The Air Force recently awarded Northrop Grumman a contract valued at more than $71 million to complete the delivery of the RQ-4 Global Hawk remotely piloted aircraft and sensors procured in the airplane’s 10th production lot, announced the company on Tuesday. Those deliveries are scheduled for completion by the end of 2014, according to the company’s April 9 release. George Guerra, Northrop Grumman’s Global Hawk vice president, said this contract award will cover the “engineering support for the production and final acceptance testing of the Lot 10 aircraft and sensors.” During Lot 10, the company will supply two Block 30 air vehicles fitted with an electro-optical/infrared camera suite and electronic eavesdropping sensors; two Block 40 aircraft carrying the Multi-Platform Radar Technology Insertion Program sensor; and three electronic eavesdropping sensor packages for retrofit on Global Hawks purchased in previous production lots, states the release. The Air Force had proposed divesting its fleet of Global Hawk Block 30 airplanes in Fiscal 2013, but Congress mandated that the service operate this Global Hawk variant through 2014. (See also Implementation Plan Details Force Structure Changes.)
An Air Force F-16 pilot designed a collapsible ladder that weighs just six pounds and folds into the unused cockpit map case.