New images of the secretive B-21 bomber undergoing engine runs and taxi tests outside Northrop Grumman’s facilities in Palmdale, Calif., show vertical features that have industry experts scratching their heads regarding some prominent elements.
While the Air Force eagerly awaits the first flight of the B-21, there aren’t enough Raiders behind that first aircraft in the pipeline to do everything the nation needs the bomber fleet to do, a top analyst said Sept. 13 at AFA’s Air, Space & ...
The Air Force has picked aerospace startup JetZero to build a prototype Blended-Wing Body (BWB) aircraft for testing and demonstrating new technologies, the service announced Aug. 16. Initial flight testing is expected to be completed in 2027.
Three B-2 bombers have deployed to Keflavik, Iceland, where they will operate and participate in exercises with other USAF aircraft and air forces of allied and partner countries, the service announced. The deployment is the second of the B-2 to Iceland but the first since ...
Northrop Grumman and the Air Force successfully demonstrated a new mission update system for the B-2 bomber in a two-day event at Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo., last month. The system receives new mission parameters and feeds them directly into the B-2’s computers without the ...
In another step toward first flight, the initial B-21 Raider has had its first “power-on” test, Northrop Grumman CEO Kathy Warden announced. The company still expects first flight—and a contract for low-rate initial production—by the end of 2023, she said in the company's second quarter ...
The B-2 is back in the air. Air Force Global Strike Command shared a video of the B-2 Spirit taking off and landing from Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo., on May 22—the stealth bomber’s first flight in months after a safety pause.
The B-2 Spirit is returning to the skies, Air Force officials told Air & Space Forces Magazine. The first aircraft is projected to take off May 22 after a break in flying operations due to a safety pause. The return to flight was recently approved ...
Air Force leaders in charge of the nation's B-2 Spirit stealth bomber fleet say they have been working behind the scenes to keep the aircraft ready—even as a “safety pause” on flying approaches six months in length. A quarter-century after its introduction, the B-2 program ...
It’s come a few decades later than perhaps it should have, but the U.S. is on the precipice of sweeping and much-needed modernization for its nuclear arsenal, the Air Force's top boss for strategic forces said May 4. The Pentagon is projecting an investment of ...
If Congress agrees with the Air Force’s request to retire 32 Block 20 F-22s as part of its fiscal 2024 budget, the aircraft be used as trainers a while longer, then stored for an undetermined period at the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base’s Aerospace Maintenance and ...
The future U.S. bomber force could provide a way for the Pentagon to simultaneously deter conflict with peer adversaries in two geographically disparate theaters, said Mark Gunzinger, the director of future concepts and capability assessments at AFA's Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, during a March ...