Fighter Saga. During President Donald Trump’s Feb. 17 visit to a Boeing plant in South Carolina, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus was seen holding a brochure for the Boeing F/A-18XT, a proposed new block of Super Hornets that might compete with the Lockheed Martin F-35, according to press pool reports. Trump reiterated his intention to buy the FA-18XT if the F-35’s price does not fall sufficiently. Boeing says the F/A-18XT, also called Block III, is the same as the Advanced Super Hornet concept the company has discussed for a few years. Boeing says the Advanced Super Hornet offers upgrades in networking, range, situational awareness, stealth and target detection over the Navy’s existing F/A18E/F Super Hornets.
MDA Japan. Navy Vice Adm. Jim Syring, director of the Missile Defense Agency, was scheduled to speak at a naval conference Feb. 15 near Washington, D.C. But he ended up flying to Japan instead to discuss missile defense with officials there. The Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block IIA interceptor, which MDA and Japan are jointly developing to destroy short- to intermediate-range ballistic missiles, achieved its first shoot-down of a ballistic missile target in a Feb. 3 test. MDA and Japan are negotiating with Raytheon, the SM-3 manufacturer, to buy Block IIA interceptors for both countries, an MDA spokesman says.
Trident Tests. An Ohio-class ballistic missile submarine conducted four successful flight tests of unarmed Trident II D5 missiles earlier this month, the Navy says. The tests were designed to validate the reliability, accuracy and performance of the Lockheed Martin-built missile. The D5, part of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, has completed 165 successful flight tests since its introduction into the fleet in 1989.
Rocket Lab. Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket arrives at its New Zealand launch site February 15 for the beginning of pre-flight checkouts, according to a company statement. Rocket Lab spokeswoman Catherine Moreau Hammond says the company expects the test flight of the rocket to take place in the next couple of months. Rocket Lab, she says, has a series of checkouts and tests to complete at the site before the vehicle is approved to fly. The launch, which will be the first orbital launch attempt from New Zealand, is the first of three planned test launches before Rocket Lab begins providing customers commercial satellite launches. Electron is capable of delivering payloads of up to 150 kg to a 500 km sun-synchronous orbit. Customers signed to fly on Electron include NASA, Planet, Spire and Moon Express.
NASA SLS. Acting Administrator of NASA Robert Lightfoot asks the associate administrator for the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate, Bill Gerstenmaier, to begin a study on the feasibility of adding a crew to the first integrated flight of SLS and Orion, Exploration Mission-1. The study will examine opportunities this could offer to accelerate having a first crewed flight and what it would take to accomplish that step. Boeing, the developer of SLS, comments that the possibility of NASA accelerating the timeline is exciting. “Safety of the crew is most important, so of course there will be many factors we will consider as we assess the feasibility of adding crew to EM-1,” the company says.
Falcon 9 Launch. The SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle is scheduled to launch its 10th resupply mission to the International Space Station no earlier than Feb. 18 from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center. The Dragon capsule aboard the Falcon 9 will carry more than 35 separate U.S. National Laboratory sponsored investigations that will be conducting onboard and outside the space station over the coming months.
Aerojet Rocketdyne Space Chief. Aerojet Rocketdyne has appointed Jerry Tarnacki as head of its recently formed Space Business unit, reporting to Eileen Drake, president and CEO of the company. Tarnacki will oversee all NASA program, defense and commercial launch systems, advanced space and launch strategy programs, and in-space propulsion system programs. Tarnacki, who joined Aerojet Rocketdyne in Dec. 2015 as vice president of Quality & Mission Assurance, will be based at the company’s West Palm Beach, Fla., facility. Tarnacki will be succeeded by John Schneider in the Quality & Mission Assurance role. Schneider was director of the company’s Los Angeles facility.
DISA CTO Retires. The Defense Information Systems Agency’s (DISA) Chief Technology Officer David Mihelcic is retiring following 31 years in government on Feb. 21. Mihelcic served in DISA for 19 years. Before serving as CTO, Mihelcic served as the deputy program director for the Global Grid Bandwidth Expansion (GIG)-BE, chief executive engineer for the Defense Information System Network, commander of the Center for Horizontal Integration, and deputy CEE for Information Processing at DISA.
