Here’s a photo of Dr. Werner Dahm from the Airman Magazine story Good, Clean Science: Top Scientist Directs Research to Save Money and the Environment:

Because science is so crucial to the Air Force, the service created the position of Chief Scientist in 1950. Dr. Werner Dahm is the current chief scientist and is the primary science adviser to senior Air Force leaders. With a background in aeronautical engineering, he also directs which programs the $2 billion budget is spent on. (U.S. Air Force photo/Master Sgt. Stan Parker)

Get a load of that painting of the XB-70. Click photo for a better look.

Sweet.

Meanwhile,

Recently, Dr. Dahm and members of the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board showed striking impacts on fuel economy that can be obtained by flying aircraft in formation to take advantage of the vortex produced from each wing tip through flight.

He said by having as few as two aircraft fly in formation, a 14 percent improvement in fuel efficiency could be realized. What’s even more impressive is that it isn’t just the trailing aircraft that reaps the benefits, both aircraft benefit.

“If the trailing aircraft can fly in the ’sweet spot’ produced from the lead plane it decreases the drag on both,” he said. “The main challenge is that sweet spot is constantly shifting, so pilot fatigue increases if they have to stay in that spot manually. Technology can solve that by relatively simple software that automatically uses trim adjustments find the sweet spot and stay in it.”

Dr. Dahm said the aircraft can be separated by a considerable distance and still see most of the benefit and that even dissimilar aircraft benefit from flying in formation.

“The benefit small aircraft see when they fly in formation with large aircraft can be so large that the fuel savings can actually equal the fuel those small aircraft would need flying solo.”

No bump drafting allowed, though.

The Day of the Atlas

Fifty years ago this month, the United States stepped briskly into the ICBM era, and it has never stepped out. Three long-range, liquid-fueled Atlas D missiles armed with nuclear warheads went on full combat alert at Vandenberg AFB, Calif., on Oct. 31, 1959.

A lot of great footage in this video:

UPDATE: Plus: United Launch Alliance’s 600th Atlas Mission

MV-22B Ospreys with Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 263 (Reinforced), 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, fly over the Egyptian coastline during Exercise Bright Star 2009 in Egypt, Oct. 12. The multinational exercise is designed to improve readiness, interoperability, and strengthen the military and professional relationships among U.S., Egyptian and participating forces. Bright Star is conducted by U.S. Central Command and held every two years. Elements of the 22nd MEU are currently are participating in the multi-national exercise while serving as the theater reserve force for U.S. Central Command. Photo by Cpl. Justin Martinez

More photos here: 22nd MEU Conducts Urban Training During Bright Star 2009

House, Senate negotiators fund second F-35 engine

U.S. House and Senate negotiators defied a White House veto threat and agreed on Tuesday to include $560 million in the fiscal 2010 defense authorization bill for an alternate F-35 engine, several sources familiar with the talks told Reuters.

President Barack Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have repeatedly said they oppose funding for the second F-35 engine, which is being built by General Electric Co and Britain’s Rolls-Royce Group Plc given mounting pressures on the U.S. defense budget.

But administration officials issued more cautious statements on Tuesday, which several sources said signaled that the White House was easing off its veto threat.

Murdoc has long been in favor of the alternative engine in principle and is glad to see that, once again, the F136 appears to have survived.

Note: You probably saw the Blogad advertisements for the GE/RR F136 program running on this site recently. Those were purchased normally as standard Blogads, and Murdoc Online has received no compensation for writing this post or for supporting the F136 program. If, in the future, Murdoc receives an F136-powered F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter in appreciation for his efforts, he will be sure to disclose it in order to remain compliant with new FTC standards.

MQ-8B Fire Scout, P7, and Ground Control Station demonstration at Yuma Proving Ground, Yuma, AZ (Northrop Grumman Photo)

Northrop Grumman release:

The Northrop Grumman Corporation-developed (NYSE:NOC) MQ-8B Fire Scout Vertical Unmanned Aircraft System (VUAS) recently completed a flight under the command and control of a new company-developed STANAG 4586 compatible ground control station (GCS).

The recent flight tests took place the week of Sept. 21 at Yuma Proving Ground (YPG). The flights demonstrated the functionality of the ground control station (GCS) that will be used for future capability demonstrations with the company-owned P7 Fire Scout VUAS. Flight activities will continue at YPG to prepare for the Army Expeditionary Warrior Experiment at Fort Benning, Ga.

