NASHUA, New Hampshire — BAE Systems has received a Block 4 modernization
contract award from Lockheed Martin to enhance the offensive and defensive
electronic warfare capabilities of the F-35 Lightning II fighter, BAE said in a
release.

Under the contract, BAE Systems will modernize its AN/ASQ-239 Electronic Warfare/Countermeasures (EW/CM) system to address emerging threats.

“The F-35 will be in service for decades, and we’re
committed to providing our pilots with an AN/ASQ-239 capability that affords a
decisive and sustained EW operational advantage,” said Deborah
Norton, vice president of F-35 Solutions at BAE Systems. “Our robust, modular
architecture enables us to efficiently insert new capabilities, supporting the
next wave of technical innovation while proactively addressing total product
lifecycle sustainability.”

BAE Systems has been the EW supplier for the F-35 program for the past 14 years, designing and developing the Block 1, Block 2 and Block 3 configurations, and delivering production units for each of the Low-Rate Initial Production (LRIP) Lots 1-11. The Block 4 program is a multiyear, multicontract design and development effort that will add 11 new capabilities to the EW system.

BAE Systems has delivered more than 500 F-35 AN/ASQ-239 EW/CM shipsets to date and is matching aircraft production with continual on-time delivery as the program ramps to full-rate production.

HONOLULU —
The U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Midgett (WMSL-757) arrived Aug. 16 at its new
homeport in Honolulu, the Coast Guard Pacific Area said in a statement. 

The
Midgett is the eighth of the Coast Guard’s national security cutters and the
second to be homeported in Hawaii. Its sister ship, the Cutter Kimball (WMSL-756)
arrived on Dec. 22. Both cutters are scheduled to be commissioned Aug. 24 during
a ceremony presided over by Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Karl Schultz. 

“The
U.S. Coast Guard has an enduring role in the Indo-Pacific Region, going back
over 150 years, and our commitment today is as strong as ever,” Schultz said.
“The national security cutters are the flagships of the fleet, and the
homeporting of the Kimball and Midgett in Hawaii and their future deployments
throughout the Indo-Pacific demonstrate the U.S. Coast Guard’s dedication to
safeguarding the nation’s maritime safety, security and economic interests
throughout the region.”

Advanced
command-and-control capabilities and an unmatched combination of range, speed
and ability to operate in extreme weather enable national security cutters to
deploy globally to confront national security threats, to strengthen maritime
governance, to support economic prosperity and to promote individual
sovereignty.

Known as
the Legend class, national security cutters are capable of executing the most
challenging national security missions, including support to U.S. combatant
commanders. They are 418 feet in length, 54 feet in beam and 4,600 long tons in
displacement. They have a top speed of more than 28 knots, a range of 12,000
nautical miles, an endurance of up to 90 days and can hold a crew of up to 150.
These new cutters are replacing the high endurance Hamilton-class cutters (378
feet) that have been in service since the 1960s.

While
national security cutters possess advanced capabilities, more than 70% of the
Coast Guard’s offshore presence exists in the service’s aging fleet of medium-endurance
cutters. Many of these ships are more than 50 years old and are approaching the
end of their service life. Replacing the fleet with new offshore patrol cutters
is one of the Coast Guard’s top priorities.

Midgett is named to honor all members of the Midgett family who served in the Coast Guard and its predecessor services. At least 10 members of the family earned high honors for their heroic lifesaving efforts. Among them, the Coast Guard awarded various family members seven gold lifesaving medals — the service’s highest award for saving a life — and three silver lifesaving medals.

The Midgett’s transit to Hawaii was punctuated by two interdictions of suspected low-profile go-fast vessels in the Eastern Pacific Ocean, the first July 25 and a second July 31. The boardings resulted in a combined seizure of over 6,700 pounds of cocaine, estimated to be worth over $89 million.

HONOLULU —
The Coast Guard Cutter William Hart (WPC-1134) arrived in Honolulu Harbor on
Aug. 17, becoming the third 154-foot fast-response cutter homeported in Hawaii,
the Coast Guard 14th District said in a release.

The FRCs
are some of the newest Coast Guard vessels to come online, replacing the aging
patrol boat fleet currently in use. The FRCs represent the Coast Guard’s
commitment to modernizing service assets to address the increasingly complex
global maritime transportation system.

FRCs boast
advanced command, control, communications, computers, intelligence,
surveillance and reconnaissance systems designed to assist the cutter’s crew
with their primary mission to patrol coastal regions.

Recently,
the FRCs already stationed in Honolulu participated in longer over-the-horizon
voyages to the Republic of the Marshall Islands and Samoa, displaying the
potential of these cutters and their importance to the Coast Guard’s overall
Pacific strategy and regional partnerships.

