Northrop Grumman will unveil the B-21 Raider on December 2, 2022 – in Palmdale, California very first full look at the world’s first sixth-generation aircraft. The advanced stealth bomber will soon join the U.S. Air Force fleet, enhancing the nation’s strategic triad and supporting national security objectives.
It features the B-21 Raider with advanced stealth technology, advanced networking, and open systems architecture. The B-21 Raider is the next evolution in the Air Force strategic bomber fleet. With more than three decades of strike and stealth technology behind it, the B-21 has been optimized for high-end threat environments and will play a critical role in the Air Force’s most complex missions.
During its development, Northrop Grumman has continued to modernize its technology through the use of advanced manufacturing techniques and materials to ensure the B-21 beats the most advanced anti-access and area-denial systems. The backbone of future U.S. air power, the B-21 will offer unparalleled capability and flexibility through advanced integration of data, sensors, and weapons. It will be capable of delivering both conventional and nuclear payloads, making it one of the most capable aircraft in the sky.
It was a digital bomber, demanding agile software development coupled with advanced manufacturing techniques and digital engineering tools that mitigate production risks while enabling modern sustainment practices. To date, six B-21 Raiders are in various stages of final assembly and testing at the Northrop Grumman plant in Palmdale.
This is demonstrated by Northrop Grumman and the Air Force’s successful migration of the B-21 ground systems data to a cloud environment. B-21 data development, and deployment, and testing-including the B-21 digital twin have been performed in support of operations and sustainment. This robust digital infrastructure will result in an even more maintainable and sustainable aircraft with lower-cost infrastructure.
Because the B-21 is designed for rapid upgradeability, it will not have block upgrades similar to earlier generation aircraft. New technology, capabilities, and weapons are seamlessly integrated through agile software upgrades and baked-in hardware flexibility. This ensures the B-21 Raider can continue to meet evolving threats for decades to come.
Since the contract award in 2015, Northrop Grumman has assembled a nationwide team to design, test, and build the world’s most advanced strike aircraft. The B-21 team consists of more than 8,000 people from Northrop Grumman, industry partners, and the Air Force, over 400 suppliers from 40 states.
Long-term operability and sustainment affordability have been of paramount importance from the beginning. In close collaboration with the Air Force, Northrop Grumman made the maintainability requirement a co-equal one to stealth performance, enabling more affordable and predictable operations and sustainment outcomes.
The B-21 Raider will be the nation’s means of executing its strategy against its strategic deterrence. It has been designed from the outset as the lead component in a larger family of systems that will also deliver intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, electronic attack, and multi-domain networking. In this dynamic global security environment, the B-21 offers the agility and deterrence so critical to U.S. and allied security.
The B-21 Raider is named in honor of the Doolittle Raid of World War II, in honor of 80 airmen led by Lt. Col. James “Jimmy” Doolittle, whose mission changed the course of the war in the Pacific theater. This was one very historic raid that acted as a catalyst for future progress in U.S. air superiority, and its courageous spirit is what takes up the naming of the B-21 Raider.
As said by Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. CQ Brown, Jr., “The unveiling of the B-21 Raider will be a historic moment for our Air Force and the nation.” The B-21 program will stay on course to continue its disciplined testing campaign beyond the unveiling, when an integrated team from the Air Force Test Center, Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center, and Northrop Grumman will validate performance and uncover areas of improvement.
The B-21 Raider is designed with an open system architecture that will enable the rapid insertion of mature technologies, allowing the aircraft to remain effective as the threat environment evolves. By doing so, this innovative approach ensures the B-21 maintains formidable combat capability across a range of operations in highly contested environments of the future.