The Air Force poured a bucket of cold water on a supposed major policy shift on satellite use. The Wall Street Journal last week reported that the Bush Administration wanted to combine national security and civilian payloads on single, large satellite platforms as a money-saving measure. According to Lt. Col. Karen Finn, the Air Force’s spokesman on space matters, that report was dead wrong. She said officials who talked with the Journal discussed joint use—Pentagon and CIA—of one space system, the Space Radar. “We were talking about a very specific system,” Finn emphasized, adding that an overall shift in satellite policy “was not talked about.”
The crash of a T-38 trainer jet this May—which caused a weekslong pause in flights across the fleet—was caused by an improperly installed pin for one of the jet’s horizontal stabilizers, according to a new accident report released Oct. 30. When the pin disengaged midflight, it created the slightest amount…