Nichols Martin
The U.S. Air Force has equipped Air National Guard F-16s with Northrop Grumman-built radars in a move to address a homeland defense requirement.
Select F-16s at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland feature the AN/APG-83 Scalable Agile Beam Radar system that the service branch procured to meet a "joint emergent operational need" identified by U.S. Northern Command, Northrop said Thursday.
The initial installation is a step toward achieving initial operational capability status for the SABR program. Last month, the company received a $1B modification under a U.S. Air Force contract to build up to 372 radars.
Mark Rossi, director of SABR programs at Northrop, said the active electronically scanned array technology provides targeting and fire control capacities to the ANG's F-16 aircraft.
APG-83, which is built upon F-22 and F-35 AESA radars, also employs synthetic aperture radar mapping for fighter pilots to obtain a larger view of surface when they perform target identification and strike missions.