William
Hart, the cutter’s namesake, was a Gold Lifesaving Medal recipient who rescued
a crew member of the tug Thomas Tracy. In 1927, Hart dove into the water in a
70-mph gale off Absecon, New Jersey, to save the mariner, who went overboard in
the storm.

Throughout
the 1930s, Hart served in the Army Corps of Engineers before returning to the
Coast Guard in 1939, advancing to chief petty officer and serving as a
boatswain’s mate. Once the United States entered World War II, Hart was
commissioned as a lieutenant junior grade and served in both the Atlantic and
Pacific theaters. He retired from the Coast Guard in 1950.

William Hart is the last of the three FRCs to be stationed in Hawaii. The crew transited the vessel from Key West, Florida, following delivery and preparation for sailing. Three more are scheduled to be homeported in Guam, increasing the Coast Guard 14th District’s total number of FRCs to six.

The Coast Guard is acquiring a total of 56 FRCs to replace the 110-foot Island-class patrol boats. Coast Guard Sector Honolulu, to whom the cutter crew will report, plans to commission the William Hart in a ceremony Sept. 26.

ALAMEDA,
Calif. — Crews aboard the precommissioned U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Midgett (WMSL-757)
interdicted a suspected low-profile go-fast vessel July 31 and seized more than
4,600 pounds of cocaine during a boarding in international waters of the eastern
Pacific Ocean, the Coast Guard Pacific Area said in a release.

This was
the second at-sea cocaine seizure made by Midgett’s crew within five days.

Midgett’s
crew seized more than 2,100 pounds of cocaine July 25 from a low-profile
go-fast boat, the cutter’s first cocaine seizure ever since departing the
Pascagoula, Mississippi, shipyard in June following acceptance by the Coast
Guard.

The July 25
and July 31 boardings resulted in a combined seizure of more than 6,700 pounds
of cocaine with an estimated street value of over $89 million.

Low-profile
go-fast vessels are built by cartels for smuggling large quantities of
contraband by riding low in the water to avoid detection. They are designed to
be quickly sunk by using their integrated scuttling valves, a dangerous
practice that jeopardizes the safety of smugglers and the Coast Guard boarding
teams.

Nearly 80%
of all known illegal narcotics coming into North America are smuggled by
international cartels through the eastern Pacific corridor, an area greater in
size than the continental United States. The profits from cocaine manufacture allow
drug cartels to diversify and fund other illicit trafficking activities such as
the smuggling of opioids, synthetics, methamphetamines, people and weapons.

One metric
ton of cocaine (2,204.6 pounds or 1,000,000 milligrams) is equal to 20 million
individual doses upon arrival in the United States. The Coast Guard removed more
than 2 million pounds (923 metric tons) of cocaine with an uncut wholesale
value of more than $27 billion over the last five years.

“The
national security cutter gets you further, faster and delivers more capability
once on scene than any other cutter in the history of our service,” said Capt.
Alan McCabe, Midgett’s commanding officer. “I am incredibly proud of the crew’s
efforts who made these two seizures possible, and we are eager to conduct
future operations throughout the Pacific.”

Midgett, the Coast Guard’s
eighth national security cutter, is sailing toward its future homeport in
Honolulu, where it will be commissioned Aug. 24 along with its sister ship, the
Coast Guard Cutter Kimball (WMSL-756), in a ceremony presided over by Coast
Guard Commandant Adm. Karl Schultz.

ARLINGTON,
Va. — The Raytheon Co. is ready to demonstrate a single-sortie mine
neutralization concept using systems it developed or is developing. The
technology will be demonstrated at Newport, Rhode Island, during the last week
of August at ANTX (Advanced Naval Technology Exercise) 2019.

The Raytheon plan
is to demonstrate “detect to engage” sea mines using unmanned systems, Andy
Wilde, director of strategy and business development for Raytheon Undersea, said
in an Aug. 15 interview with Seapower.

Wilde said that
unmanned systems will “revolutionize” mine countermeasures (MCM) that currently
take weeks or months to clear minefields and put minesweepers at risk. The Navy
is developing an MCM mission package for the littoral combat ship (LCS) that
will rely largely on unmanned systems.

Raytheon will
demonstrate its AQS-20C towed sonar, now in production, pulled through the
water by a riverine craft acting as a surrogate for the Textron-built MCM
unmanned surface vehicle (MCMUSV) that will be a component of the MCM mission
package for the LCS.

