The Air Force has awarded Northrop Grumman a $60 million contract to begin production of the next five RQ-4B Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicles. Northrop officials say the company expects to begin production of hardware late this year and assembly next year. The new RQ-4B is designed to carry 3,000 pounds of payload—a 50 percent increase over the RQ-4A model—to deliver and increase the amount and type of information available to warfighters.
After years of experiments and tests, senior Air Force leaders say they're on the verge of using C-17s and other cargo aircraft to launch cruise missiles via airdrop, touting the development as a way to bolster the combat fleet and a major shift in the service’s mindset.