WASHINGTON — Northrop Grumman's secretive B-21 bomber appears set to receive its stealth coating at the same spot its B-2 parent was born.



On Jan. 31, the company was awarded a $35.8 million contract modification from the US Air Force to "construct a new 45,900 square foot coatings facility at Air Force Plant 42." While the B-21 was not specifically named in the contract announcement, Plant 42 is located at the Palmdale, California, facility that has been tied to the bomber program for years.



Palmdale is home to the final assembly and checkout facilities that were used by Northrop to produce the B-2 bomber. Stealth coating on the B-2 fleets are repaired at the location as well, but given the lack of new production for the B-2, the B-21 is the most likely design for the new facility.



Notably, the expected completion date for construction of the facility is listed as Dec. 25, 2019. The Air Force has a tentative operational date of 2025. If the facility is up and running at the start of 2020, it could lead to a first run of low-rate initial production planes rolling off the line in early 2021, which would track nicely to that 2025 date.



