Unofficial Aviation Buff Thread

AD1184

Celestial
Take a load of this, Lockheed Martin just filed a patent for a fusion reactor small enough to fit inside F-16 jet fighter, meaning, future fighter jets will be able to fly for days not for hours:


View: https://youtu.be/-Vdag-7McJQ


I bet if it can fit into F-16 it can fit into an UFO as well.

This is a fantasy patent. There are no viable fusion power reactor designs, let alone ones that could be brought aloft by an aircraft. Experimental reactors have actually been growing in size over the decades, and not reducing in size, as researchers attempt to produce a reaction that is able to sustain itself indefinitely and give more useable energy than it consumes in operation.
 

Dejan Corovic

As above, so bellow
This is a fantasy patent. There are no viable fusion power reactor designs, let alone ones that could be brought aloft by an aircraft. Experimental reactors have actually been growing in size over the decades, and not reducing in size, as researchers attempt to produce a reaction that is able to sustain itself indefinitely and give more useable energy than it consumes in operation.

Yeah, you might be right.

But Lockheed had been working on something like that for years. I read a little bit about it. There is a competing team that raised $5.0M, so maybe Lockheed asserted its IP rights just in case something comes out of it.

Apparently its a circular standing wave in plasma that is stable lot longer then in ordinary tokamaks.
 

AD1184

Celestial
Yeah, you might be right.

But Lockheed had been working on something like that for years. I read a little bit about it. There is a competing team that raised $5.0M, so maybe Lockheed asserted its IP rights just in case something comes out of it.

Apparently its a circular standing wave in plasma that is stable lot longer then in ordinary tokamaks.
The term of a patent is limited, typically to a period of twenty years or less. Given that the technology is not commerically viable in the present, even with an optimistic development period, there is not much time in which they will be able to enforce the exclusivity of a patent.

I just checked and this one expires in 2037, which is only fifteen years away:

1667333010212.png

The application was made back in 2014, and patent granted in 2018.


In 2022, there are still no operational fusion power reactors.

If the problem of fusion power were as simple as creating a standing wave in the plasma, then everyone would be doing it. My own speculation is that the first fusion power reactors will be housed in complexes as big as typical fission reactor power plants.
 

pigfarmer

tall, thin, irritable
I've seen two SR71s.

One is on the flight deck of USS Intrepid on the west side of Manhattan. On that one you can actually go up on a ladder and peer into the cockpit. Smells like slide rules in there. One-room schoolhouse old school analog. But they removed a number of systems and ( if I recall correctly ) the articulated cones at the very tip of those engine intakes that had a lot to do with it's amazing speed. Stuff's still classified as far as I know. That specimen is a bit rough honestly.

The other is pointing at you like a rifle barrel when you walk into the Udvar-Hazy National Air & Space Museum. If you ever get a chance to go you can skip the National Mall and go straight to this place. Absolutely breathtaking. That one has a big velvet rope around it and you can't get too close but it's in perfect condition.

Odd little note. We went there some time ago, don't think it had been open that long. The Space Shuttle at Udvar-Hazy at the time was Enterprise. Fast forward a few years and when I go to Intrepid with my nephew there's Enterprise again. Like it followed me, or maybe that's the only one I will be permitted to see. They put Discovery in Udvar-Hazy as it went on real missions where Enterprise was a a glide test rig.

Either way, they're both cool as hell to see. Big. You really have to recalibrate your bigness-o-mometer. Same for Udvar-Hazy.
 

Dejan Corovic

As above, so bellow
I've seen SR-71 here in UK. I was in the aviation museum in Duxford. Hands down, it would win every airplane beauty pageant :)

I've seen F-15, as well, but a bit from a far. Very lanky airplane. I can't figure how they managed to store all that fuel in a such slim fuselage.
 

pigfarmer

tall, thin, irritable
I was going to put this in a different thread but this seems more to be an aviation geekout

U-2 Spy Planes Snooped On Chinese Surveillance Balloon

U-2 Spy Planes Snooped On Chinese Surveillance Balloon

U-2 Dragon Ladies had the ability to actually fly above the balloon and gather multiple types of intelligence about it from its perch.
BYJOSEPH TREVITHICK, TYLER ROGOWAY|PUBLISHED FEB 6, 2023 3:12 PM
THE WAR ZONE
U-2 Spy Planes Snooped On Chinese Surveillance Balloon

