The Air Force awarded Raytheon an $81.7 million contract for Lot 6 production of 202 Miniature Air Launched Decoy Jammers and their containers, announced the company on Monday. “This weapon will provide unprecedented capability and flexibility to the US Air Force and improve the survivability of our airmen and their aircraft,” said Harry Schulte, Raytheon’s vice president of air warfare systems, in the company’s April 22 release. MALD-J adds a radar-jamming capability to the basic MALD design, which is designed to confuse enemy air defenses by duplicating the flight profiles and signatures of friendly aircraft. Raytheon began delivery of MALD-Js last fall, states the release. (See also Miniature Advances and MALD Jammer Moves into Operational Flight Testing.)
USAF Pushes Safer F-16 Training After Contractor’s Death
Oct. 23, 2020
The Air Force revamped its F-16 Basic Course following a 2017 incident where an inexperienced student pilot strafed the wrong target and killed a military contractor. Now, students must fly their first nighttime close air support sortie with an instructor pilot in the rear seat of a two-person F-16D. If…