X-48B First Test Flight

BWB News Update:

AvioNews from Farnborough - "Bigger BWB 'X-Plane' Planned"

Could this be a white project to cover some other black projecr "Arora" and some type of stealth troop transport?

Time to bumb...it has been a few months and we now know that they are moving forward with an X-48C model that will be in the 80,000 lb payload class range. Hummm....sounds like a C-141 / KC-135 payload tanker size, which would be a nice upgrade to old school C-130 / KC-130 / AC-130 60,000 lb payload range. Faster, quieter and more payload! The C-130 is staring to be too little for armored transports.

NASA - Test of Futuristic X-48C is Historic Wind Tunnel's Swan Song

Who Wants to Build a Bigger BWB?

"Interestingly the Air Force Research Laboratory is co-funding a lot of this work because it is interested in the BWB, sorry hybrid wing-body, as a future energy-efficient tanker/transport. Boeing is trying to persuade AFRL, as well as NASA, to fund a manned flight demonstrator. The design team within Boeing's Phantom Works is coy about its concept for a demonstrator, not least because the Commercial Airplanes folks in Seattle get annoyed every time the BWB attracts attention. But it appears they are looking at a 80,000lb empty-weight, 737-sized cargo aircraft that could be built as a demonstrator and evolved into an operational vehicle."