Under the concept,
an MCMUSV is launched from an LCS and deploys the AQS-20C. Once a possible sea
mine is detected by the AQS-20C’s synthetic aperture sonar, a Barracuda
expendable semi-autonomous mine neutralization unmanned undersea vehicle is —
on the same pass — launched into the water from a A-size sonobuoy launcher on
the MCMUSV.

The Barracuda deploys
a float that serves as an RF datalink to the CUSV and an acoustic data link to
the Barracuda. The tactical mission plan is downloaded from the LCS to the
Barracuda via the CUSV. The Barracuda starts a search track and, once it
acquires a mine, it maintains position at the mine. The operator on the LCS
confirms the object is s mine and commands the Barracuda to detonate the mine
with a charge. The MCMUSV would then continue its mission on its planned track.

Raytheon will
have a time slot during ANTX 2019 in Narragansett Bay to run its MCM system
through several geometric patterns, Wilde said.

He said his
company is looking to take advantage of artificial and machine learning to
optimize the performance of its systems.

He also said
the MCM mission concept could be expanded to other missions, including by use
of a B-size sonobuoy launcher with other payloads.

The AQS-20C sonar is now in
production. Raytheon currently is developing the Engineering Development Models
of the Barracuda and recently completed the Navy’s Preliminary Design Review.

ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. Navy has issued a draft Request for Proposals for its planned Large Unmanned Surface Vessel (LUSV), one of the vessels planned for its future surface fleet.

“The LUSV will be a
high-endurance, reconfigurable ship able to accommodate various payloads for
unmanned missions to augment the Navy’s manned surface force, the Aug. 9
announcement on the FedBizOps website said.

“With a large payload
capacity, the LUSV will be designed to conduct a variety of warfare operations
independently or in conjunction with manned surface combatants. The LUSV will
be capable of semi-autonomous or fully autonomous operation, with operators
in-the-loop (controlling remotely) or on-the-loop (enabled through autonomy).”

Naval Sea Systems
Command (NAVSEA) intends to award multiple contracts for conceptual designs
from the defense industry. A final RFP is to be issued in the fourth quarter
fiscal 2019. 

On July 16, the Navy issued an RFP for the Medium Unmanned Surface Vehicle (MUSV), another vessel planned to be part of its future fleet concept. That RFP calls for “a pier-launched, self-deploying modular, open architecture, surface vessel capable of autonomous safe navigation and mission execution.”

The Navy is expected to field the LUSV and MUSV as adjuncts to its future surface fleet that will include the future surface combatant and the new FFG(X) guided-missile frigate as well as Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers and the Independence- and Freedom-class littoral combat ships.

SAN PEDRO,
Calif. — The U.S. Coast Guard and partner agencies responded to a report of
multiple bales of narcotics in the water near Santa Catalina Island on Aug. 13,
the Coast Guard 11th District said in a release.

A
concerned citizen notified Coast Guard Sector Los Angeles-Long Beach
watchstanders, reporting multiple bales of what the caller believed to be
narcotics floating near Santa Catalina Island.

A Coast
Guard Station Los Angeles-Long Beach 45-foot response boat-medium crew and a Baywatch
Isthmus boat crew responded to investigate.

Coast
Guard and Baywatch crews recovered 43 bales from the water. The bales were
transferred to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, who confirmed the bales
consisted of marijuana weighing about 1,300 pounds with an estimated street value
of $1 million.

“We
appreciate the assistance provided by our partners and vigilant mariners in
keeping these drugs off of our streets,” said Lt. Andrew L. Fox, the Station
Los Angeles-Long Beach commanding officer. “We encourage anyone who sees
suspicious activity on the water, signs of distress, or hazards to navigation
to contact Coast Guard Sector Los Angeles Long Beach personnel on VHF channel
16 or at (310) 521-3801.”

The origin
of the bales is unknown. The case remains under investigation by agents of
Immigration and Customs Enforcement-Homeland Security Investigations and the
Coast Guard Investigative Service.

Response to the report was
coordinated through an interagency structure known as a regional coordinating mechanism
(ReCoM). Located in San Diego, Los Angeles and San Francisco, the ReCoM
partnerships include the Coast Guard, CBP’s Office of Air and Marine Operations
and Office of Field Operations, U.S. Border Patrol and ICE’s Homeland Security
Investigations, in cooperation with state and local law enforcement partners
operating along the California coast.

PATUXENT
RIVER, Md. — The U.S. Navy’s newest aircraft carrier Advanced Arresting Gear
(AAG) system received the green light to recover all props and jets, according
to an Aircraft Recovery Bulletin (ARB), the Program Executive Office (Tactical
Aircraft Programs) public affairs office said Aug. 13.

