Lockheed Gets $247M NASA Supersonic X-Plane Development Contract

Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) has received a potential $247.5 million contract to design, build and test a supersonic aircraft for NASA.

NASA said Tuesday the cost-plus-incentive-fee contract calls for the development of a Low-Boom Flight Demonstration aircraft, dubbed X-plane, designed to travel at a speed of about 940 miles per hour at 55,000 feet and produce a sound at 75 perceived decibel level instead of a sonic boom.

Work on the cost-plus-incentive-fee contract started Monday, April 2, and is slated for completion on Dec. 31, 2021.

Lockheed™s Skunk Works business will develop the X-plane based on the company™s preliminary design work on the agency™s Quiet Supersonic Technology program under a task order awarded in 2016, the company said Tuesday.

Skunk Works will build the aircraft at its Palmdale, California-based facility in preparation for the plane™s initial flight in 2021.

NASA will fly the aircraft by mid-2022 to gather and relay public feedback on the flights to U.S. and international regulators in order to draft new supersonic flight rules.

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