Free Republic

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States has offered to add Israeli systems and munitions to a new U.S.-built fighter jet and deliver it to Israel by 2015, provided a deal is sealed in coming months. Lockheed Martin Corp, maker of the radar-evading F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, would tie in Israeli-built command, control, communications, computer and intelligence systems for a unique version of the jet for sale to Israel, Jon Schreiber, a senior Pentagon program official, told Reuters Monday. The United States also would integrate bombs that use an Israeli precision guidance kit called Spice along with Python 5 air-to-air missiles...

A former engineer for defense contractor Lockheed Martin Corp. claims in a federal whistleblower lawsuit that the company knowingly used "defective" stealth coatings when building its F-22 Raptor stealth jets. Darrol Olsen, a stealth engineer who was fired by Lockheed in 1999, claims Lockheed "falsely certified" the coatings between September 1995 and June 1999, saying they had passed stealth tests and concealing results that showed otherwise. Olsen said in the lawsuit he was told to "stay out of it" when he complained to his superiors. The whistleblower suit was originally filed in October 2007 in California and was unsealed earlier...

Lockheed Martin successfully fired a U.S. Army Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System (GMLRS) rocket 92 kilometers in a recent test at White Sands Missile Range, NM. The flawless test highlighted recent product improvements of this battle-proven system to give it a longer reach, maintaining its accuracy and effectiveness while minimizing potential collateral damage. Firing crews for the launch were from the 5th Battalion, 3rd Field Artillery from Fort Lewis, WA. This test firing of a unitary GMLRS met all mission objectives, which included: + Verify production of GMLRS and HIMARS production lines; + Validating rocket and launcher reliability; + Proving...

A new generation of electro-optical imaging satellites to be built by Lockheed Martin pending congressional approval will have an aperturesize of 2.4 meters, a senior U.S.intelligence official said. James R. Clapper, undersecretary of defense for intelligence, disclosed the aperture size — or diameter of the satellite’s primary imaging mirror — of the Next-Generation Optical satellite system Oct.19 during a keynote address here at the Geoint 2009 Symposium. Technical details and capabilities of the nation’s spy satellites typically are closely guarded secrets. Aperture size and altitude are the two factors that determine a satellite’s imaging resolution, which is the minimum size...

Here is a video report on a new prototype military vehicle made by Lockheed Martin that flipped over while carrying a news crew. The crew was on board as Lockheed was showcasing the safety and maneuverability of the new JLTV, which they believe surpasses the Humvee used for so long by the military. Just prior to the test drive that went wrong, Lockheed officials had been bragging that in 50,000 miles of test driving, the JLTV had never flipped over. But, inexplicably, it flipped over shortly thereafter with the news crew on board. No word yet from Lockheed Martin as...

The ranking Republican on the House Armed Services Committee says the battle to fund more than 187 F-22 stealth fighters is not over, even though pro-Raptor forces suffered a stinging defeat in the Senate this week. Rep. Howard "Buck" McKeon of California told HUMAN EVENTS the next F-22 war zone is a House-Senate committee conference on defense spending. There, as ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, McKeon will fight to preserve final bill language to provide for 12 more jets, as the House approved...Gen. John Corley, who heads Air Force Air Combat Command in Langley, Va., sent a...

Defense Spending: The TARP bailout may hit $24 trillion, but the Senate says the F-22 is too expensive to build and maintain. So why are the Japanese so desperate to buy this "unnecessary" Cold War weapon?By a vote of 58-40, the Senate on Tuesday voted to remove $1.75 billion set aside in a defense bill to build seven more F-22 Raptors, adding to the 187 stealth technology fighters already in the pipeline. After some hope the production lines would be kept open, the Senate succumbed to arguments by the administration and others that the fighter was too expensive, too hard...

Imagine a fighter jet that would give the United States complete air superiority in any conflict. An aircraft that’s faster, has longer range, and is more fuel-efficient at high speeds than any aircraft ever built. A plane virtually invisible to radar and deadly accurate, almost guaranteeing that any selected target would be destroyed. An aircraft so advanced that the armed forces of every country on earth are scared to death of it and know that they would be defenseless against it for years to come. We have that plane. It’s called the F-22 Raptor, and our President and Commander-in-Chief, Barack...

