ROCKET CENTER, W.Va. — Northrop Grumman opened a state-of-the-art missile production and assembly center Thursday at its Allegany Ballistics Laboratory.
The new Missile Integration Facility is the company’s latest expansion of its Naval Industrial Reserve Ordnance plant.
“This facility will allow us to deliver game-changing strike missile capability to war fighters with speed and scale, both for men and women of the U.S. military and for our friends and partners around the globe,” Erik Buice, vice president of Missile Products at Northrop Grumman, said.
The company said the facility will produce about 300 high-tech missiles a year and add engineering and manufacturing jobs to the area.
Northrop Grumman has invested more than $1 billion since 2018 in solid rocket motor and missile technologies, said Frank DeMauro, vice president and general manager of Weapons Systems at Northrop Grumman.
Allegany Ballistics Laboratory has been used by the Navy since the 1940s, DeMauro said. The missile integration facility known as Plant Four consists of over 100,000 square feet of advanced production space.
“The investment that Northrop Grumman has made into this point and into the future is nothing short of phenomenal,” said U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va. “We have over 1,600 people working here to protect our country and support our war fighters, which is their mission and there is no better place to do it than West Virginia.”
Capito emphasized the impact the company has on the community.
“If you go to the grocery store in this area and you look to your left or to your right, one of those people or one of those families are connected to this facility,” she said.
Northrop Grumman is the third largest manufacturing employer and largest defense contractor in West Virginia, DeMauro said.
“There is a recognition by not only the local governments but the federal government and the criticality of Allegany Ballistics Lab and the role it plays in munitions,” he said.