SOCOM Stocking Up on CV-22 Osprey Spares

V-22 Osprey The Naval Inventory Control Point has issued a pair of ceiling priced order contract procurements to the Bell-Boeing Joint Program Office in Patuxent River, MD. The orders come under contract N00383-03-G-001B, covering additional U.S. Special Operation Command (SOCOM) spares for the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft as it prepares to enter service. The contracts were not competitively procured. These contracts follow on the heels of a number of related events. One was the MV-22 being declared “operationally suitable and effective” on July 14/05, despite open questions about how to escort or protect them. Another was a $35 million contract modification to “complete requirements for correcting deficiencies and fulfilling capability gaps identified in the baseline Block 0/10 for the CV-22″ for SOCOM’s special version of the tilt-rotor aircraft. See also this interview with SOCOM’s commanding general re: the V-22’s perceived importance to SOCOM. Order 0052 is a $12.8 million order that will be performed in Fort Worth, TX (51%) and Ridley Park, PA (49%), and work is expected to be complete by December 2007. Order 0053 is a $6.2 million order that will be performed in Ridley Park, PA (100%), and is also expected to be complete by December 2007. […]