Without congressional intervention, the Air Force's ability to conduct air superiority missions will be increasingly at risk over the next three decades. President Obama's fiscal year (FY) 2010 defense budget request would stop production of the F-22A Raptor at just 187 aircraft and permanently shut down this production line.In reality, the F-22A program would actually end production at 186 fighters and not 187, because the March 2009 crash of an F-22 at Edwards Air Force Base involved a test aircraft not part of the official program of record. President Obama's decision to cap F-22A production at 186 fighters would in...

Defense: By a narrow margin, a House subcommittee has voted to keep open the F-22 Raptor production line. The future of American air dominance and the fate of the world's most capable fighter hang in the balance.On May 30, with North Korea huffing and puffing about nuclear war, the first of 12 high-tech U.S. F-22 Raptor fighter jets landed at Kadena Air Base on the southern Japanese island of Okinawa. It was just days after North Korea unnerved the region by detonating a nuclear device. There were reasons the F-22 was deployed to Japan. The stealthy, radar-evading fighter jet is...

WASHINGTON -- A top Air Force general, swerving from the Pentagon leadership, said ending production of Lockheed Martin Corp's F-22 Raptor fighter jet, as proposed by President Barack Obama, posed a high risk to U.S. ability to carry out its current military strategy. "In my opinion, a fleet of 187 F-22s puts execution of our current national military strategy at high risk in the near-to mid-term," Gen. John Corley, head of the Air Combat Command, wrote in a June 9 letter to a senator. "To my knowledge, there are no studies that demonstrate 187 F-22s are adequate to support our...

Not for commercial use. Solely to be used for the educational purposes of research and open discussion. Arrest of Kenyan Exposes Massive Global Arms Trade The East African Africa News February 25, 2002 Monday Kenya L AST WEEKEND'S arrest of Kenyan-born Sanjivan Ruprah, who is alleged to be a part of a major arms smuggling operation to Africa, has brought into the open the extent of the multi-million dollar illegal business. The whereabouts of Bout remain unknown. Some media reports say he is in Moscow, while others say he is in the Congo or the United Arab Emirates. An international ...

"A House committee threw a wrench in the Obama administration's plans to end Lockheed Martin Corp.'s F-22 Raptor fighter program, voting instead to add $369 million in extra funding to keep production of the Air Force's most advanced jet alive." "Mr. Gates thinks the Air Force only needs 187 of the F-22 fighters. The White House didn't budget for additional planes beyond that level in its proposed 2010 Defense Department budget, which is currently being reviewed by Congress. "Everybody knows where the Secretary and the President stand on the F-22," said Geoff Morrell, a spokesman for Mr. Gates. But in...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Lockheed Martin Corp.'s F-22 program got an unexpected lift Wednesday after House lawmakers approved $369 million to continue production of the radar-evading fighter jets. The surprise amendment, likely to reopen a debate over the necessity of the Cold War planes that cost $140 million each, was approved by the House Armed Services Committee by a vote of 31-30, along party lines. The extra funding was adopted as part of the 2010 Defense Department spending bill mark-up. The bill still needs to make its way through the full House and Senate.

Sensitive data detailing launch procedures for a US military missile air defence system have been found on a second-hand computer hard drive bought on eBay. More than 300 hard disks were studied and researchers uncovered other sensitive information including bank account details, medical records, confidential business plans, financial company data, personal id numbers, and job descriptions. The drives were bought from the UK, America, Germany, France and Australia through computer auctions, computer fairs and on the online auction site eBay. The exercise was carried out by BT's Security Research Centre in collaboration with the University of Glamorgan in Wales, Edith...

MUNICH --- Most of the media coverage from EADS’ annual financial results conference held here March 10 focused on the fact that a legal clause allowing customers to pull out of the A400M program will kick in on April 1, and played up the fact that in this event EADS would have to repay governments 5.7 billion euros. But this is neither newsworthy – the cancellation clause was first revealed in a report released by the French Senate on Feb. 10 – nor accurate, as the cost to EADS in the event of cancellation would be far higher. The company...

