Harper Construction to Build USMC Recruit Facilities in San Diego

The Few. The Proud.

Harper Construction in San Diego, CA won a $56.2 million firm-fixed-price contract for design and construction of a physical conditioning recruit barracks, a recruit training barracks and a sports medicine and reconditioning therapy clinic at Marine Corps Recruit Depot (MCRD) San Diego. The 2 barracks will house a total of 1,729 Marines and will both include company offices and laundry facilities.

The contract also contains 3 unexercised options, which, if exercised, would increase the cumulative contract value to $65.6 million. Work will be performed in San Diego, CA and is expected to be completed by May 2011. This contract was competitively procured via the Navy Electronic Commerce Online website, with 15 proposals received by the Naval Facilities Engineering Command Southwest in San Diego (N62473-09-C-1205).

MCRD San Diego is a major USMC recruit training base in the United States…

Honeywell Gets $25.3M to Supply F-16 Circuit Card Assemblies

USAF F-16s over Iraq

Honeywell International in Albuquerque, NM received a maximum $25.3 million firm-fixed price, sole-source, indefinite delivery/ indefinite quantity contract for aircraft circuit card assemblies for the US Air Force’s F-16 fighters.

The date of performance completion is Aug. 16, 2014. There was originally 1 proposal solicited with 1 response received by the Defense Supply Center Richmond. The assemblies will be delivered to Ogden Air Logistics Center, Hill Air Force Base, in Utah (SPRHA4-09-D-0001).

The assemblies are an upgrade replacement for ones currently in the F-16 Digital Flight Control Computer (DFLCC) box…

Rosetta By Any Other Name: IBM Gets GALE-Related Work

The IBM T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, NY won a $9.7 million cost-reimbursement contract modification to support the intelligence analyst research effort called Rosetta: An Analyst Co-Pilot.

Rosetta will tightly couple speech transcription, language transition, and adaptive, multi-source information distillation in ways that permit English-speaking intelligence analysts to focus on and understand the most important information in their area of expertise.

Rosetta is IBM’s name for the work it is doing under the US Defense Advanced Research Project Agency’s (DARPA) Global Autonomous Language Exploitation (GALE) Program, according to DARPA’s Jan Walker…

$24M to Elbit for Finnish Defense Communication System

Elbit Systems in Haifa, Israel received a contract valued at EUR 17 million ($24 million) to provide Finland’s Ministry of Defence with high speed radio and data transmission communication systems to be delivered between 2010 and 2012.

Finland is purchasing Elbit’s Tadiran family of communication systems, which include high frequency (HF) and very high frequency (VHF) tactical radio equipment designed for use by ground forces for data transfer and voice communications.

US Army Awards $8.6M in Environmental Remediation Service Orders

The US Army awarded a total of $8.6 million in performance-based task orders for environmental remediation services at Army facilities in the United States and Puerto Rico.

The Army has two environment remediation programs for active/operating Army installations – the Installation Restoration Program (IRP) and the Military Munitions Response Program (MMRP). The IRP is a program to identify, investigate and clean up hazardous substances, pollutants, and contaminants resulting from past US Department of Defense (DoD) operations and activities. The MMRP addresses the safety, health, and environmental issues caused by past DoD munitions-related activities. Congress established the MMRP to address unexploded ordnance, discarded military munitions and munitions constituents located at sites on other than operational ranges.

The recent Army task orders are for both types of remediation programs…

Boeing to Supply Data Transfer System to Arleigh Burke Class Destroyers

Arleigh Burke Class Destroyer
(click to view larger)

The Boeing Company received a $14.6 million US Navy contract (N00178-09-C-2003) to produce the information transfer system that controls mission-critical capabilities on guided missile destroyers. Boeing will supply 6 shipsets of the Gigabit Ethernet Data Multiplex System (GEDMS) AN/USQ-82(V) for the Navy’s modernization efforts on Arleigh Burke Class (DDG 51) destroyers.

