Raytheon Awarded $239M for StormBreaker Smart Bomb Production

The Pentagon today awarded Raytheon a $239.113 million contract for StormBreaker (SDBII, GBU-53/B) production Lot 6.

The current action relates to classified Foreign Military Sales (FMS), and 6.3% of contract value supports FMS, the Pentagon said in a release.

Work will be performed in Tucson, Arizona, and is expected to be completed November 28, 2023.

Raytheon’s StormBreaker was approved for operational use on the Boeing F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jet earlier this week. While F-15E Strike Eagle is the first platform to add the bomb, the Pentagon plans to start fielding the weapon on the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.

GBU-53/B StormBreaker glide-bomb

The StormBreaker is a guided bomb with a pair of wings that allow it to glide up to 64km after being released from an aircraft. The bomb gets its name from its ability to fly through bad weather, darkness, smoke or dust.

The 93kg StormBreaker features a tri-mode seeker that uses imaging infrared and millimeter wave radar in its normal mode. The weapon can also deploy its semi-active laser or GPS guidance to hit targets.

The weapon can fly more than 45 miles to strike mobile targets. Its small size enables the use of fewer aircraft to take out the same number of targets as previous, larger weapons that required multiple jets.