The U.S. government has declined to make a long-awaited sale of block 52 F-16s to Taiwan for fear of upsetting China. The White House blocked the $4.9 billion deal for 66 advanced F-16s last year and there was little hope of it being revived this year. It's seems the United States doesn't want to give them to Taiwan, mainly because mainland China would oppose the sale. In 2006 the U.S. had already blocked the sale to Taiwan of 66 F-16C/D block52s after the island's parliament repeatedly failed to approve funds for an earlier arms package. Then in July 2008, the...

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter flew supersonic for the first time yesterday, achieving another milestone. The aircraft accelerated to Mach 1.05, or about 680 miles per hour. The test validated the F-35 Lightning II's capability to operate beyond the speed of sound and was accomplished with a full internal load of weapons on the one-hour flight. "The F-35 transitioned from subsonic to supersonic just as our engineers and our computer modeling had predicted," said Jon Beesley. "I continue to be impressed with the aircraft's power and strong acceleration, and I'm pleased that its precise handling qualities are retained in supersonic...

Opinion: Maintaining air superiority Congress must fund more F-22s By Phil Gingrey, Washington Times 09/09/2008 The F-22A Raptor is the key to America's air superiority, and we need more of them. Recently, however, some have argued otherwise. Many of the dissenters suggest that Congress is considering continuing F-22 production for simple, political reasons. I respectfully disagree. Continuing the F-22 production is not a political nicety for the Air Force or for the defense of our nation. It is a necessity and the current program of record - 183 Raptors - is woefully inadequate to fulfill the National Military Strategy. This...

In another blow to Boeing Co.'s battered defense business, the U.S. Air Force on Thursday tapped rival Lockheed Martin Corp. for a contract potentially worth more than $3.5 billion to build a new generation of global positioning satellites. Chicago-based Boeing, which has a huge workforce in Southern California, would have made the satellites in El Segundo. The loss of the contract, known as Global Positioning System IIIA, was Boeing's third high-profile defeat in as many months. The company lost a $35-billion contest to build aerial refueling tankers for the Air Force in February and a $3.74-billion award to build unmanned...

Six international companies have submitted bids for a contract potentially worth more than $10 billion to build 126 multirole fighter jets, the Indian ministry of defense said. The international companies offered their proposals on the last day of bidding, a ministry spokesman said. The list of bidders will be reduced to two or three before a final decision is made, the spokesman said. The bidders include Lockheed and Boeing of the United States, MIG of Russia, Dassault of France, Saab of Sweden and European Aeronautic Defense and Space, the consortium that makes the Typhoon. The spokesman said the first batch...

Hutchison Whampoa Teams With U.S. Defense Firm for Port Security Li Ka-Shing Seeks U.S. Contract Hutchison Whampoa Teams With U.S. Defense Firm for Port Security Hutchison Whampoa, the firm that currently runs both ends of the Panama Canal, is teaming up with an American technology company in a bid to win tens of millions of dollars in U.S. port security funding. Three companies - Hutchison Whampoa Ltd., PSA Corp. Ltd. of Singapore, and London-based P&O Ports - will test an advanced electronic system manufactured by California-based Savi Technology to ensure the security of cargo entering U.S. ports. Hutchison Whampoa's effort...

WASHINGTON, April 22 (Reuters) Los Angeles-based Northrop Grumman Corp won a $1.16 billion contract to modify its high-altitude unmanned Global Hawk surveillance plane into a new maritime patrol aircraft, the Navy said on Tuesday. Northrop beat out Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co to win the deal, which runs through September 2014 and covers three unmanned test planes and an option for three low-rate initial production planes. The Navy plans to buy 68 Global Hawks under the Broad Area Maritime Surveillance (BAMS) program over the coming years, in a deal Navy officials said would be worth at least $3.74 billion,...

The Marietta-built F-22 Raptor is capable of amazing feats. It can cruise at 1,100 miles an hour, soar to 60,000 feet, and destroy air and ground targets with ease, all while staying virtually undetectable to radar. It is a technogeek's dream, a unique blend of speed, stealth and maneuverability designed to make pilots swoon and enemies duck and cover. The question is: Can the Raptor fight off an even fiercer foe — a budget-conscious Defense Department that wants to cap Raptor production at 187 planes? In Cobb County, especially, there is keen interest in the answer. Lockheed Martin's giant plant...

