'Blueberry milkshake': Who is Noshir Sheriarji Gowadia? Bombay-born Parsi prodigy helped make US B-2 bombers, then became Pentagon nightmare
Noshir Sheriarji Gowadia, now 81, sits behind bars in Colorado's Florence, serving a 32-year sentence handed down on Jan 24, 2011.
The former Northrop engineer helped design the B-2 stealth bomber's propulsion system, held top-level security clearance, and taught classified aeronautics. He was convicted of
espionage
after passing classified information to Beijing.
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Born April 11, 1944, to a Parsi family, Gowadia reportedly earned the equivalent of a PhD by 15.
At 19, he left for US to study aeronautical engineering and became a naturalised American on July 25, 1969. A year later, he joined Northrop, where he was instrumental in developing the B-2 Spirit's infrared-shielded propulsion system.
"The entire geometry came from me," Gowadia later boasted. His internal codename: "Blueberry Milkshake".
Northrop secured the B-2 contract in 1981, the bomber's defining breakthrough being its radar-elusive profile.
Gowadia's work reduced visual, infrared, and radar signatures - vital to B-2's stealth edge. He left Northrop to start his own defence consultancy in Albuquerque, retaining security clearance.
He advised on CIA aircraft and nuclear weapons at Los Alamos, and in 1999, launched NS Gowadia Inc. But mounting expenses drove him to look abroad for clients - a search that ended in China. Gowadia made three trips to China, providing details on stealth propulsion. Beijing used the information to build an undetectable exhaust system for cruise missiles. His total payment: $110,000. Years later, satellites picked up what looked like a B-2 clone drone at a Chinese air base.
On Oct 13, 2005, FBI agents knocked on Gowadia's Hawaii home. Gowadia was convicted in 2010, on 14 counts including disclosure of B-2 designs to China and other nations.
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