DoD Unleashes Robotic Dogs

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

The 325th Security Forces Squadron at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida is the first DoD unit to adopt the robotic quadrupeds for regular patrol operations, reports The Drive The robot dogs will be monitored by a non-commissioned officer via virtual-reality headsets and able to issue commands. Plus they can access swampy terrain more difficult for humans, able to operate in up to five feet of water.

The US government spent billions on a system for detecting hacks, but the Russians outsmarted it, reports The Washington Post, slipping digital Trojan horses into the US computer systems, probably sometime in the spring. The months-long hack of federal networks, discovered in recent days, has revealed new weaknesses and underscored some previously known ones.

The National Security Council will invoke an Obama-era presidential directive to create a special group responsible for managing the federal government’s response to a breach in the networks of multiple agencies, reports FCW.

The Hill reports Senate and House leaders on the cusp of a coronavirus relief deal Wednesday afternoon. The deal is reported to include individual stimulus payments between $600 and $700 and $300-per-week supplemental unemployment assistance. Congressional leaders want to attach the relief package to a $1.4 trillion omnibus spending package that needs to pass by Dec. 18 to keep the government funded.

Embedded in the relief proposal is an extension of a provision federal contractors see as vital to maintaining their financial well-being and keeping employees, reports Washington Technology.

President-elect Joe Biden commended the latest progress toward a bipartisan coronavirus relief package but described it as a “down payment” on additional measures that will ultimately need to be enacted early next year, reports The Hill.

The first military health care workers have received the coronavirus vaccine, reports Stars and Stripes. DoD’s initial allocation of the vaccine is 43,875 doses. Each of the initial 16 US-based military sites included in the first round of distribution has more than 1,000 people who are in the top priority group to receive vaccines.

The next vaccine challenge will be reassuring older Americans, according to The New York Times, which reports questions and fears abound.

 

 

A Pittsburgh breakfast restaurant had planned to hold a Toys for Tots event alongside the far-right extremist group Proud Boys this week. But the plans fell apart when it became clear the event was not sanctioned by the Marine Corps-affiliated charity, reports Marine Corps Times.

President Donald Trump weighs an executive order for ill veterans who served at a toxic “black goo” base, reports McClatchyDC.com. Thousands of service members deployed to Karshi-Khanabad, Uzbekistan, or K2, lived in tents on  grounds that were saturated with solvents and fuels that formed a “black goo” under their feet. K2 have had difficulty getting the VA to recognize and cover their medical costs.

Congress OKs new Arctic icebreakers for the Coast Guard, reports Navy Times. The Coast Guard has two icebreakers, but only one is operating following an August fire that damaged the USS Healy. Ongoing construction work on a new icebreaker is not expected to be finished until 2024. The funding for the icebreakers is in the FY21 National Defense Authorization Act passed by Congress.

US Supreme Court ruling reverses the military statute of limitations on rape cases, reports Military Times, unanimously overruling the military’s top appeals court, which had put a five-year statute of limitations on rape cases that occurred between 1986 and 2006. The ruling, published Dec. 10, does not have a bearing on rape cases outside that window but could open up new prosecutions for past incidents.

The US Navy is investigating a potential LCS class-wide design flaw, reports Defense news. Repeated failures in the propulsion train on the Freedom-class littoral combat ships Little Rock and Detroit have raised the specter of a class-wide design flaw that could trigger an expensive reworking of a crucial component on 17 of the Navy’s small surface combatants.

The littoral combat ship Gabrielle Giffords interdicted more than $100 million worth of cocaine from a “low-profile vessel” in the Pacific, reports Navy Times. The Navy put a crimp in the cocaine supply line earlier this month when it interdicted roughly 6,200 pounds of booger sugar with an estimated wholesale value of $106 million.

Navy unveils warrant officer specialty to operate MQ-25 Stingray refueling drones, reports Navy Times. The service is gearing up to recruit approximately 450 warrant officers, in grades W-1 through W-5, for the new aerial vehicle operator (AVO) warrant officer specialty, designated 737X, over the next six to 10 years.

The Marine Corps is about to revolutionize infantry training, focusing as much on brains as brawn and weighing consolidation of its core grunt specialties into a single, all-around infantry warfighter, reports USNI News.

Contracts:

The Boeing Co., St. Louis, Missouri, has been awarded a $10,849,059 modification (P00122) against five-year basic ordering agreement SPRPA1-14-D-002U for additional F/A-18 A-D and E-G aircraft integrated product support. This is a firm-fixed-price contract. Locations of performance are Missouri, California, Virginia, Washington, Nevada and South Carolina, with a Dec. 31, 2023, performance completion date. Using military service is Navy. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2021 Navy operation, maintenance and procurement funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency Aviation, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

DynCorp International LLC, McLean, Virginia, is awarded an $18,120,424 modification under contract N62742-17-C-3570 in the amount of $18,120,424 which provides for the exercise of the fourth option period under a cost-plus-incentive-fee contract for various support services to Department of Defense (DOD) components. The work to be performed provides for various support services to DOD components (e.g., Naval Mobile Construction Battalions, Naval Expeditionary Combat Command Pacific, Explosive Ordnance Detachment Group One, Coastal Riverine Group One, etc.) conducting humanitarian assistance, civic assistance, minor military construction projects, contingency efforts, supporting various exercises and other projects located at various sites, usually in remote areas in the Philippines, Cambodia, Timor-Leste and other countries in South Asia, Southeast Asia and Oceania. After award of this option, the total cumulative contract value will be $135,215,620. Work will be performed at various locations in Southeast Asia, South Asia and Oceania, and this option period is from January 2021 to December 2021. Fiscal 2021 operation and maintenance (Navy) contract funds in the amount of $3,187,500 are obligated on this award and will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. Naval Facilities Engineering Command Pacific, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, is the contracting activity.

Lockheed Martin Rotary and Mission Systems, Manassas, Virginia, is awarded a $9,297,472 cost-plus-incentive-fee modification to previously-awarded contract N00024-17-C-6259 to exercise an option for Foreign Military Sales (FMS) engineering services, materials and spares. Work will be performed in Manassas, Virginia (65%); Clearwater, Florida (32%); Syracuse, New York (2%); and Marion, Florida (1%), and is expected to be completed by August 2024. FMS funds in the amount of $2,968,429 will be obligated at time of award and will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. Country name(s) are withheld due to international agreement. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, DC, is the contracting activity.