USAF awarded Raytheon a $54 million contract Sept. 5 to construct and test a demonstration satellite with “a full-earth sharing sensor assembly” to provide a threshold missile warning capability and objectives of the Space-Based Infrared System satellite program. The company also is to provide “performance data” leading toward an Alternate Infrared Satellite System. Due date for the work is September 2008, with a final report three months later. The Air Force embarked on the AIRSS program to supplement or replace SBIRS, believing that technology has advanced so much since the start of SBIRS that the service could produce a “simpler design” with less technology risk.
A new Navy missile could fill a long-range air-to-air need for the U.S. Air Force’s fourth-, fifth-, and sixth-generation fighters. The Navy’s portfolio acquisition executive for munitions posted information on the AIM-424 Long Range Air-to-Air Missile online on Aug. 22, the same day it unveiled the project at the service’s…