combat aircraft

ALSO

THIS

MONTH...

F-15X breaks cover

Boeing ofers USAF a new Eagle.

See US News

Singaporean Chinooks move

Training transfers to Australia.

See World News

The first upgraded
Tu-22M3M
is rolled out
at Kazan.
United Aircraft
Corporation

NEW RADAR FOR MARINE HORNETS
THE US MARINE Corps plans to
equip a portion of its Hornet leet
with a new active electronically
scanned array (AESA) radar and both
Raytheon and Northrop Grumman
have now conducted it checks of
their respective systems on F/A-18s.
Raytheon conducted a trial itting of
its AN/APG-79(V)4 radar during June.
The system was designed speciically
for the Hornet several years ago in
anticipation of this requirement.
Raytheon had previously conducted

a it check of the AN/APG-79(VX) on a

Hornet in 2010.

Northrop Grumman also conducted

a similar itting of its AN/APG-

Scalable Agile Beam Radar (SABR)

on a Marine Corps Hornet at MCAS

Miramar, California, in early August.

The SABR system has already been

selected by the US Air Force to

replace the existing radar on 72 Air

National Guard F-16Cs assigned to

homeland defense, and engineering

eforts are under way.

The Marine Corps hopes to replace

the Raytheon AN/APG-73 radar on

88 Hornets assigned to seven ighter

attack squadrons between 2020 and

2022. The efort was irst revealed
      with the service’s 2018 aviation
      plan and is part of an efort to keep
      the ighters relevant until they are
      replaced by F-35B/Cs. The Hornet
      leet is expected to be retired around


2023. The service released a request
      for information for the APG-
      replacement in March.

The Northrop Grumman SABR is fit-checked

at Miramar in August. USMC

AIR FORCE ONE

REPLACEMENT

CONTRACT

FORMALIZED

THE AIR FORCE Life Cycle

Management Center has awarded

a contract modiication to Boeing

that authorizes it to move forward

with detailed design, modiication,

test, certiication and delivery

of two 747-8 presidential airlift

aircraft under the designation

VC-24B by 2024. The ixed-

price contract is valued at $3.

billion. Boeing will carry out the

modiication work at its San

Antonio, Texas facility and deliver

the aircraft by December 2024.

In related news, President Trump

has said that the new Air Force One

will dispense with the traditional

blue, light blue and white color

scheme carried by the aircraft

since the early 1960s. It will instead

have a more patriotic scheme that

features the red, white and blue

colors of the American lag.

HEADLINES [NEWS]

http://www.combataircraft.net // October 2018 07