NORTHROP’S PROBLEMS : First Flight of Stealth Bomber Delayed
Northrop has delayed the first flight of its B-2 stealth bomber by about two weeks, meaning that the aircraft is not scheduled to fly before mid-July, it was learned Tuesday.
Air Force officials had said in recent months that the first flight was scheduled for late June or early July. The flight was originally scheduled for a year and a half ago, but funding delays and a technical redesign of the aircraft forced major postponements.
Northrop and Air Force officials declined to discuss any changes in the flight schedule, but internal sources at Northrop’s B-2 division in Palmdale said the company is now considering mid-July as the target for the first flight.
Flying Undetected
There have been no taxi tests of the aircraft so far, company officials have acknowledged, indicating that the first flight is not imminent. Typically, new aircraft are subject to low-speed and then high-speed taxi tests on the ground to determine whether they handle as expected. Only if no anomalies are detected is a flight attempted. Based on the conservative approach taken so far, the taxi tests could take some time, experts said.
“None of the B-2s have ever moved under their own power,” a Northrop source at Palmdale said. “Any time any of the planes have moved, they have been towed.”
The bomber, a program that will cost an estimated $70 billion for 132 aircraft, is intended to fly undetected by enemy radar and drop a large payload of nuclear or conventional weapons. It is designed to elude radar through the use of exotic materials and an all-wing design without a conventional fuselage.
The delay does not indicate that any significant new technical problems have emerged, but a series of postponements this year has resulted in additional political problems for the bomber.
Congressional leaders are watching closely for a first B-2 flight before they decide on the final budget for the aircraft during the next fiscal year. The congressional armed services committees are currently conducting markups of the 1990 Defense Department budget, and some congressional opponents of the B-2 are calling for further cuts until the aircraft flies.
Pete Williams, assistant secretary of defense for public affairs, said during a Washington press briefing for reporters Tuesday that no firm date has been set for the first flight. “What we’re trying to avoid is putting pressure on the contractor to make it jump like a performing seal and do it on cue, and we don’t want it to go until they’re fully confident that they’re ready to go,” Williams said.
Williams said it is not necessary to hold up production of the aircraft until flight testing occurs, as some members of Congress have demanded.
Defense Secretary Richard B. Cheney “firmly thinks that both the costs and the technical risks have been fully assessed and that it’s prudent for us to proceed,” Williams noted.
