March 29, 2024

NASA Plans 3-D Printing of Habitats on Other Planets

3-D printing

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.

3D printing is extending the lives of everything from NASA tools at the International Space Station to broken tanks in South Korea. Now, Executive.Gov reports, NASA plans to expand its current use of 3D printing technology to build habitats on other planets and landing pods. Stars and Stripes reports that soldiers on a new facility at Camp Humphreys in South Korea using 3-D printing to get broken-down tanks and trucks ready for battle quicker. This is the fourth deployment of the $250,000 facility, which has five 3D printers able to produce everything from Humvee ignition switches to M4 rifle butt-stocks.

President Donald Trump’s administration is readying tariffs on all remaining Chinese goods coming into the US if talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping fail to de-escalate, reports Bloomberg. The announcement could cover an additional $257 billion worth of Chinese imports to the US, adding onto the $250 billion worth of goods already subject to additional duties.

More than 5,000 US active-duty forces will be used to “harden” points of entry along the US-Mexico border, reports Military Times, to confront what officials say is now two caravans of more than 6,000 migrants from Central America. The 5,200 active duty troops would join about 2,100 National Guard forces sent by Texas, California, New Mexico, and Arizona earlier this year to bolster the border. Most of the National Guard forces are unarmed.

DoD is pushing back against Russian claims that the US was involved in a drone attack on a Russian air base in Syria earlier this year, reports Military Times. Russia claims 13 drones were heading toward Khmeimim air base in Syria’s coastal Latakia province when a US Navy P-8 Poseidon flying over the Mediterranean took “manual control” of them and began searching for “holes through which they started penetrating.”

Defense News reports 355-ship Navy is not enough to prepare for two simultaneous major conflicts and maintain its rotational presence requirements for surge operations and combat casualties, according to a new study from the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation, described by Axios as the conservative think tank stocking Trump’s government.

With funding in peril, Coast Guard changes the name of icebreaker to “Polar Security Cutter,” reports Breaking Defense, hoping a clearer emphasis on national security missions will help convince the House to fund the ship.

Veterans report feeling great even while facing serious health problems like cancer, arthritis, and emotional distress. Military Times reports that the United Health Foundation and the Military Officers Association of America has tracked health issues among former military members since 2011, with the goal of highlighting that the “health care needs of people with military service differ in several important ways from civilians.”

US Special Operations Command — and the allied armies they work with — want a reliable means of stopping fratricide. The idea is similar to Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) transponders on aircraft that emit signals that enable radars to identify these planes as friendly, reports Task & Purpose, noting difficulties identifying “partner forces in the combined air and ground battlespace during both day and night operations, and in all weather conditions,” according to a SOCOM research solicitation.

Boeing views the low-ball bids that helped it win contracts for a Navy drone and an Air Force training jet as spending money to make money, reports Washington Examiner. CEO Dennis Muilenburg says, “This is a targeted and very deliberate strategy focused on some key defense franchises that we believe have life-cycles that are measured in decades,” and will offer a potential $60 billion long-term revenue stream.

With Russia in its crosshairs, Canada moves to buy a sub hunter, reports Defense News, with the Royal Canadian Navy considering Britain’s Type 26 frigate design, a multi-mission ship designed to cut through the water quietly, hunt submarines, and defend against hostile missiles and aircraft.

Contracts:

ACR Technical Services Inc., Newport News, Virginia (FA4890-19-D-1001); APRO International Inc. Vienna, Virginia (FA4890-19-D-1002); Goldbelt C6 LLC, Chesapeake, Virginia (FA4890-19-D-1003); Science and Management Resources Inc., Pensacola, Florida (FA4890-19-D-1004); and Yulista Support Services LLC, Huntsville, Alabama (FA4890-19-D-1005), have been awarded a ceiling $473,000,000 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for the Air Force Enterprise Contracted Precision Measurement Equipment Laboratories Services II. This contract provides Air Combat Command, the Air National Guard, and other major command and combatant command customer management, supervision, personnel, equipment, tools, materials and other items necessary to perform equipment calibrations by professional and technical metrologists. Work will be performed at various Air Force bases in the continental US and outside the continental U.S., and is expected to be completed by Sept. 30, 2028. This award is the result of a competitive acquisition and five offers were received. Fiscal 2019 operations and maintenance funds in the amount of $1,300,000 will fund the current requirement. Headquarters Air Combat Command Acquisition Management and Integration Center, Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Virginia, is the contracting activity.

