The American airline Lockheed Martin joined the F-X program to create 6th generation fighters. It is expected that this aircraft will replace the next modern aircraft in the air - the F-22 fighters. Lockheed Martin has begun developing its own design for the aircraft of the future. The likely creation of such an aircraft is somewhere around 2030.
The airline has just begun to develop a project for an aircraft of the future, details or at least some information on the aircraft is not yet even on the official website of Lockheed Martin. The designers of the Skunk Works group, which is one of the divisions of the Lockheed Martin concern, are working on the project. This division was directly involved in the creation of the following well-known projects:
- reconnaissance aircraft U-2
- strategic reconnaissance aircraft SR-71 Blackbird;
- tactical attack aircraft F-117 Nighthawk;
- F-22 Raptor multipurpose aircraft of the fifth generation;
- F-35 Lightning II multipurpose aircraft of the fifth generation.
As you can see, the future of the new aircraft is quite real, the Skunk Works division has proved its professional level with these implemented projects.
Based on the scant information that the concern shared with the media, the new aircraft will be provided with:
- increased in comparison with the fifth generation of aircraft, speed indicators;
- they promise to bring aerodynamics to the maximum;
- increased range of combat use;
- maximum invisibility for any means of detection;
- the equipment and components of the aircraft will be able to self-repair.
Artificial intelligence, which will be used in the 6th generation aircraft, will control all systems, sensors, airborne radars, which will bring the response to various conditions of combat air operations to a completely new level. Among other things, the aircraft of the future is planned in two versions - manned and unmanned. All these assumptions today sound pretty fantastic, but we note that all of the above conditions in the form of technologies and projects are currently being actively created not only by Lockheed Martin, but also by other companies and manufacturers, various institutes and associations in the aircraft and space industry. But the path to creating a project, a technical solution, a prototype and, finally, a working model for the concern will be long and difficult, and very costly in financial terms.
In addition, the technologies that are supposed to be used in the creation of the aircraft must also be implemented. One thing is obvious - all developments will grow until 2020, when a real project of the aircraft of the future will begin to be created from them. And such an aircraft will be able to go into operation no earlier than 2030. So this project will lose its relevance even before the start of the real stages of development.