U.S. Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Robert M. Trujillo / Tyler Schlitt Photography / LiveStormChasers.com
SHARE
JOSEPH TREVITHICKView Joseph Trevithick's Articles
FranticGoat
TYLER ROGOWAYView Tyler Rogoway's Articles
Aviation_Intel
The U.S. Air Force's U-2S Dragon Lady spy planes were among the assets tapped to monitor and collect intelligence on a Chinese government surveillance balloon during its recent trip across parts of the continental United States and Canada. An F-22 Raptor stealth fighter finally shot down the balloon with an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile off the coast of South Carolina on Saturday, and efforts are now underway to recover the wreckage from the Atlantic Ocean. Readers of The War Zone can first get up to speed on what we already know about this incident, and its conclusion, in our past reporting here.
A U.S. defense official confirmed the use of the U-2S as part of the broader response to the Chinese spy balloon to The War Zone today. It's not immediately clear all the points along the balloon's voyage that U-2s were present.

A U-2S Dragon Lady. USAF

The Pentagon said over the weekend that the balloon had first entered U.S. national airspace over the Aleutian Islands on January 28. It then passed into Canadian airspace two days later and returned to U.S. airspace, over northern Idaho, on January 31. The balloon then followed a broadly southeasterly track across the contiguous United States before moving out over the Atlantic off South Carolina, where it was ultimately shot down.

The War Zone has separately learned that at least two U-2Ss helped monitor the balloon while it was over the Midwest, using the callsigns Dragon 01 and Dragon 99. At least one Dragon Lady was also in contact at times with the Air Force's Eastern Air Defense Sector (EADS), also referred to by the callsign Huntress. EADS is part of the U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and is responsible for safeguarding the airspace over roughly the eastern half of the contiguous United States.

While we can't say with certainty exactly what the roles of the U-2Ss in monitoring the balloon were, their employment makes good sense. The Dragon Lady is the only aircraft in U.S. military inventory, at least that we know, that can fly persistently at altitudes even higher than where the balloon was soaring, which was between roughly 60,000 and 70,000 feet throughout its trip across the United States and Canada.

A view from the cockpit of a U-2 flying at 71,000 feet. Note the pilot's flight suit is more akin to a space suit due to the altitudes at which the Dragon Lady typically flies. USAF
On top of that, each U-2S can be configured to collect multiple types of intelligence simultaneously, as you can read more about here. One common sensor loadout for the Dragon Lady consists of the Senior Glass signals intelligence suite, components of which are spread between bays in the fuselage and two underwing 'Super Pods' when it is installed, together with either the Senior Year Electro Optical Reconnaissance System-2 (SYERS-2) or Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar System-2 (ASARS-2) in the nose. SYERS-2 is a multi-spectral camera system that can produce high-resolution imagery of a target, even at night. ASARS-2 also produces images, but by using a radar operating in a synthetic aperture mode, giving it an all-weather capability.

A graphic showing various sensor and other payload options for the U-2-series. USAF

An example of imagery taken using the SYERS-2. UTAS (Now Collins Aerospace)
With any array of sensors like this, a U-2S could gather high-quality visuals of the balloon, as well as soak up any electronic emissions that it might have been pumping out. The Dragon Lady can further carry robust data links that allow for sharing the information it gathers with personnel on the ground in near-real-time.
The ability of the U-2 to get above the balloon is critical for a number of reasons. Just surveilling it from a top-down perspective using various sensors could provide additional intelligence as to its design and capabilities. Even what could have been hidden within its envelope would have been important to find out. But most importantly, it would provide a way to intercept directional satellite communications from the balloon with greater reliability. This is a critical form of intelligence collection on such a long-range and sensor-laden device like this.
Finally, the U-2 possesses a highly capable electronic warfare suite. Flying in relatively close proximity to the balloon, and especially above it, it's possible it may have been able to jam any communications being sent to satellites above.
Once again, no aircraft disclosed in the Air Force's inventory is capable of these high-flying, long-loitering operations.

