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The Northrop B-2 Spirit, also known as the Stealth Bomber, [3] is an American heavy strategic bomber, featuring low-observable stealth technology designed to penetrate dense anti-aircraft defenses. A subsonic flying wing with a crew of two, the plane was designed by Northrop (later Northrop Grumman ) as the prime contractor, with Boeing ...
It is intended that the bomb will be deployed on the B-2 Spirit, and will be guided using GPS. [6] [7] It is also planned to be deployed on the B-21 Raider. [8] In July 2007, Northrop Grumman announced a $2.5-million stealth-bomber refit contract. Each of the U.S. Air Force's B-2s is to be able to carry two 14-ton MOPs. [9] [10]
The B-2's operational altitude imposes a flight time for defensive weapons that makes it virtually impossible to engage the aircraft during its weapons deployment. [citation needed] New stealth aircraft designs such as the F-22 and F-35 can open their bays, release munitions and return to stealthy flight in less than a second. [citation needed]
Mark Gunzinger, a retired Air Force colonel who flew the older B-52 Stratofortress bomber, said the stealth B-2 Spirit could essentially engage "any target on the face of the earth, and it can do ...
A B-2 Spirit stealth bomber taxiing t Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri in March 2003. ... Getty Images. Chronologically, the B-21 will debut in service at Ellsworth Air Force base in South Dakota
Flight test data collected from the original YB-49 test flights were used in the development of the B-2 bomber. [citation needed] Shortly before his death in February 1981, Jack Northrop learned from the Northrop Corporation of the company's flying wing bid for the future B-2; he remarked: "I know why God has kept me alive for the past 25 years."
The Air Force now has the B-61-12 tactical nuclear bomb ready for operational use on its 20 B-2 Spirit stealth bombers.
On 23 February 2008, a B‑2 crashed on the runway shortly after takeoff from Andersen Air Force Base in Guam. [1] The crash of the Spirit of Kansas, 89-0127, which had been operated by the 393rd Bomb Squadron, 509th Bomb Wing, Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri, and had logged 5,100 flight hours, [6] was the first crash of a B‑2. [7]