Northrop Grumman said Nov. 18 it has successfully conducted a demonstration flight, as scheduled, of its new Scalable Agile Beam Radar sensor, which the company is developing at its own expense for the current F-16 fleet, and officials say it’s adaptable to other platforms. Northrop expects to fly SABR on an F-16 in 2009. • The Northrop Grumman-led team, that includes Raytheon and Alliant Techsystems, fired the first-stage rocket motor for the Missile Defense Agency’s Kinetic Energy Interceptor, in the fourth of five planned static fire tests that left officials “very confident” the first stage will “perform as designed” in the actual flight test in 2009, said Anthony Spehar, Northrop’s KEI program manager; his counterpart at Raytheon, Chuck Ross, said using a “test-like-you-fly methodology” is keeping the program “on track.” • A group called Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility has filed a lawsuit against officials at Tyndall AFB, Fla., charging they have let environmental violations slide and asking for a copy of an Air Force Office of Special Investigation report, according to a Nov. 20 report by WMBB News.
Anduril and General Atomics will develop their Collaborative Combat Aircraft for the Air Force, beating out Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman, the service announced on April 24. But any of the non-selected companies can compete to actually manufacture the eventual design, the Air Force said.