Northrop Grumman has just received a new contract from DARPA to continue developing a means to accurately determine structural failures in advance. The effort—called Structural Integrity Prognosis System, or SIPS—has been underway for two years and last summer provided its first demonstration, predicting the results of live fatigue tests on components of a Navy EA-6B Prowler. The SIPS team currently is using SIPS to assess the fuselage of a retired A-10 Warthog. DARPA awarded $14.2 million for the first two-year effort, and the new two-year contract is worth $17.8 million. As Joseph Garone, Northrop’s director of advanced capabilities development, said, “The potential benefits from SIPS are huge.”
The top Air Force commander on on the Japanese island of Okinawa has clamped down alcohol and issued a curfew for junior enlisted Airmen and Guardians at Kadena Air Base for the next month. The order came roughly two weeks after a U.S. Marine was arrested for allegedly robbing and…