The timing of just how fast and steadily new B-21s arrive continues to bear heavily upon current Air Force decisions regarding the pace and scope of B-1 retirement.
The two planes will need to be tested and flown before more are built.
The U.S. Air Force (USAF) is moving rapidly along with the construction of its first two B-21 Raiders, as the next-generation stealth bomber inches ever closer to full-scale serial production.
According to senior Air Force officials, the first B-21 Raider will be completed in early 2022 and undertake its maiden flight later that year. The USAF initially stated that the maiden flight would occur by December 2021, but Randall Walden, director of the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office, says that this earlier estimate was always a best-case scenario. Meanwhile, the second B-21 is taking shape: it’s “really starting to look like a bomber,” said Walden in an interview with Air Force Magazine. “The second one is really more about structures, and the overall structural capability,” he added. “We’ll go in and bend it, we’ll test it to its limits, make sure that the design and the manufacturing and the pr