The GCS contains multiple radios for voice, secondary command and control and a Tactical Common Data Link for primary command and control and sensor data downlink. The operator stations are fully redundant with PC-based commercial off-the-shelf workstation components. The GCS intercommunication system is digital with an external wireless system for other crew members.

Been real busy but was sent this by a reader about the Iranian aircraft crash noted previously:

Iran Air Force Il-76 Crash Details and Video

Facts are now in concerning the tragedy at the 2009 Sacred Defense air show in Tehran. On the 22nd of September, at 09:02 hours, IRIAF Il-76MD “Simorgh” (Baghdad-2/Adnan-2, No. 1 with 5-8208 serial) crashed near Varamin City, killing all seven crew members aboard. At 09:02 hrs, the pilot radioed to Mehrabad control tower that the aircraft’s engines under the right wing had caught fire.

Iranian-made Saegheh fighter jets fly over the mausoleum of late revolutionary founder Ayatollah Khomeini, during a military parade ceremony marking the 29th anniversary of the start of the 1980-1988 Iraq-Iran war, just outside Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2009. An Iranian military plane crashed into fields just south of Tehran early Tuesday, according to the state IRNA news agency, saying the plane flew in the air force show that was part of the parade, but there was no immediate word of casualties or details about the plane. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

“Saegheh” apparently means “thunder.” Though, in this particular case, it may also mean “barreled fish.”

Here’s a little more (though not much) on the crash.

WWII women pilots to get ‘long-overdue’ honor; Local woman who died while serving as a WWII pilot is among them

Kalamazoo Gazette:

Mabel Rawlinson was killed on Aug. 23, 1943, when her plane crashed during a training exercise at a military base in North Carolina.

Rawlinson, 26, was a member of a newly formed unit of female pilots serving in World War II. But the pilots were not recognized as enlisted soldiers.

So the U.S. Army did not pay to bring Rawlinson’s body back to her hometown of Kalamazoo.

It did not pay for the small graveside ceremony at Mount Ever-Rest Memorial Park.

She received no medals.

“She was forgotten,” said Pamela Pohly, Rawlinson’s niece.

But not anymore.

Sixty-six years after a group of 1,102 women, including Rawlinson, broke the gender barrier in the sky, enabling generations of women to become military pilots, President Barack Obama has awarded the Women Airforce Service Pilots the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest civilian honor accorded by Congress.

About time.

Air & Space Magazine:

Marine Corps Major John Glenn got up on the morning of July 16, 1957, strapped into a Vought F8U Crusader, and took off from Los Alamitos Naval Air Station in California like a cannon shot. Three hours, 23 minutes, and 8.4 seconds later (a time based on a National Aeronautic Association formula for records), he touched down at Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, New York, setting a transcontinental speed record: 725.55 mph.

Zoom.

Here’s an interesting tidbit:

The Crusader, sometimes called “the last gunfighter,” had no search radar, so for his three refuelings, Glenn had to find the AJ Savage tankers—North American’s converted twin-recip-engine bombers sent up in pairs for redundancy—using a direction finder to home on the tankers’ beacons.

During a practice refueling over Texas before the record flight, he recalls, “I was plugged in and taking fuel when the tanker’s right engine started belching black smoke. Then the left engine started doing the same thing. I pulled out the [refueling] drogue and flew wing on him, and he couldn’t hold altitude. He got down to around 3,500 feet and ordered a bailout.” Glenn watched the crew get out with three good chutes as the airplane descended and crashed in an open area. “It was full of fuel and went off like an atomic bomb,” he says. An investigation later revealed that the ground crew had mistakenly put jet fuel in the AJ’s gasoline tanks.

Oops.

The New Playbook

The Air Force has begun radically revising its combat playbook for the F-22 fighter. Instead of employing the Raptor en masse, as previously planned, USAF will use it as a scarce but extremely powerful enabler, deployed selectively in those times and places when it can enhance the performance of the entire combat air force.

Plans call for F-22s, in small numbers, to work in cooperation with more numerous but aged F-15s, which are expected to serve for another 15 years. The two air superiority fighters, old and new, will share air combat duties and hew to employment tactics suitable for a mixed force.

Good read on what the plans for the Raptor are now that it appears that additional planes will not be purchased.