The United States Air Force has finally selected a manufacturer for its next stealth bomber, the consortium of Lockheed Martin and Boeing were locked in a Battle with Northrop Grumman for the lucrative contract and it has now been confirmed that the country’s next stealth bomber will be built by Northrop Grumman. It’s going to be an expensive one, costing about $564 million apiece.
As you can imagine not a lot of details are being made public at this point in time, for obvious reasons, though it was revealed in the press conference that the bomber that Northrop Grumman is building happens to be a complete package concept which includes engines and sub-systems. Details about the engine used and manufacturer won’t be revealed.
2025 is when the new bomber might get its Initial Operational Capability, a designation for the aircraft has not yet been decided, or revealed to the public. It’s believed that the aircraft will cost $564 million per unit.
It was explained in the press conference that the USAF made two separate cost analysis for the decision which came within two percent of each other, ultimately the contract was awarded to Northrop Grumman.
This isn’t the first time that Northrop and the USAF are working together, the company has built, maintained and upgraded the B-2 Spirit for more than two decades and it recently built the X-47B flying-wing naval unmanned combat aircraft demonstrators which have proven to be quite successful.
Filed in . Read more about Usaf. Source: foxtrotalpha.jalopnik