Tag: military aviation

Aviation Week Profiles US Air Force Modernization Programs

Aviation Week reports on the US Air Force’s major modernization programs. The Northrop Grumman B-21 Raider “will be the U.S. Air Force’s next generation, long-range stealth bomber, replacing the company’s B-2 Spirit and the Rockwell B-1B Lancer. The Air Force and Northrop now expect the public rollout of the bomber to take place this year, ahead of its first flight next year. Six of the aircraft are in production at the secretive Plant 42 complex in Palmdale, California, and the first airframe recently completed loads calibration testing.” The most important “modernization project in the Air Force’s tactical aircraft portfolio is also its most secretive, with limited on-the-record information about the sixth-generation fighter that will replace the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor.” The Boeing Company, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman are all in the running to develop the new fighter aircraft. The US Air Force remains committed to the F-35 Lightning II program and is intent on procuring upgraded engines for the aircraft. Orders for the F-15EX Eagle II have been reduced to 80, and there are plans to request $321.9 million in 2024 for procurement of the T-7A Red Hawk trainer. The US Air Force plans to make a decision on further procurement of the KC-46A Pegasus by next spring and is to accelerate development of “its next-generation ‘KC-Z,’ with a preliminary analysis of alternatives planned to start in 2024 – well ahead of its original schedule of 2030.” Production of the LGM-35A Sentinel ICBM is expected to begin in 2026, and the US Air Force expects to introduce the Lockheed Martin AIM-260 Joint Advanced Tactical Missile and several new cruise missiles in the coming years.
Full Story (Aviation Week)

Air Force Special Operations Command Grounding Fleet of Osprey Tilt-Rotor Aircraft

The Hill reports the US Air Force Special Operations Command “has grounded its entire fleet of CV-22 Ospreys due to two recent safety incidents involving the aircraft’s clutch.” The decision “stems from an ‘increased number of safety incidents’ involving the Ospreys, including two in the past six weeks and a total of four since 2017.” The decision to ground the aircraft “follows two accidents that killed nine Marines earlier this year involving the Marine Corps’ MV-22B version of the aircraft.”
Full Story (The Hill)

France Retires Mirage 2000C

Aviation Week reports that the French Air Force “has retired the Dassault Mirage 2000C from operational service, leaving just three variants of the delta-winged fighter in French service.” The Mirage 2000C was formally retired at the end of June but will make a final appearance at this year’s Bastille Day flyby celebration.
Full Story (Aviation Week)

USN Tests SMAMD System on MQ-8C

Seapower Magazine reported that the US Navy recently had a successful demonstration of an MQ-8C Fire Scout UAS carrying the “Single-system Multi-mission Airborne Mine Detection (SMAMD) System.” The tests included “drifting, tethered and moored mines throughout beach zone to deep waters,” both night and day, in various water depths, and during various weather conditions. The SMAMD System, developed by BAE Systems for the Office of Naval Research, can perform detections in a single pass, with “low false alarm rate,” and sends “real-time detection sent via data link” which enables rapid response.
Full Story (Seapower Magazine)

Navy Orders “Safety Pause” for Aircraft Following String of Crashes

The Washington Post reports the US Naval Air Forces “has ordered a one-day ‘safety pause’ for its aircraft after a string of crashes in California this month led to the deaths of a Navy pilot and five Marines.” The pause, which will take effect Monday, will “affect all Navy aviation units that are not deployed, the Naval Air Forces said Saturday in a news release.” The release said, “As a result of recent crashes involving U.S. Navy and Marine Corps aircraft, Commander, Naval Air Forces has directed all non-deployed Navy aviation units to conduct a safety pause on June 13 in order to review risk-management practices and conduct training on threat and error-management processes.”
Full Story (Washington Post)

USAF’s Sixth Generation Fighter Officially Enters Development

Defense News reports that Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said during an event at the Heritage Foundation that the service’s “secretive and highly classified Next Generation Air Dominance fighter program has started its crucial engineering and manufacturing development phase.” Kendall said that the service “began early experimental prototyping on NGAD in 2015, when he was the Pentagon’s top acquisition official. This was essentially an X-plane program, he said, designed to reduce risk and develop key technologies needed for the production program.” Kendall said that the technology has continued to progress and the “NGAD effort is now envisioned as a ‘family of systems’ incorporating several elements, including a handful of autonomous drone aircraft accompanying the manned aircraft in formation.” Kendall said, “The clock really didn’t start in 2015; it’s starting roughly now. … We think we’ll have capability by the end of the decade.”
Full Story (Defense News)

B-21 to Make First Flight in 2023

Air Force Times reports that the first flight of the B-21 Raider stealth bomber is expected to take place in 2023. The public unveiling of the bomber is expected later in 2022. The first B-21 “finished its first in a series of ground tests at Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale, California, earlier this month.”
More Info (Air Force Times)

Northrop Grumman-Built Fire Scout Deployed Aboard USS Jackson

ExecutiveGov reports that the US Navy “has deployed a Northrop Grumman-built Fire Scout autonomous helicopter aboard an Independence-class littoral combat ship to support maritime intelligence, reconnaissance, surveillance and targeting missions in the Indo-Pacific area.” The MQ-8C Fire Scout “on USS Jackson marks the unmanned aircraft system’s first operational deployment to the region.”
Full Story (ExecutiveGov)