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American scientists have drawn up plans for a new generation of nuclear-powered drones capable of flying over remote regions of the world for months on end without refuelling. The blueprints for the new drones, which have been developed by Sandia National Laboratories – the US government's principal nuclear research and development agency – and defence contractor Northrop Grumman, were designed to increase flying time "from days to months" while making more power available for operating equipment, according to a project summary published by Sandia. "It's pretty terrifying prospect," said Chris Coles of Drone Wars UK, which campaigns against the increasing...

The U.S. Air Force is getting serious about developing a so-called adaptive engine for its current and future fighter jets and is now putting the money where its mouth is. Five giants in the industry were recently awarded contracts worth a whopping $4.9 billion. General Electric, Pratt &Whitney, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrup Grumman were awarded contracts worth around $975 million each for the prototype phase of the Next Generation Adaptive Propulsion Program. Until now, only GE Aviation and Pratt & Whitney were developing engines as part of the Adaptive Engine Transition Program (AETP) with the goal of eventually producing...

Northrop Grumman’s Antares rocket is scheduled to lift off at 5:56 p.m. Eastern time on Tuesday, Aug. 10, as part of the company’s 16th mission to deliver supplies, equipment and NASA science investigations to the International Space Station, NASA announced. As long as skies are clear, the launch may be visible to people across the Mid-Atlantic region and possibly other parts of the eastern United States... Live coverage of the mission countdown is scheduled to begin at about 1 p.m. Tuesday on the Wallops IBM video site. Launch coverage on NASA TV is scheduled to begin at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday.

For SLS, two well documented, and visible changes have been made to the boosters, which are technically called Five Segment Reusable Solid Rocket Motor (RSRMV): the addition of a fifth propellant segment and the removal of all recovery and reuse hardware. The added fifth segment will produce 20% greater average thrust and 24% greater total impulse over the Shuttle-era design and will marginally increase the overall burn time of the five-segment SRBs to approximately 2 minutes 12 seconds, ten seconds longer than Shuttle. The new segment will increase the overall thrust each booster is capable of producing, with each five-segment...

Aaron Rich, who had reportedly been blocking his family’s private investigator from looking into whether or not his brother Seth was a WikiLeaks source, works for an influential defense contractor that provides cyber security. According to a source close to the Rich family, Aaron works for Northrup Grumman, which was named as the fifth-largest defense contractor in the world in 2015. The source did not provide what his specific role is at the company. “It’s not just hacking and defending, there’s a lot more to it,” a cyber software engineer at Northrup Grumman says in a video on the company’s...

The Department of Justice on Wednesday announced the arrest of a Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) official for allegedly leaking classified information to journalists, including one that he was apparently in a relationship with. Law enforcement officials arrested 30-year-old Henry Kyle Freese of Virginia and charged him with two counts of willful transmission of national defense information. If convicted, he faces a maximum of 20 years in prison.

Two independent investigations, made up of federal and industry officials, pointed to Northrop's payload adapter as the cause of the satellite's loss, the report said, citing people familiar with the probes. The payload adapter is a key part of deploying a satellite in orbit, connecting the satellite to the upper stage of a rocket. Zuma is believed to have cost around $3.5 billion to develop, according to the report. The satellite was funded through a process that received a lesser degree of oversight from Congress compared with similar national security-related satellites, industry officials said. ... The investigations tentatively concluded that...

In less than two weeks, the Office of Personnel Management is expected to launch the new background investigation service to help fix the mess created by a series of incidents ranging from a lack of contractor oversight to the massive data breach affecting 21.5 million current and former federal employees. Officials promise the National Background Investigations Bureau (NBIB) will be a much different organization than its predecessor, the Federal Investigative Services. “It will have a politically appointed director, will be headquartered in D.C. and be a full member of the Performance Accountability Council, so it aligns with customers for increased...

Los Angeles entrepreneur Elon Musk has built a multibillion-dollar fortune running companies that make electric cars, sell solar panels and launch rockets into space. And he's built those companies with the help of billions in government subsidies. Tesla Motors Inc., SolarCity Corp. and Space Exploration Technologies Corp., known as SpaceX, together have benefited from an estimated $4.9 billion in government support, according to data compiled by The Times. The figure underscores a common theme running through his emerging empire: a public-private financing model underpinning long-shot start-ups. "He definitely goes where there is government money," said Dan Dolev, an analyst at...

Dueling bidders for a major Pentagon stealth bomber contract would be eligible for massive tax credits under a bill that's on Gov. Jerry Brown's desk. Brown has been pushing for an aerospace tax credit that could help companies create thousands of jobs near Palmdale. In July, lawmakers grudgingly approved a $420 million tax credit that would benefit a joint bid being submitted by Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp. The governor signed the fast-tracked AB2389 into law after his office assured competitor Northrop Grumman Corp. that it would receive a similar deal.

