After several months of training for their nuclear mission, B-52H crews from Minot AFB, N.D., recently practiced the bomber’s conventional strike role by dropping live cluster bombs during a night training sortie over the Nevada Test and Training Range. “There is no better way to demonstrate your proficiency and build confidence in your capabilities than to go out and drop live weapons on the range,” said Lt. Col. Brandon Parker, 23rd Bomb Squadron commander, in a Feb. 14 release. The 23rd BS crew dropped both unguided CBU-87B combined effects munitions and the GPS-guided CBU-103 wind corrected munitions dispensers during a Feb. 11 night training sortie. “The CBU-103 was a direct hit,” said Capt. Michael Devita, 23rd BS weapons and tactics flight commander. “We don’t get a lot of opportunities like this. We only get to drop about two of these munitions per year,” he added.
The Space Force is playing midwife to a new ecosystem of commercial satellite constellations providing alternatives to the service’s own Global Positioning Service from much closer to the Earth, making their signals more accurate and harder to jam.