Guard and Reserve Cyber. Several congressmen last week introduced legislation in the House that requires the Defense Department to add cyber security as a category to an existing database that tracks the specialties and capabilities of National Guard and Reserve members. “The men and women who serve in the Guard and Reserves often have critical expertise in their civilian careers, especially in cyber security and technology, and tracking their skills is essential if we are to tap into and utilize that talent,” says Rep. James Langevin (D-R.I.), one of the sponsors of the bipartisan Department of Defense Emergency Response Capabilities Database Enhancement Act. The bill is a companion to similar bipartisan legislation introduced in the senate.
Pride of California. BAE Systems on Feb. 11 dedicated its new 950-foot floating dry dock at its ship repair yard in San Diego, naming the dry dock “Pride of California.” The dry dock is capable of lifting 55,000 long tons and is the largest floating dry dock in California. This month the Navy’s amphibious transport dock ship USS New Orleans will be the first ship to be serviced in the new dry dock.
HASC Vice Ranking Member. Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee, says that his colleague Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas) has been selected as the vice ranking member on the committee. O’Rourke was first elected to the House in Nov. 2012 and represents the 16th District of Texas, which includes El Paso. He serves on the Strategic Forces, and Emerging Threats and Capabilities Subcommittees.
Cylance President/COO. Cyber security antivirus company Cylance Inc. names Daniel Doimo as President and Chief Operating Officer. Doimo will be responsible for the company’s sales, marketing, business development, and professional services organizations. He will report to CEO Stuart McClure. Previously Doimo was executive vice president of global solutions and a member of the executive committee of Schneider Electric.
Navy IT Contract. The U.S. Navy awards TWD and Associates Inc. a $11.6 million cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for information technology support services for continued enhancement, operation, maintenance, and life-cycle support for software and systems applications supporting mission command networks. The award includes options that if exercised raise the value to over $24 million. The initial obligation is for $6 million in FY ’17 operations and maintenance funds. The contract was not competitively procured.
Tyonek Cyber Contract. The U.S. Air Force awards Tyonek Global Services Inc. a $9 million firm-fixed-price contract for cyber operations formal training support. The company will provide course planning, technical writing, course development, instructor training, and all other support necessary to support the field training unit. The initial obligation is for $5.8 million in operations and maintenance funds. The work will occur at Hurlburt Field, Fla., and Joint Base San Antonio – Lackland, Texas.
Israeli Cyber Funding. Israel-based IntSights, an intelligence-driven security company focusing on cyber threats, completes $15 million in a Series B funding round. Following the Series A round 4 months earlier, this new round includes investments from Glilot Capital Partners, Blackstone, Blumberg Capital, Wipro, Vintage Investment Partners, and other strategic investors. IntSights’ platform provides multi-source, extensive intelligence coverage, an analytics engine prioritizing collected intelligence, and the ability to translate critical pieces of intelligence into actions. It results in a report presented on a user-friendly platform, the company says. IntSights currently provides its services to international customers in the retail, telecom, manufacturing, and financial sectors, mostly in the U.S. and Europe. The funding will be used to expand the company’s presence in the U.S., with a majority spent towards marketing, sales, and engineering.
Fortinet Opens Up Cyber Training. Fortinet is making its cyber security-focused Network Security Expert training and certification program universally accessible and free. Fortinet is now offering NSE program level 1 courses to the public while levels 2 and 3 will be opened in the second quarter of 2017. NSE 1 covers network security fundamentals and the history of the cyber security market. Level 2 covers the core security solutions used to address level 1 challenges while level 3 provides a deeper dive into advanced security products and capabilities against specific threats and attack vectors.
Global Lightning. U.S. Strategic Command says its annual Global Lightning command-and-control exercise, conducted Feb. 7 to 16, gave American military forces an opportunity to train with allies, assess joint operational readiness and validate the command’s ability to identify and mitigate attacks. The event involved other combatant commands, other U.S. government agencies and other nations, including the United Kingdom.