March 28, 2024

Raytheon Cuts 19,000 Staff & Contractors

raytheon

Morning Coffee is a robust blend of links to news around the internet concerning the Naval Air Station Patuxent River Morning Coffee logoeconomic community. The opinions expressed here do not reflect opinions of the Leader’s owners or staff.

Raytheon Technologies cuts 15,000 staff and 4,000 contractors, mostly in Pratt & Whitney and Collins Aerospace divisions, due to decreased commercial aerospace sales from the COVID-19 pandemic, reports Defense News. The ongoing personnel actions will reflect a 20% cut at both divisions, and include both temporary furloughs and a hiring freeze. In its merger with United Technologies in April, Raytheon already planned to cut 1,000 mostly corporate jobs.

Military troops will not have a hands-on role in distributing coronavirus vaccines to Americans once inoculations are ready to go to the public, reports Stars and Stripes. The Army general in charge of dispensing a vaccine says the military role will provide the planning, contracting, and logistical analysis needed to move 300,000 doses across the country.

US Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams warned, some populations may be reluctant to take a COVID-19 vaccine, citing the infamous Tuskegee Institute syphilis experiments from 1932-1972, in which hundreds of African-American sharecroppers with the disease were studied and deceptively given ineffective treatments instead of penicillin, reports Military.com. “I would consider it a great tragedy if we actually had a safe and effective vaccine to end this pandemic but discover that disparity actually worsens because the people who could most benefit either can’t get it or won’t take it,” Dr. Adams said.

Norfolk maritime academy administrator sold phony Coast Guard credentials in $200K scheme, reports Pilot Online. An administrator at Norfolk’s Mid-Atlantic Maritime Academy, Lamont Godfrey, 42, of Portsmouth, conspired with three other men to sell phony Coast Guard merchant mariner credentials. The academy is a private maritime training center that offers Coast Guard-approved courses required for merchant mariners.

European nations have been ramping up their military spending in recent years, non-US members of NATO increasing their military spending by $130 billion since 2016. While providing better burden sharing within NATO, National Defense Magazine reports on US worries that US companies will be shut out of lucrative international projects as Europe builds indigenous military capabilities which some nations do not wish to share with non-EU members.

A South Korean study finds the Chinook upgrade is more expensive than buying new helos, reports Defense News. A parliamentary audit of the Defense Acquisition Program Administration upgrading 17 of the 43 CH-47D Chinook helicopters would be about 1.35 trillion won ($1.2 billion), which is higher than the estimated cost of 1.22 trillion won for buying new ones. The upgrade cost is partly driven by the fact that Chinook manufacturer Boeing no longer produces parts for older variants.

Japan suspects a missile data leak was possible in a massive cyberattack earlier this year on Mitsubishi, reports Fifth Domain. The suspected leak involves sensitive information about a prototype of a cutting-edge, high-speed gliding missile intended for deployment for the defense of Japan’s remote islands amid China’s military assertiveness in the region.

To gain an edge on hypersonic weapons, the Pentagon wants more help from universities, reports Defense News. DoD has asked Texas A&M University to create and manage a University Consortium for Applied Hypersonics. Over five years, DoD will pay $20 million per year to the university’s Engineering Experiment Station to address what is seen as a need for greater interplay among government, academia, and industry to create hypersonic weapons.

 

 

USNI News Fleet and Marine Tracker: Oct. 26, 2020

The commander of Fort Bliss has barred off-base dining and all trick-or-treating for Halloween in response to the surge of coronavirus cases at the Army base and in nearby El Paso, which accounted for more than 30% of all new cases reported in Texas on Monday, reports Stars and Stripes.

Emails reveal how Navy CAPT Brett Crozier’s pleas for help from the Navy fell on deaf ears until his bombshell letter leaked, reports Task & Purpose. The day after three sailors aboard the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt tested positive for the COVID-19, CAPT Crozier wrote in a private email that it was possible 50 crew members could be ill by the end of that week, noting that the only environment worse for contagious disease was likely prison.

An A-10 pilot accidentally dropped a projectile while training in South Korea, reports Stars and Stripes. The pilot from the 25th Fighter Squadron was on a routine training flight when he released the non-explosive projectile over rough, remote terrain just south of Pilsung Ragne in Gangwan Province. A safety investigation is underway and additional measures put in place to reduce the likelihood of future incidents.

The military does a lot of things well. However, it seems incapable of making an infographic that doesn’t make viewers want to gouge their eyes out, says Task & Purpose. The article explains this image attempted in 2018 to depict the ways electronic warfare works. Instead it has become a pop art masterpiece that looks like it was created by Rear Adm. Andy Warhol.

DefSec Mark Esper and SecState Mike Pompeo stepped up the Trump administration’s anti-China message in India, reports Military Times. In talks with their Indian counterparts, Esper and Pompeo signed an agreement expanding military satellite information sharing and highlighted strategic cooperation between Washington and New Delhi with an eye toward countering China. They also lauded joint cooperation in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.

Last week was a bad week for al Qaeda around the world, reports The New York Times. American drones and US allies killed several Qaeda leaders and operatives in the past week. But the organization has “ingrained itself in local communities and conflicts,” according to a UN report. At least seven top Qaeda operatives were killed in the latest of a recent spate of US Special Operations drone strikes, some by using a secretive weapon described by the Wall Street Journal. The so-called Ninja Hellfire missile replaces the explosive warhead with long blades that crush or slice its victim, minimizing risks to any civilians nearby.

Medal of Honor Alwyn Cashe’s family has waited more than a decade for the Iraq War hero to be recognized, reports Military Times. Now, they’ll have to wait a little longer because the Senate has left town for a two-week recess without taking up legislation that would allow the president to bestow the nation’s highest military honor on Cashe, who died in November 2005. Under current law the medal must be awarded within five years of a service members’ heroism. DefSec Esper requested that Congress pass new legislation bypassing that rule and putting the issue before the president. The earliest the chamber can now consider the legislation is Nov. 9, after the upcoming elections.

Contracts:

Q.E.D. Systems Inc., Virginia Beach, Virginia, is awarded a $76,360,281 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for specification development and availability execution support, formerly known as third party planning services for guided missile cruiser (CG), guided missile destroyer (DDG), landing helicopter assault, landing helicopter dock landing platform dock, and dock landing ship class vessels. This contract includes options which, if exercised, would bring the cumulative value of this contract to $229,411,097. Work will be performed in Norfolk, Virginia (51%); San Diego, California (43%); and Everett, Washington (6%), and is expected to be completed by October 2023. Fiscal 2021 operations and maintenance (Navy) funding in the amount of $2,825,931 is being obligated at time of award and funding in the amount of $2,825,931 will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured; a history of one bids and a lack of sources sought responses form the basis of the justification and approval for this effort. This single source contract to Q.E.D. will allow the government additional time to conduct extensive market research in preparation for a follow-on competitive effort. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, DC, is the contracting activity (N00024-21-C-4200).

Leave A Comment