March 28, 2024

Self-Flying Cars Available – No Pilot’s License Required

Flying car

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.

Less than a year since the Air Force announced it was pursuing “self-flying cars,” one took flight in Austin, TX, reports Military.com. The vehicle is the single-passenger Hexa, an electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) platform with an open cockpit seat surrounded by a honeycomb of small rotors. Made by LIFT Aircraft, the 18-rotor Hexa is being marketed commercially as a flight experience available to all consumers, no pilot’s license required.

If all systems remained go, the US National Reconnaissance Office launched a new intelligence payload into orbit this morning (Wednesday) between 1:50 and 6:25 am EDT from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, FL, reports C4ISR.net. The NRO develops, procures, and operates US intelligence satellites. This will be the eighth time the agency has used a Delta IV Heavy rocket to get payloads on orbit, with the most recent launch taking place in January 2019 for NROL-71.

DoD’s top research body is proving that better cybersecurity starts with hardware, reports FCW. About halfway into its three-month bug bounty program, crowd-sourced hackers haven’t yet been able to crack the DARPA’s security program.

Breaking Defense reports after years of inaction on cyber infrastructure, Congress may move on an Internet of Things Cybersecurity Law in two to three weeks, said Mark Montgomery, executive director of the congressionally mandated Cyberspace Solarium Commission. “We saw that with the workforce at home, household Internet of Things devices — particularly household routers — have become vulnerable but really important pieces of our National Cyber ecosystem.”

The Army is testing whether technologies developed in a lab to defend the tactical network and ensure safe data transfer can survive real-world conditions, reports C4IRS.net. Servers will not sit in air-conditioned buildings with near-constant connectivity, the tactical network must be mobile and able to change locations sometimes more than once an hour, in response to new tracking techniques from adversaries.

The FAA plans to test drone detection and mitigation technology at multiple civilian airports in real-world environments, reports FCW. There are plans to test systems from as many as 10 vendors at the Atlantic City International Airport in New Jersey, beginning early next year. The tests will expand to as many as four other airports to try out various aspects of those systems.

President Donald Trump released a 50-point second-term agenda  which vows to maintain American military might and “wipe out” terrorist groups overseas but also to stop the country’s involvement in “endless wars,” reports Military Times. Republican Party officials this cycle opted not to adopt a new platform, instead reiterating their support for the 2016 document passed just before Trump’s election.

The Marine Corps wants a commercial off-the-shelf tool to identify social media accounts that pose a threat to personnel and the Marines Corps Enterprise Network, reports C4ISR.net. The goal is to identify “evil twin” social media accounts pretending to be key personnel, general officers, and senior executive service employees. These fake accounts are sending malicious links to service members, as well as extorting information and money while posing as key members of the corps.

 

 

COVID convalescent plasma is already being administered to infected US service members although its benefit remains unknown, reports Navy Times. Such plasma is collected from people who have recovered from a COVID-19 infection, so their blood contains antibodies. In theory, these antibodies neutralize the virus and improve the outlook for patients newly fighting the disease. The medical community has not determined whether injecting CCP into sickened patients kick-starts the immune system and aids in recovery.

USNI News Fleet and Marine Tracker: Aug. 24, 2020

FoxHurricane updates on Hurricane Laura forecast it to become a major hurricane before making landfall in the US on Wednesday evening, today. The Texas and Louisiana coasts from San Luis Pass to Morgan City are on alert for the arrival of the storm that could reach the states as a Category 2 hurricane overnight Wednesday, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Aleksei A. Navalny, the outspoken Russian dissident, was a victim of poisoning, reports The New York Times. German doctors added  him to the ranks of Russians stricken by mystery illness after drawing the wrath of Moscow. While not able to pinpoint the exact poison, they said tests showed it came from a group of chemicals known as cholinesterase inhibitors, which interfere with the nervous system. While they are used medically to treat Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia, in some forms they are also found in chemical weapons and pesticides.

A sixth service member and second National Guardsman has died from COVID-19, reports Military.com. The California National Guard officials confirmed the death, which occurred Aug. 20. The family has requested that personal information be withheld.

The aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan and its strike group entered the South China Sea earlier this month and have been carrying out air operations, reports Navy Times.

The Air Force is on the verge of announcing which company will provide a 5G cellular network at Nellis AFB, reports C4ISR.net. Once the 5G network is in place, it will not be available to everyone at Nellis — at least initially. Instead, the Air Force intends to test whether it can make its command and control infrastructure more survivable by spreading it out over multiple locations when needed. Iran’s attack this past January on US forces at Ain al-Assad air base in Iraq underscored the vulnerabilities of concentrating its command-and-control assets in a single location.

