The US Federal Claims Court has decided that the Air Force must pay companies that built homes on the former Lowry Air Force Base in Denver around $9 million—the amount it cost them to clean up asbestos left behind when the service demolished buildings on the Lowry redevelopment site. The Rocky Mountain News reports that the Denver law firm representing the homebuilders during their two-year legal battle says the court’s decision provided the “first judicial decision in the country” addressing Section 330 of the 1993 National Defense Authorization Act, which offers a “broad indemnity from the military to parties who purchase former military properties for all costs incurred as a result of environmental contamination caused by the military’s historic activities on the property.”
As Air Force leaders consider concepts of operations for Collaborative Combat Aircraft, sustainment in the field—and easing that support by using standard parts and limiting variants—should be a key consideration, according to a new study from AFA's Mitchell Institute of Aerospace Studies.