1. The AWACS Story William A. Skillman Westinghouse Retiree
April 24, 2013

2. The Need for AWACS
1962 – Air Force AEW Pulse Radar (EC-121 Warning Star)
blind to low-flying targets
Pulse Doppler developing technology offered look-down capability:
Westinghouse: BOMARC, F-4J (F-4 A/C) Single Target radars,
APQ-81-Track-While-Scan (U.S. Navy)
Hughes: F-15
General Electric/Northrop Grumman: E-2, Hawkeye, carrier AEW
1963 USAF TAC & ADC issued
SOR-206 “Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS)”
AEW = Airborne Early Warning
SOR = Specific Operational Requirement

3. Response to SOR 206 AIRFRAME Proposals: Boeing, Douglas, Lockheed
RADAR Proposals:
Westinghouse, Hughes, Raytheon, GE, 3 others
AIR FORCE:
SAB determined proof of concept needed,
ASD formulated Overland Technology Program(ORT)
DOD funded ORT program – 1964
SAB=Air Force Scientific Advisory Board
ASD=AF Aeronautical Systems Division (Wright-Pat)
DOD=Department of Defense

4. ORT Aircraft – EC121-1966 Three Aircraft with scaled radars:
Westinghouse–High PRF (Pulse Repetition Frequency)
Hughes – Medium PRF
Raytheon – Low PRF
Radar Antenna mounted in lower radome

5. ORT Antenna in EC-121 Radome Low sidelobe slotted waveguide array

6. Results of ORT Flight Tests
1968 Raytheon and GE dropped
AWACS Support Program to develop critical radar technologies
1970 Boeing selected as “prime” contractor
1970 Radar Fly-off initiated: WECO and Hughes design & build Brassboard radars

7. Brassboard Fly-off Dec. 1971- Radars delivered to Boeing - Seattle
Radars installed in 2 Boeing 707s
Mar.-Sep Radar Test Flights
Westinghouse: 49 flights, 300 hours
Oct Flight test results and DDT& E proposals resulted in Westinghouse win

8. Westinghouse Brassboard Radar

9. AWACS Brassboard Antenna
Slotted Waveguide Planar Array
Low Sidelobes to minimize ground clutter
Electronic Steering in Elevation for height finding

10. Brassboard Aircraft

11. The Road to Production Post-Win: Airborne Tracking Demo - 6 flights
VIP flights Andrews AFB
Jan Full Scale Production Authorized
1974 Jamming Vulnerability “Adequate”
1975 Production Radar Flight test begun
Oct st Prod. Radar delivered to Boeing
Mar st E-3A, Sentry, delivered to A.F.
May 1978 Initial Operational Capability - 6 A/C

12. 1980 Icelandic Odyssey!
Balto. > Tinker > Keflavik> England + Reverse
Purpose: observe performance of improvement

13. Who has 707 AWACS? U.S.A.F. AN/APY-1
Active: …
Scrap (TS-3 – BB A/C)
Crashes (Nellis & Elmendorf AFB)..2
NATO AN/APY-2
Active: …
Crash (Greece) …
U.K. …
France …
Saudi Arabia …
TOTAL

14. Recent AWACS Variants Boeing 707 out of production Boeing 767 Japan 4
Phased Array – Wedgetail -Boeing 737
Australia 6
Turkey 4
South Korea 4

15. AWACS Deployments Saudi Arabia – Yemen Desert Storm - Iraq
Allied Force - Kosovo
Enduring Freedom - Afganistan
Iraqi Freedom
Odyssey Dawn/Unified Protector - Libya
Noble Eagle – Homeland defense
Humanitarian Relief – Hurricanes Rita & Katrina

16. Non-US AWACS Radars
These countries are the only exporters, besides the U.S., of an AWACS type radar.
Russia IL-76 or A50 or Mainstay
Sweden – SAAB, Ericsson, Erieye
China – KJ-2000 (mod IL-76)
Israel – Israeli Aircraft Industries – Phalcon
Numerous radar/aircraft combinations are being supplied to other countries.

17. References Much of the material was drawn from:
“Development of the Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) Radar” by Wm. A. Skillman and Robert E. Cowdery, recipients of the IEEE AESS 1995 Pioneer Award for the development of AWACS. Published in the IEEE Trans. on Aerospace and Electronic Systems, Vol 31, No. 4, Oct For a later version with color pictures, as well as this slide show, see the author's website at “
Link to my home page top right
Here you can also find two eye-witness accounts of the Hindenburg disaster of 1937 and a slide show “Remembering the Hindenburg” by the author.