U-2 Dragon Lady has been an indispensable national asset for over six decades. USAF
What electronic emissions they might have been able to collect from the balloons remains unclear, as does what intelligence-gathering capabilities it might have had. It would not be hard for such a lighter-than-air platform to carry its own cameras, radars, and especially signals intelligence payloads.
Yesterday, Politico reported that the U.S. Intelligence Community had previously assessed that smaller balloons detected off the coast of Virginia in 2020 were carrying some kind of radar-jamming payload.
In 2019, The War Zone laid out a detailed case for how previous reports of sightings of cubes with spheres inside off the eastern coast of the United States could have been balloons with radar reflectors and electronic surveillance payloads that could be used to gather critical intelligence about U.S. military capabilities. There is a historical precedent for this, as you can read more about here.
At that time, the 'cube-in-sphere' sightings had been labeled as unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), more colloquially known as unidentified flying objects (UFO). The Chinese surveillance balloon flying over the United States and the disclosure that multiple incidents have happened previously over U.S. territory, including over the continental United States, has prompted renewed questions about whether other sightings of balloon-like objects may have been foreign intelligence assets, too. The War Zone has presented an in-depth analysis in the past of how some UAP sightings of various kinds are likely instances where people have spotted intelligence-gathering platforms belonging to foreign adversaries, usually operating in highly sensitive test and training areas.

A view of the Chinese surveillance balloon and the solar-powered payload handing beneath it. Tyler Schlitt Photography / LiveStormChasers.com
In January, the Pentagon’s newly formed All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence's (ODNI) National Intelligence Manager for Aviation (NIM-A) jointly published an unclassified annual report on UAP-related activity in 2022. This included mention of 366 newly cataloged UAP incidents, including older ones that were not previously known to AARO or NIM-A. Of those 'new' incidents, 163 were assessed to be "balloon or balloon-like entities."
In addition, while the Pentagon says that prior Chinese balloon incidents stretch back to President Donald Trump's time in office, U.S. officials only determined within the last two years or so that they were linked to the Chinese government. Details about how these assessments were made remain unclear, but this does seem to corroborate statements from various Trump administration officials that they were unaware of this during their tenure.
"I will tell you that we did not detect those threats. And that's a Domain Awareness gap that we have to figure out, but I don't want to go into further detail," Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck, the head of NORAD and U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM), told The War Zone and other outlets at a press conference earlier today. "The intel community, after the fact, I believe, as has been briefed already, assessed those threats to additional means of collection from additional means, and made us aware of those balloons that were previously approaching North America or transited North America."
President Joe Biden and his administration are being roundly criticized in many corners for the response to this balloon and why it was not shot down earlier. The Biden administration has countered by highlighting the potential risks of doing so while the balloon was overland and the ability to gather further intelligence on the balloon once risks posed by its own capabilities were mitigated. That data could be exploited to learn more about the balloon and its capabilities, as well as provide further evidence to connect it to the Chinese government.


"So there was a potential opportunity for us to collect Intel where we had gaps on prior balloons. And so I would defer to the intel community but this gave us the opportunity to assess what they were actually doing, what kind of capabilities existed on the balloon, what kind of transmission capabilities existed," Gen. VanHerck himself stressed at the press conference today. "And I think you'll see in the future that that timeframe was well worth its value to collect."
"I would point out, and I think it's important to talk about, is day-to-day we do not have the authority to collect intelligence within the United States of America," VanHerck added. "In this case, specific authorities were granted to collect intelligence against the balloon specifically and we utilized specific capabilities to do that."
Altogether, this underscores the value of using U-2Ss, among the many platforms that were likely involved in the monitoring and intelligence exploitation of the balloon as it passed over the United States.
If nothing else, with this disclosure now that U-2Ss helped in the response to the balloon's presence, it will be interesting to see what other details about the U.S. military's monitoring efforts might be released.
 
Last edited:

nivek

As Above So Below

British Military Aircraft Reports Very Close Encounter with Doughnut-Shaped UFO

Aviation authorities in England have released a report on a curious case wherein a Royal Air Force jet nearly collided with a doughnut-shaped UFO. The odd incident, which was revealed by a local media outlet this past Saturday, is said to have occurred last November over the city of Newcastle during a training exercise involving a military transport plane. As their flight was making a turn, crew members noticed what they thought was a drone flying ahead of the aircraft. However, when they passed the odd object, the personnel aboard the jet were left mystified by what they saw.

According to the UK Airprox Board, which investigates such aerial incidents, the mysterious object "passed level with the flight deck windows and a few feet outside the wing tip." This vantage point allowed the crew to get a fairly good look at the anomaly and they described it as dark, circular object measuring two to three feet in diameter with a hole in its center. Although they characterized the object as a drone in their report, the board conceded that the peculiar shape of the craft left them "unable to determine the nature of the unknown object."

The report went on to note that, while they could not identify exactly what the object was, the case was particularly troublesome as the two craft only passed within about a foot of each other. To that end, they mused that "providence had played a major part in the incident" as there was "a very high chance" that the jet would have collided with the UFO had it not been turning at the very moment that the sighting took place. Fortunately, that did not occur and, instead, the crew aboard the aircraft were simply left with a particularly strange tale from that day's flight.


