Boeing announced Monday that its industry team developing a small diameter bomb II offering for the Air Force concluded a 42-month risk-reduction phase on Sept. 29. This phase concluded with a flight test of its SDB II design that, dropped from an F-15E at Eglin AFB, Fla., successfully tracked a moving target, as planned, and then struck a separate stationary target and detonated, as intended, Boeing spokesman Tim Deaton told the Daily Report Monday. “Bottom line, our weapon system has proven itself, and when this capability is available to the warfighter it will help transform the battlefield,” said Debra Rub, vice president of Boeing’s weapons programs. Boeing’s team, which, includes Lockheed Martin, is competing against Raytheon for the rights to supply the Air Force with the bomb, which is meant to attack moving surface targets. The Air Force aims to pick the winner around March 2010.
The Air Force’s Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile is behind schedule and may significantly overrun its expected cost, which could partially explain why the service is reviving the hypersonic AGM-183 Air-Launched Rapid-Response Weapon.