$25.8 Million for Nightforce Sniper Dayscopes

Nightforce scope
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Nightforce, Inc. in Orofino, Idaho, was awarded a $25.8 million firm-fixed-price contract for its family of dayscopes, with accompanying service for spares, repairs and upgrades. These scope sights will be used by special forces and snipers in the US Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps. Work will be performed in Orofino, ID, and is expected to be complete by April 2015. This contract was competitively procured and solicited via the Federal Business Opportunities Web site, with 1 offer received by the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Crane, IN (N00164-10-D-JQ23).

This order is a focused example of a larger trend toward marksman-class optics buys by advanced militaries in general, and the US military in particular. High-quality optics, in the hands of trained riflemen, are proving to be extremely useful against opponents who regularly use human shields and commit related war crimes. In response, services are moving to ensure that their snipers are well equipped, and also shifting toward much wider fielding of high-quality combat scopes. That push includes both dayscopes like these, and day/night capable sights like the PAS-13 family. Since snipers work in pairs, buys like advanced spotter scopes are also underway.