Air Force awards $48.9 million contract to Raytheon
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The current MALD is a state-of-the-art, low-cost, decoy flight vehicle that is modular, air-launched and programmable. It weighs less than 300 pounds and has a range of approximately 500 nautical miles (about 575 statute miles).
The new MALD-J adds radar-jamming capability to the basic MALD platform without altering the decoy's outer mold line.
"During EMD, Raytheon will put MALD-J through an aggressive series of free-flight and captive-carry tests," said Scott Muse, Raytheon's MALD program director.
Prior to entering EMD, the MALD-J successfully completed all 27 test events, culminating in a free-flight test in December 2009. Raytheon recently completed a second free-flight test of the MALD-J April 27.