The equipment will be retrofitted on the USS Barry (DDG 52), USS Stout (DDG 55), USS Benfold (DDG 65) and 3 foreign navy vessels. The US Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division in Dahlgren, VA manages the contract, which also includes spares.

The GEDMS for Arleigh Burke Class destroyers acts as a ship-wide data transfer network…

Boeing’s Skyhook Shot: Redefining the Aerial Heavy-Lift Market?

Skyhook concept

In April 2006, “WALRUS Hunted to Extinction By Congress, DARPA?” dealt with the cancellation of DARPA’s WALRUS ultra-heavy lift program. WALRUS aimed to develop an airship that could lift between 250-500 tons, offering capacity that rivaled ship-borne options, but offered the benefits of transport all the way to the front without requiring ports and related infrastructure.

The program would have developed a 30-40 ton capacity demonstration model in its early stages, which would have had a useful role of its own. “Walrus Heavy-Lift Blimp Rises, Falls” also noted the requests of combat commanders for airlift options that could be used with smaller airfields, that cannot accommodate the 20-ton capacity C-130 Hercules aircraft. Not to mention related items like pressure to lower fuel use at the Pentagon, and 2005 warnings from the Army Corps of Engineers about energy costs/supplies and future military operations.

Now a private consortium sees similar needs and trends in key civilian sectors. A Canadian/American partnership that includes Boeing has set itself the public goal of building the commercial equivalent of DARPA’s desired demonstrator…

Sysco to Provide Food Services at US Installations in Alaska

Sysco Food Services of Seattle in Kent, WA won a maximum $7.3 million firm-fixed price, indefinite quantity full-line food distribution contract modification to provide food services to US Army, US Air Force, and US Job Corps facilities in Alaska.

The original proposal was Web solicited with 3 responses. This contract is exercising the 4th option year of a 5-year contract, which includes 4 one-year option periods. The date of performance completion is Aug 26/10. The Defense Supply Center Philadelphia manages the contract (SPM300-08-D-3160).

Higher, Cheaper: RVSM Certifying the Super-Hornet

F/A-18Es over Afghanistan

It’s a seemingly small change. Allow US Navy F/A-18 E/F Super Hornets to cruise between 29,000 and 41,000 feet, where the thinner air would save the US Navy several million dollars per year in fuel costs – $250,000 for each of their qualifying Super Hornet squadrons. Unfortunately, that’s where passenger airliners fly, an altitude band called “Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum” (RVSM) airspace. Even worse, in 2005, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reacted to congestion by reducing RVSM separation, but compensated by requiring dual-altimetry systems to minimize the odds of catastrophic error. That rule neatly eliminated almost all military fighter jets.

A US NAVAIR release describes the 3-year process that led to RVSM airspace certification for the 340 Super Hornets produced in Production Lot 22 and beyond. Certification efforts for other Hornet family aircraft are also proceeding, including the F/A-18F-derived EA-18G Growler electronic warfare aircraft, and smaller Navy/USMC F/A-18 A+, C, and D Hornets.

$39.8M to Nan to Build 2 Marine Corps Base Hawaii Barracks

Marine Corps Air Station
Kaneohe Bay

Nan in Honolulu, HI won a $39.8 million firm-fixed-price contract for design and construction of 2 barracks for single Marines at Marine Corps Base Hawaii in Kaneohe Bay, HI. Nan will build 2 reinforced concrete or masonry buildings, 1 with 88 semi-private rooms and the other with 62 semi-private rooms. The buildings will be interconnected through walkways and will not exceed 5 stories in height, with community and service core areas consisting of laundry facilities, lounges, duty officer and bunk room, housekeeping, vending area, and public restroom.

Nan expects to complete construction by February 2012. This contract was competitively procured via the Navy Electronic Commerce Online website with 9 proposals received by the Naval Facilities Engineering Command Pacific in Pearl Harbor, HI (N62742-09-C-1303).

Marine Corps Base Hawaii is home to the Marine Corps Air Station Kaneohe Bay…