Initial approval is given for updated capabilities plan, allowing air force to purchase two further aircraft
The US Air Force has received an initial go-ahead to dramatically alter plans for its next-generation airborne ground surveillance fleet, adding two of the $1 billion systems to its spending plans and delaying the in-service date by three years until 2015.
The Joint Requirements Oversight Council approved an updated capabilities plan incorporating the changes last month, says Col Joseph Smyth, programme manager for the Northrop Grumman E-10A Multi-sensor Command and Control Aircraft. The new plan allows the air force to buy seven complete E-10A systems, including one for use during development and demonstration and another for training. A previous plan to buy five aircraft under a $5 billion budget proved insufficient to properly "operationalise" the replacement for the USAF's Northrop Grumman E-8 Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System fleet, says Smyth.
The updated plan still requires approval next March by the Defense Acquisition Board, which last year entertained a proposal to kill the programme. Instead, the E-10A was rescoped to focus on core missions of detecting incoming cruise missiles and tracking moving ground targets.
The USAF was forced to reshuffle some requirements for the back-end battlefield management command and control (BMC2), awarded to Northrop Grumman last September. As a result, the first E-10A will be introduced without the ability to fuse multiple streams of intelligence into a single picture, control unmanned air vehicles or run automated systems to identify moving targets and make recommendations to change USAF air tasking orders.
The air force also is moving forward on several changes to the Boeing 767-400ER design. Placing a 3.7 x 20.8m (12.1 x 68.2ft) "canoe" below the forward fuselage for the gimbaled radar antenna will require adding ventral fins to the aft section, Smyth told the Defense News ISR Integration 2004 conference in Arlington, Virginia on 15 November. Support structures are also being added for the cabin floor and to support the Northrop Grumman/Raytheon Multi-Platform Radar Technology Insertion Programme sensor.
The first E-10A testbed is to be delivered to Northrop Grumman's modification centre at Lake Charles, Louisiana in December 2006. The aircraft will be equipped with General Electric CF6-80C2B8F engines and a 1MW auxiliary power unit provided by a Honeywell T55 engine core mounted in its aft cargo compartment.
STEPHEN TRIMBLE / WASHINGTON DC
Source: Flight International
