Air Force asks Boeing for smart munitions that blend radar and electro-optical sensors for precise guidance
EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. – Smart munitions experts at the Boeing Co. will provide the U.S. military with additional GBU-39 small-diameter bomb (SDB) smart weapons under terms of a potential $6.9 billion 11-year contract announced in late September.
Officials of the U.S. Air Force Life Cycle Management Center at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, are asking the Boeing Defense, Space & Security segment in St. Louis for additional munitions in SDB increment 1 lots 20 to 29 production.
The SDB is a munition small enough to launch from unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and other small military aircraft, and is able to hit moving targets with an advanced precision-guided munition seeker that blends millimeter-wave radar, uncooled imaging infrared sensors, and semi-active laser.
This contract involves foreign military sales (FMS) to Japan, Bulgaria, and Ukraine. The SDB uses a blend of radar and electro-optical sensors to guide the munition to its target.
The first increment of the SDB has a GPS-aided inertial navigation system to attack stationary targets such as fuel depots and bunkers. The second variant, the Raytheon GBU-53 SDB II, includes a thermal seeker and radar with automatic target recognition for attacking mobile targets such as tanks, vehicles, and mobile command posts during the day, at night, and in bad weather.
The GBU-39 SDB can go aboard the F-15E Strike Eagle, JAS-39 Gripen, and AC-130W gunship. In the future it also may go aboard the F-16, F-22 Raptor, F-35 Lightning II, A-10 Thunderbolt II, B-1 Lancer, B-2 Spirit, B-52 Stratofortress, and AC-130J. The General Atomics Predator C unmanned aircraft eventually also may carry this weapon.
The Small Diameter Bomb is designed to fit inside concealed aircraft weapons bays. The small size of the munition helps reduce the radar signatures of the aircraft that carry it, as well as keep collateral damage to a minimum when the munition hits its targets.
On this order Boeing will do the work in St. Louis, and should be finished by December 2035. For more information contact Boeing Defense, Space, & Security online at www.boeing.com/company/about-bds, or the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center-Hill Air Force Base at https://www.hill.af.mil/About-Us/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/1583368/air-force-life-cycle-management-hill-afb-site/.
John Keller | Editor-in-Chief
John Keller is the Editor-in-Chief, Military & Aerospace Electronics Magazine--provides extensive coverage and analysis of enabling electronics and optoelectronic technologies in military, space and commercial aviation applications. John has been a member of the Military & Aerospace Electronics staff since 1989 and chief editor since 1995.