.
 

pigfarmer

tall, thin, irritable
I've read that they are already testing unmanned dedicated tankers from aircraft carriers. Also that he next gen fighters and maybe that B-21 Raider will fly with a suite of AI 'appliance' type companions each having some specific function.

@Dejan Corovic you might get a kick out of this book. It's not great but is entertaining and runs along these lines
220px-Ghost_Fleet_%28novel%29.jpg
 

Dejan Corovic

As above, so bellow
I've read that they are already testing unmanned dedicated tankers from aircraft carriers. Also that he next gen fighters and maybe that B-21 Raider will fly with a suite of AI 'appliance' type companions each having some specific function.

@Dejan Corovic you might get a kick out of this book. It's not great but is entertaining and runs along these lines
220px-Ghost_Fleet_%28novel%29.jpg

I can now understand why aliens are traveling around our galaxy.

AI took over their jobs, so they were bored sitting at home.
 

Dejan Corovic

As above, so bellow
And another fitting video documentary.

I heard of WWII "Foo Fighters" in European war zone, but never heard of similar encounters over war time Japan. Here is a detailed and fully declassified account from original military documents. We are talking about whopping 300 encounters (!):


View: https://youtu.be/k2-zJazatCQ

Don't miss reading comments section, there are always gems like this one down there:

"I knew a World War II veteran. He told me to call the Foo fighters appearing like a ball of fire was not accurate. They were like nothing ever seen. They did not look anything like fire. They gave off light, was the closest to a fire he could say. He told me it as similar to electric sparks, during engagement with the enemy, the Foo fighters distanced themselves from the combat but stayed close, usually collecting in a close area and waiting. On the return after the mission was complete, the Foo fighters returned to trail, or even flank, the returning aircraft. He told me even the Japanese reported the Foo fighters. All sides believed they were secret weapons of their enemies."
 
Last edited:

Dejan Corovic

As above, so bellow
yeah, only pity is that photographer clipped the wings of the plane.

It would be much nicer photo if it included a whole wings, from one tip to another.
 

Rick Hunter

Celestial
I was going to put this in a different thread but this seems more to be an aviation geekout

U-2 Spy Planes Snooped On Chinese Surveillance Balloon

U-2 Spy Planes Snooped On Chinese Surveillance Balloon

U-2 Dragon Ladies had the ability to actually fly above the balloon and gather multiple types of intelligence about it from its perch.
BYJOSEPH TREVITHICK, TYLER ROGOWAY|PUBLISHED FEB 6, 2023 3:12 PM
THE WAR ZONE
U-2 Spy Planes Snooped On Chinese Surveillance Balloon

U.S. Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Robert M. Trujillo / Tyler Schlitt Photography / LiveStormChasers.com
SHARE
JOSEPH TREVITHICKView Joseph Trevithick's Articles
FranticGoat
TYLER ROGOWAYView Tyler Rogoway's Articles
Aviation_Intel
The U.S. Air Force's U-2S Dragon Lady spy planes were among the assets tapped to monitor and collect intelligence on a Chinese government surveillance balloon during its recent trip across parts of the continental United States and Canada. An F-22 Raptor stealth fighter finally shot down the balloon with an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile off the coast of South Carolina on Saturday, and efforts are now underway to recover the wreckage from the Atlantic Ocean. Readers of The War Zone can first get up to speed on what we already know about this incident, and its conclusion, in our past reporting here.
A U.S. defense official confirmed the use of the U-2S as part of the broader response to the Chinese spy balloon to The War Zone today. It's not immediately clear all the points along the balloon's voyage that U-2s were present.

A U-2S Dragon Lady. USAF

The Pentagon said over the weekend that the balloon had first entered U.S. national airspace over the Aleutian Islands on January 28. It then passed into Canadian airspace two days later and returned to U.S. airspace, over northern Idaho, on January 31. The balloon then followed a broadly southeasterly track across the contiguous United States before moving out over the Atlantic off South Carolina, where it was ultimately shot down.

The War Zone has separately learned that at least two U-2Ss helped monitor the balloon while it was over the Midwest, using the callsigns Dragon 01 and Dragon 99. At least one Dragon Lady was also in contact at times with the Air Force's Eastern Air Defense Sector (EADS), also referred to by the callsign Huntress. EADS is part of the U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and is responsible for safeguarding the airspace over roughly the eastern half of the contiguous United States.

