An artist’s impression of a
US Navy CMV-22 conducting
a carrier on-board delivery
mission. Bell BoeingNAVY OSPREY IS GO
FIRST CONTRACT FOR COD CMV-
T
HE BELL BOEING Joint
Program O ce has
received a $4.19-billion
multi-year contract
that provides for the
production and delivery
of 58 new V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft. The
Osprey order includes 39 CMV-22Bsfor the US Navy carrier on-board
delivery (COD) mission, 14 MV-22Bs
for the US Marine Corps, a single
CV-22B for the US Air Force and four
MV-22Bs for Japan. The multi-year
production contract continues
Osprey production through to at
least 2024, according to Bell Boeing.facility in February. Located at Fort
Worth Alliance Airport, the ACE
will perform maintenance, repair
and overhaul work on around 80
jets operated by the company. Its
eet currently includes subsonic
L-39ZA and Hunter F58 jets
as well as supersonic K r-C
ghters that support a variety of
US and foreign military training
requirements. ATAC is one of
several contractors vying for
the USAF’s potential $7.5-billion
combat air forces contracted air
support (adversary air) program.
Draken International has also
started receiving its Mirages,
in this case former Spanish Air
Force Mirage F1Ms. The rst of 22
examples — F1M serial C.14-
— arrived at Draken’s Lakeland,
Florida, facility in July to be
readied for upgrade.ADVERSARY MIRAGES ARRIVE IN THE US
THE AIRBORNE TACTICAL
Advantage Company (ATAC)
recently took delivery of an
initial pair of Mirage F1 ghters,
which arrived at its adversary
center of excellence (ATAC-ACE)
on June 27. By mid-month 13 of
the ghters were in the new FortWorth facility. The ex-French Air
Force Mirages are the rst of 63
that were purchased from France,
along with support equipment
and 150 engines, in September- The contractor — which is
part of Textron Airborne Solutions
— announced plans for the new
RAIDER DESIGN
NEARLY FROZEN
THE USAF’S RAPID capabilities o ce
and Northrop Grumman expect
to conduct a critical design review
(CDR) for the new B-21A bomber by
the end of 2018. The CDR will freeze
the design of the new bomber and
allow construction of prototypes
to begin. The USAF plans to begin
elding the Raider around 2025 and
will acquire 100 or more B-21As at
a cost of $550 million each (in 2010
dollars). Component testing is under
way and a sub-scale model of the
bomber is undergoing wind tunnel
tests. Northrop Grumman was
awarded a cost-plus engineering
and manufacturing development
contract in respect of the B-21A
in October 2015, which has an
estimated value of a $21.4 billion.The Airborne Tactical Advantage
Company has begun reassembling
and modifying the fi rst of 63
Mirage F1s at Fort Worth Alliance
Airport in Texas. ATAC[NEWS] UNITED STATES
08 September 2018 //^ http://www.combataircraft.net
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