The Air Force has agreed to give NASA a third Global Hawk air vehicle for the civil agency’s high-altitude environmental science research efforts, Ed Walby, Northrop Grumman’s director of business development for high-altitude, long-endurance systems, said Thursday at AFA’s Air Warfare Symposium in Orlando. Northrop builds the Global Hawk. Like the first two Global Hawks supplied to NASA, the third aircraft is from among USAF’s tranche of prototype air vehicles built during the Global Hawk advanced concept technology demonstration, said Walby. NASA’s third aircraft will be ACTD #7, the final prototype aircraft manufactured; it resembles most closely the Global Hawk production model, he said. Already NASA has ACTD #1 and ACTD #6. NASA rolled out the first of its two converted Global Hawks last month. Walby offered no timeline on the transfer.
Since President Donald Trump first unveiled his “Golden Dome” missile defense initiative in late January, much of the focus for it has been focused on space—how the Pentagon may deploy dozens, if not hundreds, of sensors and interceptors into orbit to protect the continental U.S. from missile barrages. But the Air…