While we can't say with certainty exactly what the roles of the U-2Ss in monitoring the balloon were, their employment makes good sense. The Dragon Lady is the only aircraft in U.S. military inventory, at least that we know, that can fly persistently at altitudes even higher than where the balloon was soaring, which was between roughly 60,000 and 70,000 feet throughout its trip across the United States and Canada.

A view from the cockpit of a U-2 flying at 71,000 feet. Note the pilot's flight suit is more akin to a space suit due to the altitudes at which the Dragon Lady typically flies. USAF
On top of that, each U-2S can be configured to collect multiple types of intelligence simultaneously, as you can read more about here. One common sensor loadout for the Dragon Lady consists of the Senior Glass signals intelligence suite, components of which are spread between bays in the fuselage and two underwing 'Super Pods' when it is installed, together with either the Senior Year Electro Optical Reconnaissance System-2 (SYERS-2) or Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar System-2 (ASARS-2) in the nose. SYERS-2 is a multi-spectral camera system that can produce high-resolution imagery of a target, even at night. ASARS-2 also produces images, but by using a radar operating in a synthetic aperture mode, giving it an all-weather capability.

A graphic showing various sensor and other payload options for the U-2-series. USAF

An example of imagery taken using the SYERS-2. UTAS (Now Collins Aerospace)
With any array of sensors like this, a U-2S could gather high-quality visuals of the balloon, as well as soak up any electronic emissions that it might have been pumping out. The Dragon Lady can further carry robust data links that allow for sharing the information it gathers with personnel on the ground in near-real-time.
The ability of the U-2 to get above the balloon is critical for a number of reasons. Just surveilling it from a top-down perspective using various sensors could provide additional intelligence as to its design and capabilities. Even what could have been hidden within its envelope would have been important to find out. But most importantly, it would provide a way to intercept directional satellite communications from the balloon with greater reliability. This is a critical form of intelligence collection on such a long-range and sensor-laden device like this.
Finally, the U-2 possesses a highly capable electronic warfare suite. Flying in relatively close proximity to the balloon, and especially above it, it's possible it may have been able to jam any communications being sent to satellites above.
Once again, no aircraft disclosed in the Air Force's inventory is capable of these high-flying, long-loitering operations.

U-2 Dragon Lady has been an indispensable national asset for over six decades. USAF
What electronic emissions they might have been able to collect from the balloons remains unclear, as does what intelligence-gathering capabilities it might have had. It would not be hard for such a lighter-than-air platform to carry its own cameras, radars, and especially signals intelligence payloads.
Yesterday, Politico reported that the U.S. Intelligence Community had previously assessed that smaller balloons detected off the coast of Virginia in 2020 were carrying some kind of radar-jamming payload.
In 2019, The War Zone laid out a detailed case for how previous reports of sightings of cubes with spheres inside off the eastern coast of the United States could have been balloons with radar reflectors and electronic surveillance payloads that could be used to gather critical intelligence about U.S. military capabilities. There is a historical precedent for this, as you can read more about here.
At that time, the 'cube-in-sphere' sightings had been labeled as unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), more colloquially known as unidentified flying objects (UFO). The Chinese surveillance balloon flying over the United States and the disclosure that multiple incidents have happened previously over U.S. territory, including over the continental United States, has prompted renewed questions about whether other sightings of balloon-like objects may have been foreign intelligence assets, too. The War Zone has presented an in-depth analysis in the past of how some UAP sightings of various kinds are likely instances where people have spotted intelligence-gathering platforms belonging to foreign adversaries, usually operating in highly sensitive test and training areas.

A view of the Chinese surveillance balloon and the solar-powered payload handing beneath it. Tyler Schlitt Photography / LiveStormChasers.com
In January, the Pentagon’s newly formed All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence's (ODNI) National Intelligence Manager for Aviation (NIM-A) jointly published an unclassified annual report on UAP-related activity in 2022. This included mention of 366 newly cataloged UAP incidents, including older ones that were not previously known to AARO or NIM-A. Of those 'new' incidents, 163 were assessed to be "balloon or balloon-like entities."
In addition, while the Pentagon says that prior Chinese balloon incidents stretch back to President Donald Trump's time in office, U.S. officials only determined within the last two years or so that they were linked to the Chinese government. Details about how these assessments were made remain unclear, but this does seem to corroborate statements from various Trump administration officials that they were unaware of this during their tenure.
"I will tell you that we did not detect those threats. And that's a Domain Awareness gap that we have to figure out, but I don't want to go into further detail," Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck, the head of NORAD and U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM), told The War Zone and other outlets at a press conference earlier today. "The intel community, after the fact, I believe, as has been briefed already, assessed those threats to additional means of collection from additional means, and made us aware of those balloons that were previously approaching North America or transited North America."
President Joe Biden and his administration are being roundly criticized in many corners for the response to this balloon and why it was not shot down earlier. The Biden administration has countered by highlighting the potential risks of doing so while the balloon was overland and the ability to gather further intelligence on the balloon once risks posed by its own capabilities were mitigated. That data could be exploited to learn more about the balloon and its capabilities, as well as provide further evidence to connect it to the Chinese government.


