3. INTRODUCTION
• The Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk is a single-seat, twin-engine stealth ground-attack aircraft formerly
operated by the United States Air Force (USAF) developed from the Have Blue technology
demonstrator and produced by Lockheed's Skunk Works.
• The Nighthawk was the world's first operational stealth aircraft.
• The F-117A aircraft is also known as the Frisbee and the Wobblin' Goblin. The mission of the aircraft
is to penetrate dense threat environments and attack high-value targets with high accuracy.
• The Nighthawk is only used for night-time missions.
4.
5. DESIGN
• The single-seat Nighthawk is powered by two non-afterburning General Electric F404 turbofan engines, and has
quadruple-redundant fly-by-wire flight controls.
• The surfaces and edge profiles are optimised to reflect hostile radar into narrow beam signals, directed away from
the enemy radar detector. All the doors and opening panels on the aircraft have saw-toothed forward and trailing
edges to reflect radar.
• The F-117A has four elevons on the inboard and outboard trailing edge of the wing. The elevons do not act as flaps
to reduce the rate of descent for touchdown.
• The V-shaped tail, which controls the yaw of the aircraft, acts as a flying tail, which means that the whole surface
acts as a control surface.
6.
7. WEAPONS
• The aircraft can carry a range of tactical fighter ordnance in the weapons bay, including BLU-
109B low-level laser-guided bomb, GBU-10 and GBU-27 laser-guided bomb units, Raytheon
AGM-65 Maverick and Raytheon AGM-88 HARM air-to-surface missiles.
• In January 2004, an F-117 successfully released a JDAM (JDAM) 2,000lb bomb for the first
time.
• The integration of JDAM and other precision-guided weapons on the F-117 is coupled with the
block II software upgrade and achieved initial operating capability (IOC) in 2006.
8.
9. SENSORS & COCKPIT
• For navigation and weapon aiming, the aircraft is equipped with a forward-looking infrared (FLIR) and
a downward-looking infrared (DLIR) with laser designator, supplied by Raytheon.
• The aircraft uses a Honeywell inertial navigation system and has multi-channel pilot static tubes
installed in the nose.
• The cockpit has a Kaiser Electronics head-up display (HUD) and the flight deck is equipped with a
large video monitor, which displays the infrared imagery from the aircraft's onboard sensors.
• The cockpit has a full-colour moving map developed by the Harris Corporation.
10.
11. SPECIFICATIONS
General characteristics
• Length: 65 ft 11 in (20.09 m)
• Wingspan: 43 ft 4 in (13.20 m)
• Height: 12 ft 9.5 in (3.78 m)
• Empty weight: 29,500 lb (13,380 kg)
• Loaded weight: 52,500 lb (23,800 kg)
Performance
• Maximum speed: Mach 0.92 (617 mph, 993 km/h)
• Range: 930 NM (1720 km)
• Service ceiling: 45,000 ft (13,716 m)