WASHINGTON - U.S. officials say the Pentagon is planning to shoot down a broken spy satellite expected to hit the Earth in early March. This is the U.S. military will use a missile to destroy a satellite in space, NBC News reports. The spy satellite has lost all power and is expected to crash back on earth in early March, spreading debris and potentially hazardous fuel over several hundred miles.

The FBI selected Lockheed Martin Corp. yesterday for a $1 billion contract to build a database for fingerprints and other biometric information. Analysts had expected Lockheed to win the Next Generation Identification system contract because the Bethesda company built and maintains the FBI's current 10-fingerprint database. Lockheed Martin's Transportation and Security Solutions branch won the one-year deal, which includes nine one-year options, according to FBI spokesman Rich Kolko. Lockheed beat out teams led by Northrop Grumman Corp. and International Business Machines Corp. The deal is a major upgrade to the FBI's Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System because it allows the...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Lockheed Martin Corp LMT.N> was awarded a $498.2 million contract to supply F-16 aircraft to Pakistan, the Pentagon said on Monday, as Pakistani officials mulled whether to go ahead with a January 8 election after the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto. Lockheed will sell 12 F-16C plus 6 F-16D planes to Pakistan under the contract, the Pentagon said in its daily list of defense contract awards. The Defense Department, which oversees sales of military weapons to foreign governments, did not say how soon the fighter jets would be delivered. Pakistan has received about $10 billion in...

HOMESTEAD, Florida (AP) -- An airboat speeding across the sawgrass and mud. A ringing in the ears when the engine was cut. Moaning. Screams for help. Desperate gasps at the water's surface. Helicopters in the distance. Christmas carols. These are the sounds Bud Marquis heard in the black swamp that night. Then, for more than three decades, there was mostly silence about the December 29, 1972, crash of Eastern Airlines Flight 401 in the Everglades. Investigators and reporters stopped calling. His airboat rusted in the yard. A rubber boot that had squished through swampwater and jet fuel deteriorated on the...

One of the enduring mysteries of aviation lore is the disappearance of famed aviator Amelia Earhart. Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, disappeared with their aircraft somewhere in the Pacific Ocean during their attempted around-the-world flight in July 1937. Earhart's ill-fated journey began in Southern California, where her specially modified Lockheed Model 10 Electra was built. Among those who helped create that aircraft was Don Fowble, a young engineer and mechanic on the Lockheed assembly line. Now 93 and a resident of Arcadia, Fowble's story is one of the first-person accounts of Earhart's attempt and the massive search effort featured...

August 28, 2007 The Cold War might be over, but the underlying strategy that arose with Reagan’s Star Wars missile defense program in the 1980s lives on as the threat of long-range missile attack remains a global concern. Lockheed Martin have just announced successful testing of part of the Missile Defense Agency's “Multiple Kill Vehicle” program designed to be a single-launch platform to neutralize an entire fleet of incoming enemy missiles. Before Reagan’s Star Wars speech in 1983, America’s missile defense system consisted mainly of the simple and scary concept of Mutual Assured Destruction – you bomb us, we’ll bomb...

Lockheed Martin overcharged the US government by $265 million on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter development programme, the company announced on 9 August. The company is now in the process of reimbursing the funds to the government, although it was not immediately clear if the funds will be returned to the JSF programme office for reinvestment or go elsewhere. “We are working with the government to determine the appropriate amount of interest” owed, according to a released company dossier. The government’s joint programme office did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment. The overbilling issue was discovered during a...

Link references article which can't be posted here. ~~~~~ As always in the liberal Beltway, no one's ever questioned Fitzgerald's unsupervised free ride and tenure as Special Prosecutor in the Plame/Libby case by his college summer roommate, James Comey, now legal counsel for the giant, Lockheed Martin.

PARIS, FRANCE, June 18, 2007 -- The Government of France has selected Lockheed Martin’s HELLFIRE II® missile system to equip its Hélicoptère d'Appui Destruction (HAD) Tiger attack helicopter fleet. The precision-strike missiles will be purchased under a foreign military sale for the French Army, which is fielding 40 HAD Tiger helicopters. The fielding is expected to be completed by 2012. “HELLFIRE II missiles will provide the French HAD Tigers a highly effective precision strike capability,” said Doug Terrell, international business development director for Tactical Missiles at Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control. (...) The modular HELLFIRE II includes three semi-active...