"So there was a potential opportunity for us to collect Intel where we had gaps on prior balloons. And so I would defer to the intel community but this gave us the opportunity to assess what they were actually doing, what kind of capabilities existed on the balloon, what kind of transmission capabilities existed," Gen. VanHerck himself stressed at the press conference today. "And I think you'll see in the future that that timeframe was well worth its value to collect."
"I would point out, and I think it's important to talk about, is day-to-day we do not have the authority to collect intelligence within the United States of America," VanHerck added. "In this case, specific authorities were granted to collect intelligence against the balloon specifically and we utilized specific capabilities to do that."
Altogether, this underscores the value of using U-2Ss, among the many platforms that were likely involved in the monitoring and intelligence exploitation of the balloon as it passed over the United States.
If nothing else, with this disclosure now that U-2Ss helped in the response to the balloon's presence, it will be interesting to see what other details about the U.S. military's monitoring efforts might be released.

Probably no aircraft have rendered more service to our military than the U2, B-52, and C-130. They've all outlived generations of would-be successors.
 

pigfarmer

tall, thin, irritable
U.S. Air Force Reveals New B-21 Design Details | Aviation Week Network

U.S. Air Force Reveals New B-21 Design Details​

Steve Trimble March 08, 2023
1000w_q75.jpeg

Credit: U.S. Air Force
A newly released Northrop Grumman B-21 picture offers the first clear view of both of the bomber’s unique air inlets.
The image, which the U.S. Air Force published March 7, reveals for the first time that the inlets are shaped like sideways teardrops.
The designers appear to have positioned a bulbous inboard section to ingest the boundary layer of air flowing over the leading edge of the wing.
If viewed from above, the inlet also appears to be L-shaped, with a right angle placed at roughly one-third of the inlet length. Both sides sweep forward from the right angle, with the outboard section at roughly two-thirds the length.
The B-21 also is designed with a pair of indentations above the engine nacelles on either side of the aft fuselage. The openings may be slits for supplemental inlets or exhausts. Alternatively, they could be apertures for sensors or communications.
Several stenciled markings appear on the wings and fuselage. The symbol for Northrop’s advanced projects division appears on the right wing, as viewed from the cockpit. The roundel of the U.S. Air Force is shown on the left wing. Along the right side of the fuselage aft of the cockpit appear three more unit logos, but the details are not visible.
The image appeared in a presentation by Gen. C.Q. Brown, the Air Force chief of staff, who addressed the Warfare Symposium in Aurora, Colorado.
The Air Force first revealed the B-21 during a Dec. 2 ceremony at the Northrop factory in Palmdale, California, but carefully obscured views of the inlet from the crowd and live footage. The aft section of the aircraft still has never been shown to the public, nor has the identity and quantity of the engines on the bomber been disclosed.
The B-21 is still scheduled to fly this year, but Air Force officials do not offer more details. “It will fly when it’s ready,” Andrew Hunter, the assistant secretary of the Air Force for acquisition, technology and logistics, told the symposium audience on March 7.
Air Force officials have consistently said the bomber’s development has gone generally to plan, and that certain aspects of the program have proceeded faster than similar advanced aircraft in the past.
The B-21’s mission system recently demonstrated that it could detect, target, track and destroy a target in simulations, Gen. Thomas Bussiere, the commander of Global Strike Command, said at the symposium. Although no further details were released, Bussiere’s remarks suggest the B-21 may be further along than the Lockheed Martin F-22 and F-35 at the same stage of development. Neither aircraft began testing the mission systems onboard until at least three years after first flight.
“The capabilities and technology integrated into that weapon system is second to none,” Bussiere said. “It will be the most advanced strike platform ever designed or built on the planet.”
 
Top