Northrop Grumman Corp has won a five-year contract valued at up to $9.9 billion from the U.S. Air Force to modernize and support the B-2 stealth bomber, the Pentagon announced on Tuesday. The Air Force is going to make sure everyone’s favorite bat-winged bomber stays stealth through 2058. The B-2 Spirit will be included in upcoming modernization planning being conducted by the Pentagon. Northrop Grumman has a contract with the Pentagon to complete a massive upgrade on the nuclear bomber. Its $9.9 billion contract will include new computer processors, avionics, radar warning receivers and communications gear, the defense website military.com...

Joint STARS aircraft undergoing work at a contractor facility may have been sabotaged. A tersely worded statement issued by Robins Air Force Base on Tuesday indicated that workers at Northrup Grumman’s Lake Charles, La., facility have discovered severed wires on an E-8C jet. “To ensure the integrity of the maintenance process, we are working with Northrop Grumman to get to the root cause,” the statement added. “The matter is currently under investigation and more details will be released as they become available.”

Northrop Grumman Corporation will field the first systems in the upgraded RC-12X Guardrail fleet, providing the U.S. Army with unparalleled signals intelligence (SIGINT) capability, under a recent task order awarded by the U.S. Army. This is a critical step toward making this mission-critical capability operational, scheduled for second quarter of this year. The RC-12X Guardrail is the Army's premier airborne SIGINT sensor and ground processing system, providing instantaneous precision geo-location and identification of threats to enable the Brigade Combat Team's Find, Fix, Finish, Exploit, Analyze and Disseminate (F3EAD) battle command process. The RC-12X Guardrail Modernization program extends the life of...

Pardon the vanity, but I have a question that I can not seem to determine the answer to. Did the Air Force, in choosing the Airbus A330 as the new refuelling tanker platform, violate the "Buy American Act" originally signed into law in 1933?

Twelve Northrop Grumman Corporation employees were honored with 2007 National Women of Color Technology Awards that recognize the significant accomplishments of minority women in science, engineering and technology, and their leadership and mentor roles in the workplace and community. Photos accompanying this release are available at http://media.primezone.com/noc/ -- Chineta K. Davis, vice president and general manager of Operations at Northrop Grumman's Electronic Systems sector, received the Technologist of the Year award. -- Veronica L. Nelson, manager of the Professional Development Program (PDP) for the company's Electronic Systems sector, received the Corporate Promotion of Education award. -- Zohra Hemani, Hilary Oliphant,...

LOS ANGELES: Northrop Grumman Corp. has agreed to buy the company that built the first private manned rocket to reach space, it was announced Friday. Northrop earlier this month agreed to increase its stake in Mojave, California-based Scaled Composites LLC from 40 percent to 100 percent, said company spokesman Dan McClain. Northrop, a major defense contractor, would not disclose the value of the deal, which still needs regulatory approval. "We went from a partial owner to the owner of the company," McClain said. Northrop and Scaled said the new ownership would not affect Scaled's operations. Maverick aerospace designer Burt Rutan...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Air Force general responsible for building a U.S. anti-ballistic missile shield on Friday voiced high confidence it could shoot down any U.S.-bound missile from North Korea, despite critics' doubts. "From what I've seen from our testing from the last several years ... and what I know about the system and its capabilities, I'm very confident," Lt. Gen. Henry "Trey" Obering told reporters after a speech to a seminar. Obering, head of the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency, declined to confirm reports that ground-based U.S. interceptor missiles had been put on alert for a possible effort to shoot...

Northrop Grumman has been selected to develop "military-grade," Solid-State Laser technology that is expected to pave the way for the U.S. military to incorporate high-energy laser systems across all services, including ships, manned and unmanned aircraft, and ground vehicles.

PASCAGOULA, Miss. (AP) -- The U.S. Navy has taken possession of its 19th Aegis-guided missile destroyer, the USS Pinckney. The ceremony was held Monday aboard the ship at the Northrup Grumman Ship Systems' operations along the west bank of the Pascagoula River. Cmdr. Robert M. Byron of Asheville, N.C., will be the new ship's commissioning commanding officer. "Thousands of shipbuilders dedicated their efforts to produce the absolute best of American industrial capability," Byron told the Monday ceremony. "Thousands of people worked hard to make this day happen; to give this brilliant technological achievement a pulse." The Pinckney has two vertical...

A Navy vessel, one day to be christened the USS New York, will bring to life a fallen icon of the city that suffered most from the terrorist attacks two years ago. On Tuesday, workers from the Amite Foundry and Machine Inc. will melt down 24 tons of steel that once formed the shell of the World Trade Center, and begin the process of resurrecting it, in a manner of speaking. At 2,850 degrees Fahrenheit, the steel will soften. From a 50-ton capacity ladle, the melted steel will be poured into a sand mold containing an imprint for the bow-stem...