The ARBs
enable propeller aircraft — C-2A Greyhounds, E-2C Hawkeyes and E-2D Advanced
Hawkeyes — and jet aircraft — F/A-18E/F Super Hornets and E/A-18G Growlers — to
perform flight operations aboard the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford.

“The
entire team did a tremendous job accelerating the schedule and working through
challenges,” said Capt. Ken Sterbenz, program manager for the Aircraft Launch
and Recovery Equipment program office (PMA-251). “This achievement is another
significant step toward ensuring the system can support the ship’s full air
wing.”

ARBs are
official Navy instructional documents identifying the weights and engaging
speeds authorized for shipboard arrestments of specific aircraft.

“Release
of the ARBs signifies Naval Air Systems Command’s ‘stamp of approval’ for the
AAG system to safely recover these type/model/series aircraft aboard the Navy’s
newest class of aircraft carriers,” said Jeff Mclean, deputy program manager
for AAG system design and development.

The team,
in collaboration with prime contractor General Atomics, continues to perform requisite
system development and demonstration testing at land-based test sites located
at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey. Comprehensive testing of new
systems like AAG is critical because it ensures the technology meets Navy
requirements and that it is safe for use in the fleet, Mclean added. The team
conducted more than 2,500 dead-load arrestments at the Jet Car Track Site and
1,420 manned aircraft arrestments at the Runway Arrested Landing Site.

“The pace of system testing was consistently demanding and required numerous team members to perform their duties in difficult conditions and in all types of weather in order to meet critical program milestones leading up to these ARB releases,” Mclean said. USS Gerald R. Ford is the lead ship in the Ford-class of aircraft carrier, the Navy’s first new class of aircraft carriers in more than 40 years.

The AAG system is designed to arrest a range of aircraft, reduce fatigue to the aircraft and provide higher safety margins while reducing manpower and maintenance. AAG is one of more than 20 new systems incorporated into the design of the Ford class.

MARINE
CORPS BASE QUANTICO, Va. — The Marine Corps’ Joint Light Tactical Vehicle is
officially ready to deploy and support missions of the naval expeditionary
force-in-readiness worldwide, the Marine Corps announced.

Marine
Corps Combat Development Command, Combat Development and Integration declared that
the JLTV program — part of the Light Tactical Vehicle portfolio at Program
Executive Officer Land Systems — reached initial operational capability (IOC)
on Aug. 2, nearly a year ahead of schedule.

“Congratulations
to the combined JLTV team for acting with a sense of urgency and reaching IOC
early,” said James Geurts, assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development
and acquisition.

“Changing
the speed in which we deliver, combined with coming in under cost and meeting
all performance requirements, is a fine example of increasing Marine Corps
capabilities at the speed of relevance, which enables our Marines to compete
and win on the modern battlefield.”

The JLTV,
a program led by the U.S. Army, will replace the Corps’ aging high mobility multipurpose
wheeled vehicle fleet. The JLTV family of vehicles comes in different variants
with multiple mission package configurations, all providing protected,
sustained, networked mobility that balances payload, performance and protection
across the full range of military operations.

“The
warfighting capabilities the JLTV provides our Marines far exceed the
capabilities offered by its predecessor,” said PEO Land Systems’ John Garner.
“I’m proud of what our team, in collaboration with the Army, has accomplished.
Their commitment to supporting the warfighter delivered an exceptional vehicle,
ahead of schedule, that Marines will use to dominate on the battlefield now and
well into the future.”

Several
elements need to be met before a program can declare IOC of a system, which
encompasses more than delivery of the system itself. The program office also
had to ensure all the operators were fully trained and maintenance tools and
spare parts packages were ready.

“IOC is
more than just saying that the schoolhouses and an infantry battalion all have
their trucks,” said Eugene Morin, product manager for JLTV at PEO Land Systems.
“All of the tools and parts required to support the system need to be in place,
the units must have had received sufficient training and each unit commander
needs to declare that he is combat-ready.”

For the
JLTV, this means the program office had to fully field battle-ready vehicles to
the Marine Corps schoolhouses — School of Infantry East at Camp Lejeune, North
Carolina; School of Infantry West at Camp Pendleton, California; The Basic
School at Quantico, Virginia; and the Motor Transport Maintenance Instruction
Course at Camp Johnson, North Carolina — and to an infantry battalion at II
Marine Expeditionary Force. The program office started delivering vehicles to
the schoolhouses earlier this year and started delivering vehicles to the
infantry battalion last month.

