B-1 software, munition tests completed

  • Published
  • By 1st Lt. Brooke Davis
  • Air Force Flight Test Center Public Affairs
A B-1B Lancer test program that combined testing of software upgrades along with integrating the 500-pound Joint Direct Attack Munition, or GBU-38, wrapped up here Feb. 24.

Airmen of the 419th Flight Test Squadron completed the last software test sortie Feb. 22 in a flight to the Utah Test and Training Range that accomplished test points ranging from radar targeting to weapons employment, said Capt. Paul Harmer, the lead flight test engineer.

In the final munition test flight Feb. 24, testers released six inert GBU-38 JDAMs in four flyover passes at the Naval Air Warfare Center at China Lake, Calif.

During the software upgrades, testers performed regression testing to verify that previous weapon employment, radar and navigation capabilities were not affected by the new software.

"This final (software test) mission was planned by the aircrew and executed as an operational mission as a graduation exercise for the software upgrades," Captain Harmer said. "The next step is to turn the upgrades over to operational testers for force development evaluation. We have a combined operational and developmental test force here so that operational pilots get a taste of what's coming to them, and operational testers have been able to be a part of our test missions."