The Army plans to field its “cloud in the sky” for the current aviation fleet by the end of fiscal 2024, reports Defense News. A common server will be installed on every aircraft; able to store, process, and then quickly transport data. The Army aims to field a future attack reconnaissance aircraft and a future long-range assault aircraft by 2030. The server will be a stack of storage, data processing and transport capability. According to the service’s Program Executive Office Aviation, contracts were awarded to Elbit Systems of AmericaMercury Systems, and Physical Optics Corp. The OTA contracts totaled roughly $3.3 million.

Shipyards continue to face persistent and substantial maintenance delays that hinder the readiness of aircraft carriers and submarines. Navy Times reports that three-quarters of the 51 aircraft carrier and submarine maintenance periods from fiscal 2015 to 2019 were completed late, resulting in 7,425 days of delays, according to the report by the Government Accountability Office. The Navy’s four shipyards — in Portsmouth, VA; Kittery, ME; Honolulu, HI; and Bremerton, WA — provide vital maintenance that includes ship overhauls, nuclear refueling, alterations, and refits, among other duties.

Contracts:

Kekolu Contracting LLC, La Plata, Maryland, has been awarded a not-to-exceed $111,700,000 firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity enterprise contract. Work will be performed at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland; and Joint Base Anacostia Bolling, Washington, D.C., and is expected to be completed May 23, 2025. This contract is for streamlined acquisition base engineering requirements, providing minor construction projects, maintenance and repair of real property. This award is the result of a competitive acquisition and seven offers were received. Fiscal 2020 operations and maintenance funds in the amount of $192,943 are being obligated at the time of award. The 316th Contracting Squadron, Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, is the contracting activity (FA2860-20-D-0004).

Atlantic Diving Supply Inc., doing business as ADS, Virginia Beach, Virginia, has been awarded a maximum $28,000,000 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for facility maintenance, repair and operations supplies and related incidental services. This was a sole-source acquisition using justification 10 US Code 2304 (c)(1), as stated in Federal Acquisition Regulation 6.302-1. This is a 327-day bridge contract with no option periods. Location of performance is Southwest Africa, with a July 19, 2021, ordering period end date. Using customers are Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and federal civilian agencies. Type of appropriation is fiscal 2020 through 2021 defense working capital funds. The contracting activity is the Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support Europe and Africa, Kaiserslautern, Germany (SPE5B1-20-D-0003).

Lockheed Martin Rotary and Mission Systems, Manassas, Virginia, is awarded a $191,723,019 cost-plus-incentive-fee contract (N00024-20-C-6117) for the procurement of engineering design development services and associated material and travel, supporting the fleet of Navy submarines and Foreign Military Sales requirements. This contract includes options which, if exercised, would bring the cumulative value of this contract to $2,224,208,878. This contract combines purchases for the Navy (90%); and the governments of Canada (8%); Japan (1%); and Australia (1%). Work will be performed in Manassas, Virginia (85 %); Virginia Beach, Virginia (11%); Fairfax, Virginia (2%); San Diego, California (1%); and Waterford, Connecticut (1%), and is expected to be completed by June 2030. If all options are exercised, work will continue through June 2030. Fiscal 2020 other procurement (Navy) funding in the amount of $500,000 will be obligated at time of award and will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. In accordance with 10 U.S. Code 2304(c)(1), this contract was not competitively procured (only one responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements). The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington Navy Yard, Washington, DC, is the contracting activity (N00024-20-C-6117).

Radiance Technologies Inc, Huntsville, Alabama, was awarded a $10,110,811 cost-plus-fixed-fee completion contract for a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency research project for the Secure Advanced Framework for Simulation and Modeling (SAFE-SiM) program. SAFE-SiM seeks to build a government-owned and controlled, faster-than-real time modeling and simulation (M&S) capability for theater-wide, mission-level M&S. This capability would enable rapid analysis supporting senior-level decisions for concept of operations development, force structure composition, resource allocation and targeted technology insertion. Work will be performed in Huntsville, Alabama (50%); Cambridge, Massachusetts (14%); Albuquerque, New Mexico (13%); Chantilly, Virginia (12%); San Diego, California (6%); and Rome, New York (5%), with an expected completion date of August 2021. Fiscal 2020 research, development, test and evaluation funds in the amount of $3,750,000 are being obligated at the time of award. This contract was a competitive acquisition in which 10 offers were received. The Defense Advanced Research Agency, Arlington, Virginia, is the contracting activity (HR0011-20-C-0146).

Leave A Comment