Lockheed Martin Corp., Rotary and Mission Systems, Moorestown, New Jersey, is awarded a $365,730,330 cost-plus-incentive-fee, cost-plus-fixed fee, firm-fixed-price contract for new-construction DDG Aegis Weapon System Baseline K2 development and integration in support of the Republic of Korea Navy. This contract involves foreign military sales to the government of South Korea. This contract will provide for combat system installation, staging and integrated logistics support required for the installation, test and delivery of the Aegis Combat System K2 baselines for three Republic of Korea Navy DDGs. These efforts include program management, system engineering and computer program development; ship integration and testing; technical manuals and planned maintenance system documentation. Work will be performed in Moorestown, New Jersey (66 percent); Ulsan, South Korea (18 percent); Seoul, South Korea (7 percent); Camden, New Jersey (7 percent); and Washington, District of Columbia (2 percent), and is expected to be completed by July 2026. Foreign military sales funding in the amount of $111,535,109 will be obligated at time of award and will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured, in accordance with 10 US Code 2304 (c)(4) (International Agreement). The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, District of Columbia, is the contracting activity (N00024-19-C-5102).

The Boeing Co., St. Louis, Missouri, is being awarded a $244,714,371 not-to-exceed, firm-fixed-price contract to procure long lead material for Harpoon full-rate production Lot 91 in support of multiple Foreign Military Sales (FMS) customers. Work will be performed in St. Charles, Missouri (54 percent); McKinney, Texas (23 percent); Toledo, Ohio (8 percent); Burnley, United Kingdom (3 percent); Middletown, Connecticut (2 percent); Grove, Oklahoma (2 percent); Elkton, Maryland (1 percent); Lititz, Pennsylvania (1 percent); Galena, Kansas (1 percent); Huntsville, Alabama (1 percent), and various locations within the continental US (4 percent), and is expected to be completed in March 2023. FMS funds in the amount of $244,714,371 will be obligated at time of award, none of which will expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured pursuant to 10 U.S. Code 2304(c)(1). The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity (N00019-19-C-0016).

BAE Systems Technology Solutions & Services Inc., Rockville, Maryland, is being awarded a $72,049,627 indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract. This contract provides for Air Traffic Control and Landing Systems Operations Onboard Ship and Shore services for the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division’s Air Traffic Control and Landing Systems Division. Support to be provided includes fleet services, equipment improvement, technical efforts, operational software, test bed efforts, repair, fabrication, and restoration; training; local area network, and quality assurance and system safety effort. Work will be performed in St. Inigoes, Maryland (80 percent); and various ship and shore locations (20 percent), and is expected to be completed in October 2023. No funds are being obligated at the time of award; funds will be obligated on individual orders as they are issued. This contract was competitively procured via an electronic request for proposals; one offer was received. The Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity (N00421-19-D-0001).

General Dynamics Information Technology Inc., Fairfax, Virginia, is being awarded a $54,436,930 modification (P00023) to a previously awarded cost-plus-fixed-fee, firm-fixed-price indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract (W15QKN-15-D-0001). This modification provides integrated logistics support for multiple foreign military sales (FMS) customers using purchased Navy defense articles including weapon systems, various aircraft, and other components procured under FMS programs. Work will be performed at Patuxent River, Maryland (52 percent); Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (11 percent); Jacksonville, Florida (2.5 percent); Pensacola, Florida (1.5 percent); Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania (1 percent); various locations within the continental US (4 percent); and various locations outside the continental US (28 percent), and is expected to be completed in October 2019. No funds will be obligated at time of award. Funds will be obligated on individual task orders as they are issued. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting activity.

KBRwyle Technology Solutions LLC, Columbia, Maryland, was awarded a $14,793,363 modification (0001 40) to contract W52P1J-12-G-0061 for Army Prepositioned Stock Four (APS-4) Korea, logistics support services. Work will be performed in Waegwan, Republic of Korea, with an estimated completion date of Nov. 29, 2019. Fiscal 2019 operations and maintenance, Army funds in the amount of $10,000,000 were obligated at the time of the award. US Army Contracting Command, Rock Island Arsenal, Illinois, is the contracting activity.

IntelliDyne LLC, Falls Church, Virginia, has been awarded a $15,695,542 firm-fixed-price contract to provide direct support to the Defense Health Agency (DHA) Global Service Center and the enterprise to fully support the integration of all desk side support, remote, or onsite troubleshooting; onsite IT touch labor; network support services activity program management; network security; and infrastructure assurance activities to include risk management framework support, in-room video teleconferencing support, Defense Health Headquarters site asset management, and network/systems engineering where required into the Military Health System Joint Active Directory Management and the Military Health System Medical Community of Interest network environment systems and infrastructure. This award is the result of a sole-source acquisition. This contract will have a six-month base period of performance (Oct. 30, 2018, to April 29, 2019) with one six-month option period. This short-term contract provides continuity of services until DHA is able to conduct a competitive award anticipated in the second quarter of fiscal 2019. This award utilizes fiscal 2019 operations and maintenance funds in the amount of $15,695,542. The Defense Health Agency, Contracting Office – Falls Church, Virginia, is the contracting activity (HT0011-19-F-0001).

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