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WOODLAND HILLS, Calif., June 19 (UPI) -- A new stellar navigation system will allow the U.S. RC-135 surveillance plane to provide more precise location information on ground targets in Iraq.
The first of 31 production units of Northrop Grumman's LN-120G systems has been delivered for installation on the RC-135 "Rivet Joint" jet, which eavesdrops on electronic communications, including cell phones, and feeds targeting data to U.S. fighters.
The plane has the potential to pick up a phone conversation between insurgents and get a fix on their locations fast enough to bring a precision missile or bomb to bear. The LN-120G is designed to greatly improve the accuracy of the locations that are pinpointed by the RC-135 and relayed to the attack plane via the Joint STARS command aircraft.
The system is capable of tracking specific stars both at night and during the day. Zeroing in on a particular star enables the positioning information from the plane's internal navigation to be refined to an accuracy of 20 arc seconds. Northrop said in a statement Tuesday that 20 arc seconds was the highest accuracy available.
"The LN-120G achieves positional accuracy of one-half a nautical mile for up to 18 hours when GPS updating is unavailable or jammed," Program Director Mike Borck said from Southern California.
The LN-120G will replace Northrop's LN-20 system, a mechanical gyro device that has been in use on River Joint planes for some 30 years.
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