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Home» News»LITENING Targeting Pod Makes First US Navy Super Hornet Flight
LITENING pod Super Hornet
LITENING is an electro-optical infrared sensor system for targeting and surveillance that enables aircrews to detect, acquire, identify and track targets at long ranges. Northrop Grumman photo.

LITENING Targeting Pod Makes First US Navy Super Hornet Flight

Northrop Grumman Corporation’s LITENING advanced targeting pod has successfully completed its first test flights on the U.S. Navy’s F/A-18 Super Hornet.

Naval News Staff 07 Sep 2022

Pod demonstrated surveillance, autonomous target tracking capabilities

Northrop Grumman press release

The Navy selected LITENING to replace the legacy targeting pods on the F/A-18 fleet in early 2022.

“This first flight demonstrated LITENING’s ability to rapidly add modern, upgradeable mission capabilities to the Super Hornet. The pod’s digital video, autonomous target tracking, and laser sensors will give Naval aviators an entirely new set of capabilities for operations over land and sea today, and the growth capabilities built into LITENING’s modular design ensure that the pod can evolve to meet changing requirements.”


James Conroy, vice president, navigation, targeting and survivability, Northrop Grumman

During the flight, pilots executed maneuvers and operations representative of combat missions, including ground moving target tracking, air-to-air tracking and target designation. The pilots also engaged the eye-safe training laser mode that allows the pod to be used for realistic training with combat controllers on the ground. The pilots were able to carry out these operations without advance training, showing the ease of use that has been made possible by close collaboration with the aviation community.

LITENING is currently in service with the Marine Corps, Air Force, Air National Guard and international customers. Northrop Grumman has delivered more than 900 LITENING pods.

Northrop Grumman US Navy 2022-09-07
Tags Northrop Grumman US Navy
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