Article Posted on : - Jun 26, 2012

F-16 Fighting Falcon. Photo: Lockheed Martin.

BALTIMORE (BNS): Northrop has received an $87.8 million foreign military sales (FMS) contract to provide the APG-68(V)9 airborne fire control radar to Thailand, Iraq and Oman for use on F-16 fighter aircraft.

The company will deliver six radar systems to the Royal Thai Air Force, 22 radar systems to the Iraqi Air Force and 15 radar systems to the Royal Air Force of Oman, for a total of 43 systems. Deliveries are expected to be completed by March 2015.

The APG-68(V)9 enables engagement of air-to-air and air-to-surface threats with greater accuracy and at greater ranges than legacy F-16 fire control radars.

The radar provides autonomous, all-environment, precision air-to-surface targeting with a high-resolution synthetic aperture radar ground mapping mode.

Northrop Grumman has been developing, integrating and producing F-16 fire control radars for 36 years. This includes three variants of the APG-66; eight variants of the APG-68; the APG-80 Airborne Electronically Scanned Array (AESA), developed specifically for the F-16 Block 60; and the newly introduced Scalable Agile Beam Radar (SABR) AESA.

The company's long heritage in fire control radars also includes fire control radars for the B-1, F-22 and the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.

The contract is in line with U S defence policy of enabling the Iraqi Air Force to assume sovereign air defence duties, and also supports foreign relations with partners Thailand and Oman, Northrop said.