Lockheed Martin has been awarded a firm-fixed-price and cost-plus-fixed-fee contract by the US Department of Defense (US DoD) for the supply of 12 additional F-16 C/D Block 50 multirole fighters to the Royal Air Force of Oman (RAFO).
Under the estimated $600m foreign military sale contract, the company will supply ten F-16 C single-seat jets and two F-16 D double-seat jets along with the provision of support equipment, technical orders and integrated logistics support.
Currently, the air force operates 12 F-16 fighter jets purchased from the US in 2002 and the current order will take the total number of F-16 fighters operated by the RAFO to 24.
The compact multirole, single-engine Lockheed Martin-built F-16 Fighting Falcon aircraft has a high level of manoeuvrability, a top speed of 2,124km/h, and can detect planes flying at very low altitudes.
The F-16 is also equipped with wind-corrected munitions dispenser infrared navigation and its AN/APG-68 radar provides separate air-to-air and air-to-ground modes, including long-range, all-aspect detection and tracking, simultaneous multiple-target tracking and high-resolution ground mapping.
F-16 jets can be equipped with air-to-surface missiles, air-to-air missiles and stand-off land-attack missiles, and the aircraft can be operated in all-weather conditions.
Work under the contract will be performed at Fort Worth, Texas, US, and is expected to be completed by 30 November 2016.
The ASC/WWMK, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, US is the contracting activity.
The F-16 jets are also widely deployed by the air forces of Israel, Egypt, Iraq, New Zealand, South Korea, Chile, Poland, UAE, Bahrain, Greece and Singapore.
Image Caption: The compact multirole, single-engine Lockheed Martin-built F-16 Fighting Falcon aircraft is capable of detecting planes flying at very low altitudes.
