, executive director of the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction, Proliferation and Terrorism and author of Our Own Worst Enemy. “But there’s a problem. There’s [just] one facility in the United States making H1N1 vaccine, and it’s using the same technology we used 50 years ago.”
Inoculating eggs — produced at the 35 U.S. chicken farms operated with the sole purpose of vaccine production — with a virus that then creates hundreds of thousands of copies of itself is Cold-War technology.
The efficiency of the virus replication determines how much and how fast vaccine can be produced.
In the case of the H1N1 vaccine, reproduction was “sluggish,” admitted Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius in an Oct. 28 news conference.
The nation’s lack of progress in moving to cell-based vaccine technology — which would cut production time from about 23 weeks to between 12 and 14 weeks and produce more vaccine — should be a concern to every American who has given so much as a nanosecond of thought about the country’s ability to recover from a bioweapons attack. Because preventing such an incident is nigh on impossible.
“It is hard to have a preventive policy for bioterrorism because of the vast variety of agents available,” stated retired Maj. Gen. John Parker, the former commanding general of the U.S. Army Medical Research and Material Command at Fort Detrick, to journalists participating in a seminar last week on the WMD threat and America’s communities sponsored by the Heritage and El Pomar foundations.
A December 2008 report issued by the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction, Proliferation and Terrorism concluded that terrorists will be more likely to use a biological weapon than a nuclear one in a future attack on the United States.
As disquieting as it is to hear, the materials to construct a bioweapon aren’t difficult to obtain, even in a post-9-11 world.
The level of technological expertise needed to manufacture a bioweapon isn’t high, said the World At Risk report.
And the materials needed to make such a weapon aren’t all closely monitored. Many of the pathogens are readily available — in nature, in sick people and in laboratories.
The key to mitigating the long-term terrorism value of a bioweapon is rapid response, recognition and recovery — and recovery includes having therapeutics available ASAP for those exposed and vaccines to prevent the spread.
“The point of terrorism is not just to claim victims but to terrorize everyone around them,” said Cliff May, president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and an adviser to the Baker-Hamilton Commission of the U.S. Institute of Peace.
The impact of a dirty bomb or a biological weapon going off somewhere in the United States wouldn’t be confined to the number of people killed or exposed to the pathogen or radiological agent, he said.
“The psychological and economic effects would be far greater than the initial public health threat,” May informed.
As Larsen concludes in his book, terrorists will again attack the United States. The appropriate reaction, he wrote, “should be shock, but not surprise.
“Americans will always be shocked when ruthless, immoral cowards intentionally kill innocents, but we can no longer justify being surprised.”
Nov 21, 2009, post by awatrobski
An independent panel says the United States can extend the life of aging nuclear weapons for decades with existing programs, a finding that activists contend means there’s no need for the nation to design replacements for the nuclear arsenal.
The findings of the JASON committee are classified, but an unclassified summary released Thursday said current methods are sufficient to keep weapons reliable in the absence of nuclear testing.
The committee, made up of independent scientific experts who do technical reviews for the government, said the success of the program to extend the lifetimes of weapons “is a direct consequence of the excellent work of the people in the U.S. nuclear weapons complex.”
The key conclusion is that the program “is working well and can work well into the foreseeable future to maintain the reliability of existing warhead types,” informed Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based Arms Control Association.
The implication is that new warhead designs are not necessary because “stockpile stewardship is working well and can be expected to work indefinitely,” he informed.
The two national laboratories in New Mexico, Los Alamos and Sandia, are involved in the stockpile stewardship program to ensure the reliability of the nuclear stockpile.
Greg Mello of the Los Alamos Study Group informed the study shows “there are no inherent long-term reliability problems associated with the careful refurbishment of existing types of warheads.”
Congress has rejected efforts to develop what’s called a reliable replacement warhead. In 2007, the Bush administration unsuccessfully sought $88 million for design and preliminary work on the proposed warhead.
The National Nuclear Security Administration endorsed the panel’s recommendations and sent the classified report to the House Armed Services subcommittee on strategic forces, which asked for the review.
The study “validates our basic scientific approach to warhead life extension programs, specifically our commitment to evaluating each weapon system on a case-by-case basis and applying the best technological approach,” NNSA spokesman Damien LaVera said in a written statement.
The panel said some issues surrounding aging weapons have been resolved, and others can be resolved under current methods.
But it also warned that stockpile surveillance is becoming inadequate. It said increasing the lifetimes of nuclear weapons depends on “continuing maintenance and renewal of expertise and capabilities in science, technology, engineering and production.”
LaVera said Friday stockpile stewardship “can do certain things but there needs to be an existing funding mechanism for that.”
Nov 21, 2009, post by awatrobski
The U.S. Army awarded Science Applications International Corp. a follow-on contract to support the integration of next-generation technology and equipment.
U.S. company SAIC was awarded the indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity task order Army Aviation and Missile Research, Development and Engineering Center Software Engineering Directorate.
Under the $848 million deal, awarded by the Army Aviation and Missile Command, SAIC will lead a team integrating new systems and software technologies to ensure the AMRDEC mission supporting extraordinary weapon systems.
“We look forward to continuing our support for this important customer as they provide mission critical systems and software engineering expertise to support weapon systems over their life cycle,” John Gully, SAIC senior vice president and business unit general manager, informed in a statement.
Nov 21, 2009, post by awatrobski
US Air Force boffinry chiefs have decided to spend as much as $7m developing “miniature weapons” for use by killer robots in the Wars On Stuff.
Weaponry’n'aerospace globocorp Boeing informed that it had bagged an initial $0.5m deal to look into ideas, which will lead on into another $6.5m of work if the scheme moves forward.
At the moment, unmanned aircraft in combat overseas mostly use standard air weapons. Generally the lightest, most delicate option open to a prowling airborne killbot will be the Hellfire missile, a hefty hundred-pound laser guided rocket which was originally developed for the purpose of taking out heavily-armoured main battle tanks.
Against a more typical modern-war target such as a pickup truck, a small house or a 4×4, the Hellfire is a blunt instrument rather than a surgical one. Fired at a single person or single room, as it often is, Hellfire is major overkill and causes a lot of collateral damage and dead bystanders – perhaps so much so as to outweigh the value of hitting the target.
Hence the “miniature weapons” deal from the US Air Force Research Lab informed, under which Boeing’s “Phantom Works” advanced-tech shop will produce something a bit more suitable to counter-insurgency work.
The new mini-missiles seem set to be at least as sophisticated as a Hellfire, perhaps more so. In addition to seeker and guidance tech, they will feature “radar options”. This could be merely a matter of fusing, making the weapon go off at a certain distance from the target, but it might also mean the missile would be able to home in on its victims independently, without a guiding laser dot.
“The concept behind this technology is designed to generate very low collateral damage,” says Boeing exec Carl Avila. “[It] allows warfighters to engage a variety of targets, including those in a suburban terrain environment.” ®
