Defense Systems

Enhanced sensor systems to help Army shed light in the darkness

The Army has named five winners of $1.8 billion in contract awards for its Warrior Enabling Broad Sensor program.

Defense Systems

Army awards unattended ground sensor contract

The Army has awarded Northrop Grumman a five-year, indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract to furnish Scorpion I and II unattended ground sensor systems for force protection and intelligence gathering purposes.

Defense Systems

Navy halts Fire Scout flights after two crashes

Following two recent incidents that resulted in crashes, the Navy has put its MQ-8B Fire Scout flight operations on "operational pause."

Defense Systems

Army won't rush into cargo-carrying UAV buy

Despite the Marines Corps' forward march on cargo-carrying unmanned aircraft in Afghanistan, the Army seems to be taking its time. So what's the hold up?

Defense Systems

Will the Air Force ever catch up with its UAV data backlog?

It may be years before the Air Force has the human resources and tools in place to keep up with the enormous amounts of data gathered from its fleet of unmanned aerial vehicles and the sophisticated sensors that they employ on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions, says Air Force Secretary Michael Donley.

Defense Systems

LightSquared might opt for voluntary bankruptcy, Falcone says

Hedge fund manager Philip Falcone said in an April 4 interview that he is giving serious consideration to filing a voluntary bankruptcy for LightSquared.

Defense Systems

ScanEagle gets hydrogen-powered fuel cell

The successful test of a flight of a Boeing Insitu ScanEagle using a hydrogen-powered fuel cell will enable the unmanned aircraft system to carry an increased payload capacity.

Defense Systems

New details emerge on Army cloud initiative

The scope of work that nine companies will provide under the Army's Area Processing Centers Army Private Cloud program include furnishing the Army with "mobile data center" services and even cybersecurity assistance as part of a grand strategy to help the military service scale back its data-center footprint.

Defense Systems

Marine Shadow UAS to get classified weapon, payload improvement

The Marine Corps has chosen a classified weapon to arm its RQ-7B Shadow tactical unmanned aircraft system and plans to equip two of the aircraft armed with the weapon in Afghanistan before it decides to arm the rest of its 13 remaining systems.

Defense Systems

Raven tactical UAV to get sensor boost

Aerovironment's Raven RQ-11B unmanned aerial vehicle will get a new miniature, gimbaled sensor payload that will give warfighters better situational awareness via higher visual fidelity and continuous observation of an item of interest.

Defense Systems

Blue Devil Block 2 airship has friends in high places

A pair of influential U.S. senators are upset about Air Force plans to cut the 370-foot-long Blue Devil Block 2 airship program and have informed the Defense Department that they believe it would be "a significant failure to stop work and not deploy" the platform to Afghanistan.

Defense Systems

Younger generation has skills to win cyber battles, official says

The rise of cyberattacks around the globe can be blamed in part on an older generation of policymakers who are out of touch with rapid technology change, a senior U.S. official said April 2.

Defense Systems

Army finishes fifth and final regional communications hub

The Army has just completed the last of five planned Regional Hub Nodes, allowing soldiers to connect back to the service's global information network from any position around the globe.

Defense Systems

Accurately stating the cyber threat situation

High-level Obama administration officials along with leading experts from the cybersecurity industry have become increasingly vocal and tried to sound a cyber alarm.

Defense Systems

Are miniature drones with flapping wings really practical?

The main challenge in making miniature drones with flapping wings work on the battlefield is finding enough battery power.

Defense Systems

Poseidon P-8A delivered to Navy, ready for BAMS integration

Naval Air Station Jacksonville celebrated the arrival of the first new, network-enabled P-8A Poseidon multi-mission aircraft in late March.

Defense Systems

Military gets do-it-yourself network waveform kit

Military services and defense agencies will now be able to develop and adapt their own SDR-standard waveforms and integrate them with SDR platforms by using the Thales-built SDR Networking Lab kit.

Defense Systems

WIN-T 2 undergoes unusual test on road to full-rate production

After braving overnight temperatures of negative 35 degrees in Alaska, elements of the Army's second-generation tactical communications network backbone were still fully operational.

Defense Systems

Nuclear force in need of C3 improvements, STRATCOM's Kehler says

STRATCOM's command, control and communications network is functioning at a less than an optimum level, Air Force Gen. Robert Kehler told the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Defense Systems

Mass layoffs loom large on defense industry horizon

The U.S. defense industry might experience hundreds of thousands of layoffs if members of Congress don't take action to head off an additional $500 billion in defense budget cuts that could take effect in January 2013, a top Pentagon official told Congress.