Lockheed Martin redesigned the lift-fan inlet on the F-35B with an aft-hinged door after problems with the bifold doors on the X-35 concept demonstrator... Lockheed Martin redesigned the lift-fan inlet on the F-35B with an aft-hinged door after problems with the bifold doors on the X-35 concept demonstrator. To check airflow around the open door and into the inlet in the hover, the F135 test engine was fitted with a mock-up of the upper fuselage. "The bifold doors did not work well with forward speed," says Rob Burns, propulsion director with the Joint Strike Fighter programme office. "But the door...

ORLANDO, Fla., June 3 (UPI) -- The display and controls of an Apache helicopter were almost stolen last week after burglars broke into a Lockheed Martin facility in Orlando, Fla. The system, a Terrorist Explosive Device Analytical Center, was later found in some bushes near the facility, The Orlando Sentinel reported. A TEDAC has a small screen and a joystick used to find targets and aim weaponry. newspaper said.

Lockheed Martin Corp. delivered its150th C-130J Super Hercules cargo plane to the California Air National Guard as the eighth and final C 130J assigned to the 146th Airlift Wing at Channel Islands Air National Guard Base near Oxnard. The aircraft was accepted on May 8 at Lockheed Martin's plant in Marietta, Ga., and flown to California by Brig. Gen. Darren W. McDew, Vice Commander of 18th Air Force. "The C-130J is an evolutionary leap in airlift technology compared to legacy C-130s," McDew said during the acceptance ceremony in Marietta. "This aircraft offers flexibility through greater range and payload for commanders...

PALMDALE - The next addition to the Joe Davies Heritage Airpark at U.S. Air Force Plant 42 didn't have far to travel. The city purchased the T-33 jet trainer for $30,000 from co-owners Frank Motter and Lyle Straider. The aircraft was visible on Motter's property at 90th Street West and Avenue D-4, where it was decorated with lights and a Santa in the cockpit during the holidays. The location made the purchase simple, with very little required in transportation costs and logistics, said Tim Hughes, assistant Public Works director for Palmdale. The aircraft was disassembled into three parts, to more...

An RAF Hercules transport plane has been destroyed in southern Iraq after it was damaged in an "incident" on landing, the Ministry of Defence said. Two people suffered minor injuries in Monday's incident, after which the C130 plane was destroyed because of the potential risk involved in recovery. A military spokesman in Basra said there was no evidence of hostile action during the landing in Maysan province. The plane, based at RAF Lyneham, had been on a routine re-supply journey. It landed 20km north of Al-Amarah at about 2010 local time (1710GMT). The two people injured were taken to hospital,...

Excerpt - WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. officials are unable to communicate with an expensive experimental U.S. spy satellite launched last year by the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), a defense official and another source familiar with the matter told Reuters on Thursday. Efforts are continuing to reestablish communication with the classified satellite, which cost hundreds of millions of dollars, but "the prognosis is not great at this point," said the defense official, who asked not to be identified. ~ snip ~

FORT WORTH, Texas: The U.S. government awarded a $635 million Fixed Price Incentive contract to Lockheed Martin on Dec. 22 to upgrade the Turkish Air Force's existing fleet of F- 16s. Under the terms of the contract, Lockheed Martin will provide 216 modernization kits to upgrade Turkish F-16C and F-16D model aircraft in the nation's air force inventory. The effort also includes flight testing, training, technical support and sustainment activities. This contract continues work started under an initial contract in July 2005, based on an agreement signed between the governments of Turkey and the United States in April 2005. The...

FORT WORTH, Texas, Dec. 15, 2006 – The Lockheed Martin [NYSE: LMT] F-35 Lightning II lifted into the skies today for the first time, completing a successful inaugural flight and initiating the most comprehensive flight test program in military aviation history. “The Lightning II performed beautifully,” said F-35 Chief Pilot Jon Beesley following the flight. “What a great start for the flight-test program, and a testimony to the people who have worked so hard to make this happen.” The most powerful engine ever placed in a fighter aircraft – the Pratt & Whitney F135 turbofan, with 40,000 pounds of thrust...

