Aircraft spots: UAE C-17 spotted in Amarillo picking up two AH-1Z viper helicopters

Super rare visit in Amarillo from a United Arab Emirates C-17 as they flew in to pickup two 2 AH-1Z Vipers for Bahrain. Needless to say I was there to document it.

Funny thing, millions of dollars of aviation hardware on the ramp and what it finally comes down to loading it - is old fashioned human muscle pushing it like my old Buick that wouldn't start.

Bahrain is to receive its AH-1Z attack helicopters under an FMS deal that was first approved in April 2018 and signed in February 2019. The helicopters are being built under the US military’s Lot 16 production run, with deliveries to Bahrain now expected to commence later this year.

As noted by the US Defense Security and Cooperation Agency (DSCA) when the procurement was first approved, in addition to the 12 AH-1Z helicopters, Bahrain is to also acquire Lockheed Martin AGM-114 Hellfire air-to-surface missiles and BAE Systems Advance Precision Kill Weapon System (APKWS) II guided rockets, as well as Thales’ TopOwl helmet-mounted display system.

The total value of the deal, including spares, support, and ancillary equipment, was estimated by the DSCA to be USD911.4 million.

Video by Steve Douglass 

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Northrop Grumman concept showcases hypothetical supersonic Air Force One

FARNBOROUGH, England – July 19, 2022 – A new supersonic aircraft tailored to provide quick-reaction capabilities to the U.S. military and allies will be offered through a collaborative agreement between Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) and Boom Supersonic.

The agreement to together propose special mission variants of Boom’s Overture supersonic aircraft was finalized at the Farnborough International Air Show.

PHOTO BY GUY NORRIS AVWEEK 

“Pairing Northrop Grumman’s airborne defense systems integration expertise with Boom’s advanced Overture supersonic aircraft demonstrates the power of collaborations like this for the benefit of our customers,” said Tom Jones, president, Northrop Grumman Aeronautics Systems. “Together we can ensure our military customers have variants of Overture for missions where advanced system capabilities and speed are critical.”

Designed to carry up to 80 passengers at twice the speed of today’s airliners, a special mission variant of Overture has the potential to support government and military missions that require rapid response.

Fitted with specialized capabilities, the aircraft could be used to deliver medical supplies, provide for emergency medical evacuation or surveil vast areas faster than conventional aircraft. The special mission Overture variant could also be used to coordinate other aircraft and ground assets in a variety of scenarios.

NORTHROP GRUMMAN/BOOM SUPERSONIC 

“Time is a strategic advantage in high-consequence scenarios, from military operations to disaster response,” said Blake Scholl, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Boom Supersonic. “This collaboration between Boom and Northrop Grumman unlocks Overture’s unmatched high-speed mission capability for the United States and its allies.”

Designed and built in the United States, the first Overture aircraft will be in production for commercial use in 2024, start flight tests in 2026 and begin carrying passengers in 2029.

About Northrop Grumman

KENDALL: USAF'S NGAD CONTRACTOR SELECTION IS DRAWING NEAR

LONDON:

The Air Force has yet to pick a winner among the companies still vying to build the service’s sixth generation jet, but a final down-select is “not all that far away,” the service’s top leader told Breaking Defense this weekend. While Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall declined to say when the service will choose a manufacturer for the fighter jet that will be the cornerstone of the Next Generation Air Dominance family of systems, he offered a small clue about the trajectory of the highly-classified program. “It’s not imminent but it’s not all that far away,” Kendall said in an exclusive interview at the Royal International Air Tattoo. “There’s a little hint I’ll drop for you.” The Air Force has confirmed three elements of the NGAD program so far: a manned, sixth-generation fighter, the AIM-260 Joint Advanced Tactical Missile currently under development, and a suite of drones — what Kendall calls “collaborative combat aircraft” — that will augment the manned fighter in battle.

In June, Kendall announced that the NGAD fighter had progressed to the engineering, manufacturing and development stage, prompting speculation about whether the Air Force had chosen a prime contractor for the program. However, later that month Kendall said there was still ongoing competition for NGAD, raising further questions about the status of the program.

Although Kendall declined to answer most of Breaking Defense’s questions about NGAD, he stated that the program will not have a single prime in the “systems integrator” that oversees the makeup of the family of systems, and that the Air Force has separate acquisition efforts for each of the elements.

“The overarching integrator will probably be the government, with probably some industry help,” he said. “The NGAD platform itself will have a traditional prime [contractor].”

The Air Force has been unwilling to discuss which aerospace companies are involved in NGAD. Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman could potentially manufacture the sixth-gen fighter, but it is unclear whether all three are currently still participating in the ongoing competition.

At least one full-scale NGAD fighter demonstrator made its inaugural flight in 2020. Air Force officials have declined to give further details about the maker of the aircraft or its capabilities, although they have made clear that digital engineering has been a critical technology that has allowed the service to develop it much more quickly than onlookers had expected.

“What we did was an experimental prototype,” Kendall said in June. “We basically had an X-plane program which was designed to reduce the risk of some of the key technologies that we would need for a production program.”

Kendall has said the Air Force plans to field NGAD “by the end of the decade.” How many the service will ultimately buy is still yet to be disclosed.

Artist illustration of what looks like an unmanned version of the B-21 posted by General Atomics,

 What looks like a unmanned version of the B-21 raider popped up online posted by General Atomics. 

The illustration accompanies an article titled "How AI And Supervised Autonomy Will Change Combat."

LINK

A recent Freedom of Information Act request revealed the B-21 Raider could be operated in a manned or unmanned configuration.


To date, the Air Force has confirmed that the B-21 will be manned — that is, it will carry aircrew — when it enters service around 2025 and that it will be
nuclear-certified about two years later. 

The service has also said no nuclear missions will take place without crew aboard. However, the service has not given a definitive answer on when the aircraft is expected to feature an uninhabited capability. It is reportedly “not a short-term priority” for the Air Force, and thus unlikely to be incorporated into early production models.

The B-21 Raider is currently under construction at the company’s Air Force Plant 42 facility in Palmdale, Calif., and look set to make its first flight in December 2021, after which it will enter flight test at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif.

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New Bell Invictus photos leak online

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Bell’s 360 Invictus advanced helicopter is now 90 percent complete and has had its new open tail rotor system attached at the company’s facility in Amarillo, Texas. Originally designed with a canted, ducted tail rotor, Invictus’ entire tail boom structure was reconfigured to simplify the design and speed building Bell’s pitch for the U.S. Army’s Future Attack Recon Aircraft.

New photos of the Invictus (sans engine) began showing up on Twitter and other social media platforms, most likely taken outside the Bell Amarillo Assembly plant.

"One of the things we looked at is as we were doing a competitive prototype, and at the same time are iterating on a weapon system of what the [engineering and manufacturing development] aircraft is going to be — the increment one aircraft — and the way we’re organized is to maintain the connective tissue between those two so that we can keep them as close as possible in terms of what we’re doing on the CP and what the weapon system will be,” Flail recently told reporters on a media trip to Texas." 

As per U.S. Army speed requirements, the tandem-cockpit, single-main-rotor Bell 360 Invictus is designed to fly at least 180 knots. The aircraft’s main rotor system is based on Bell’s 525 Relentless helicopter — which has flown at speeds beyond 200 knots in test flights — but will be scaled to fit the Invictus. While the Bell 525 has five rotor blades, the 360 Invictus will have four.

Bell is competing against Sikorsky and its Raider X helicopter in the FARA contest. The Raider X is a compound-coaxial helicopter with counter-spinning main rotors and a pusher propeller.