STEPHEN TRIMBLE / WASHINGTON DC
Bolstering awareness and defences at US airports and borders accounts for the bulk of a White House proposal to raise the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) budget to $40.2 billion, or 10% in fiscal year 2005.
The DHS spending package delivered to Congress on 2 February includes a proposal to boost the Transportation Security Administration by 20% over FY2004 levels, raising the two-year-old agency's annual budget to $5.3 billion.
A major initiative to develop a countermeasures system that can protect passenger and cargo aircraft from missile threats would receive an extra $61 million under President George Bush's proposal. DHS awarded $2 million study deals last month to teams led by BAE Systems, Northrop Grumman and United Airlines, to propose a missile detection and countermeasure system for commercial aircraft. The proposals are due as early as June.
The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is proposing a funding increase to triple the flight hours of its 16-aircraft Lockheed Martin P-3 Orion fleet from 200h to 600h a month. A $12.5 million initiative proposed by ICE would resurrect the use of long-range primary radars for border security.
US Customs and Border Protection is investing about $10 million to develop a system of unmanned air vehicles.
The completion time for the Integrated Deepwater System, the US Coast Guard's sweeping effort to recapitalise its surface and air assets, is being brought forward from 27 to 22 years. In FY2005, the programme's proposed budget would rise by $10 million to allow production of two vertical take-off and landing UAVs to begin, continue service life extension and technical upgrades of legacy aircraft and launch the development of new patrol boat designs.
More immediately, the coastguard is requesting an extra $1.8 million to arm Sikorsky HH-60s at the Cape Cod air station in Massachusetts, as a prelude to arming all coastguard helicopters. An ongoing experiment in counter-drug operations using a squadron of leased MH-68 gunships, or the military variant of the Augusta 109E, is expected to continue receiving financing in FY2005, but coastguard officials are mulling the idea of converting the fleet to a standard procurement programme by 2007.
Source: Flight International