ARLINGTON, Va. - To the military and defense firms that make it, the F-35 Lightning II is a "next generation" fighter jet, a technological leap meant to replace several aging fighters and help America maintain its dominance in aerial warfare. The Pentagon plans to buy thousands of the new stealthy jets, to be flown by three branches of the military and by eight foreign countries. And despite being the most expensive Pentagon spending program ever, with a total cost of about $275 billion, each plane is supposed to be relatively cheap to build, a rarity in defense spending. But as...

Lots of SR71 aircraft pictures with brief discriptions of various accidents that occured over the life span of the aircraft.

Global Hawk to Fly 1st Mission Over U.S. Nov 19 2:59 PM US/Eastern They've become a fixture in the skies over Iraq and Afghanistan, a new breed of unmanned aircraft operated with remote controls by "pilots" sitting in virtual cockpits many miles away. But the Air Force's Global Hawk has never flown a mission over the United States. That is set to change Monday, when the first Global Hawk is scheduled to land at Beale Air Force Base in northern California. "This landmark flight has historic implications since it's the first time a Global Hawk has not only flown...

On the forefront of our country's most western state, against the backdrop of the USS Arizona Memorial and the Battleship Missouri, floats 4 of our major Missile Defense assets; the USS Russell (DDG-59), USS Lake Erie (CG-70), USS Port Royal (CG-73), and SBX-1. These 4 ships, in conjunction with the GBI sites in Alaska and California can neutralize North Korea's ballistic missile intentions. In the last 12 months, the United States has successfully intercepted 13 ballistic missiles during realistic operational testing. In the last 90 days, the United States intercepted 4 ballistic missiles from long range to short range and...

Nothing on the planet can see the F-22, much less outfight it. But when the F-35 comes online, the two will literally dominate the skies. The F-35 will be able to see virtually hundreds of airplanes at distances far exceeding the scope of previous fighter systems. Tracking distances are classified, but the new aircraft's sight range is said to be twice that of existing fighters (about 40 miles in every direction for existing aircraft).

PALMDALE - A Lockheed L-1011 TriStar, one of a fleet of roughly 250 built and tested at Plant 42 between 1968 and 1985, could become the latest addition at the city's Heritage Airpark. The City Council has authorized staff to acquire an L-1011 for display at the airpark, a 26-acre facility on the north side of Rancho Vista Boulevard (Avenue P) between 20th and 25th streets east. The park was created for the display of approximately 40 aircraft designed, built, modified or flight tested in Palmdale. The cost of buying the plane will be $60,000, and the cost of getting...

PALMDALE - Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. will continue work on developing a hypersonic vehicle to be used to strike enemies thousands of miles away under a $14.6 million contract extension from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. "It's DARPA saying, 'We like what you're doing; keep doing it,' " said Dianne Knippel, Lockheed Martin spokeswoman at the company's Palmdale facility. The contract is part of the Falcon program, a joint DARPA-Air Force effort intended to develop hypersonic flight technologies that may eventually be applied to a future hypersonic bomber, capable of delivering weapons from the continental United States to anywhere...

WASHINGTON — Boeing wants to guard the nation's borders — for a couple of billion dollars. Boeing's St. Louis-based defense division has developed a plan — combining radar and laser technology, sensors and cameras, unmanned aerial vehicles, other surveillance equipment and rapid communications tools — to keep illegal immigrants, drug smugglers, potential terrorists and gun runners from entering the United States. It's done so at the behest of the Department of Homeland Security, which, seeking better ways to protect U.S. borders, a few months ago asked corporations with expertise in systems integration to supply ideas and technological know-how. That started...

The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) recently awarded Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT - News) a modest $1.7 million contract to design a remotely controlled "nano air vehicle" (NAV). The miniature device has nothing to do with nanotechnology (its size is nowhere near nanoscale) but, at 1.5 inches -- about the size of a maple seed, which the device is said to resemble -- it's still impressively small. According to reports, DARPA is hoping that the NAV will be able to deliver a sensor payload about a half-mile from its point of release, then return safely to its home...