On Aug. 2,
Lt. Col. Neil Berry, the commanding officer for 3rd Battalion, 8th Marines,
notified Morin and his team of the unit’s combat readiness with the JLTV. On
Aug. 5, The Director, Ground Combat Element Division at CD&I notified PM
LTV of its IOC achievement. The JLTV is scheduled to start fielding to I MEF
and III MEF before the end of September.

According
to LTV Program Manager Andrew Rodgers, during the post-acquisition Milestone C
rebaseline of the JLTV schedule in January 2016, IOC was projected to occur by
June 2020. 

Rodgers
says that detailed program scheduling, planning and, most importantly, teamwork
with stakeholders across the enterprise enabled the program office to deliver
the vehicles and reach IOC ahead of schedule.

“It was
definitely a team effort, and we built up a really great team,” Rodgers said.
“In terms of leadership, our product managers’ — both Gene Morin and his
predecessor, Dave Bias — detailed focus and ability to track cost, schedule and
performance was key. Neal Justis, our deputy program manager, has significant
prior military experience working for the assistant secretary of the Army for acquisition,
logistics and technology, so having him on board knowing how to work the
Pentagon network was a huge force multiplier.”

Rodgers is
quick to note that, although the team has reached IOC, this is only the
beginning of the JLTV’s future legacy.

“We are really at the
starting line right now. Our grandchildren and great-grandchildren will see
JLTVs in the DoD,” Rodgers said. “We’ll easily still have these assets
somewhere in the DOD in the year 2100. Welcome to the start of many generations
of JLTVs.”

ARLINGTON,
Va. — The vice chief of naval operations has praised the progress made by the
naval aviation F/A-18 Super Hornet strike fighter community in improving its
readiness and is optimistic that a readiness goal of 80% will be reached by Oct.
1.

In a blog
post Aug. 12 on the Navy Live blog, VCNO Adm. Robert Burke wrote of his recent
visit to the commander of Strike Fighter Wing Atlantic and Strike Fighter Squadron
106 (VFA-106) at Naval Air Station Oceana, Virginia, “to get a firsthand look
at the changes to aviation maintenance practices and to gain insight on the
challenges and priorities of aviators and maintainers,” he said. VFA-106 is the
East Coast fleet replacement squadron for the F/A-18 community.

“It has been
less than a year since the Navy set out to restore strike fighter readiness
rates to 80%, and the one-year deadline of Oct. 1 is approaching,” Burke said. “For
the aviation community, the endeavor to increase the mission-capable rate of
F/A-18E/F Super Hornets posed a challenge that naval aviation leadership
attacked with fervor.”

Burke was
referring to the directive from then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to the U.S. Navy,
Marine Corps and Air Force to increase the readiness rates of its fighter
communities to 80% by Oct. 1. The services had been experiencing readiness
rates lower that 50% that had negatively affected numbers of mission-capable
aircraft, flight hours for pilots and pilot morale and retention.

Burke said
that VFA-106 was the most recent squadron “to initiate reforms under the Naval
Sustainment System (NSS), starting in April of this year. VFA-106 has the
largest inventory of Super Hornets on the flight line, as they are responsible
for training newly winged aviators for the fleet.

“In short,
this squadron is the largest contributor to the strike fighter readiness
recovery,” he said. “Since VFA-106 maintenance performance impacts overall
Super Hornet readiness status more than any other squadron, the recent
implementation of NSS procedures had a significant impact on the overall goal. …
VFA-106 learned from the FRS squadron [VFA-125] at NAS Lemoore who completed
early iterations of NSS changes. This rapid learning and improvement drove
VFA-106 to reduce maintenance turnover timeframes, raise the average mission
capable (MC) aircraft numbers, and return several long-term down aircraft to a
flying status.”

Burke said he
spoke with two junior Sailors who were plane crew chiefs to ask their opinion
of the NSS process.

“With pride,
they both spoke of ownership, of learning the whole aircraft, well outside of
their rating expertise, and of true teamwork,” he said. “This is a great
example of U.S. Navy Sailors being given tremendous responsibility — and
running with it!”

Burke said
that VFA-106 “is reaching the point where lack of MC aircraft is no longer a
limiting factor to pilot production, even when supporting operations in
multiple locations or underway on the aircraft carrier.

“These are powerful results that will ensure we have enough instructors and pilots in the future,” he said. “Success at VFA-106 is one example of how the Naval Aviation Enterprise is working together to achieve our 80% readiness goal,” Burke said.

“Because NSS addresses all elements of aviation maintenance — people, parts and processes — to make permanent changes that increase aviation readiness and lethality, we are seeing improvements that are sustainable for the future. Through collaboration and a whole-of-aviation approach, the Naval Aviation Enterprise is on its way to achieve and sustain its readiness goal.”