Pentagon seeks laser armed drone to bring down ICBMs by 2023

Mrbsct · Jun 16, 2017

MDA seeks laser-armed HALE UAV for counter-ICBM role
Gareth Jennings, London - IHS Jane's Missiles & Rockets
14 June 2017

The MDA's efforts to field a laser-armed HALE UAV may well be focused on the RQ-4 Global Hawk, though the agency is interested in systems that might meet at a future date the specification required. Source: Northrop Grumman
The United States is looking to field a laser-armed unmanned aircraft to intercept intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) towards the middle of the next decade, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) disclosed on 13 June.

In a solicitation posted on the Federal Business Opportunities (FedBizOpps) website, the MDA Advanced Technology Directorate said it requires a high-altitude long-endurance (HALE) unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) with the payload capacity needed to carry a high-energy laser system payload to high altitudes for Boost Phase Intercept (BPI) of ICBMs in the 2023 timeframe.

"The results of this RFI [request for information] will inform future programme options for maturing BPI technology and capability following the current Low Power Laser Demonstrator (LPLD) effort. Proposed aircraft should be able to maintain continuous positive ground control and are expected to operate from the Pacific Missile Range Facility in Hawaii and Edwards Air Force Base in California," the solicitation read.

While the MDA said it was seeking a HALE UAV for this role, it did note that manned concepts will be considered "with the appropriate justification".

Performance specifications listed in the RFI call for the HALE UAV to be able to fly higher than 63,000 ft; to have an endurance of greater than 36 hours on-station (plus flight time for notional 3,000 km transit to station); to be able to fly at a cruise speed of less than Mach 0.45 at on-station altitude; to have a payload capacity of at least 5,000 lb (2,268 kg) and as much as 12,500 lb (5,670 kg); have power available for the payload of at least 140 kW and as much as 280 kW for greater than 30 minutes with no loss in platform altitude; to support a one- to two-metre aperture optical payload; have low vibration at altitude, with angular displacements of less than 50 µrad; and to maintain continuous positive ground control.
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http://www.janes.com/article/71412/mda-seeks-laser-armed-hale-uav-for-counter-icbm-role

Questerr · Jun 16, 2017

The last ABM laser was so big it took up the front end of a 767. That's going to have to be a big ass drone.

APACHERAT · Jun 16, 2017

Some what related.

Just released today.

Report to Congress on Navy Laser, Railgun and Hypervelocity Projectiles

https://news.usni.org/2017/06/15/re...230369141&mc_cid=ff217e3cb7&mc_eid=2aedd16e3c

waltky · Mar 22, 2018

Looks like the Army already beat `em to it...

Navy Likely to Be First Service to Field Laser Weapons, Expert Says
22 Mar 2018 - If one service has made sufficient progress to use laser weapons in its arsenal in the next few years, it's the U.S. Navy.

If one service has made sufficient progress to use laser weapons in its arsenal in the next few years, it's the U.S. Navy, according to the former director of the Missile Defense Agency. "The Navy right now is the most forward-leaning because they're the only service that has actually fielded an operational prototype weapon, the Laser Weapon System that they put on the USS Ponce," said Trey Obering, an executive vice president at consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton who leads the directed energy innovation team. Military.com spoke with Obering, a former Air Force lieutenant general, fighter pilot and NASA space shuttle engineer, in the midst of this week's Directed Energy Summit hosted by Booz Allen Hamilton and the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

Getting the laser in the hands of sailors to survey how and when they would use the LaWS was critical to making laser weapons a reality in wartime missions, Obering argued. The Air Force and Army have struggled to do so. Obering recognized that each of the services operates in very different environments, which affect range and power levels. While the Army, "a close second to the Navy," he said, is looking to get directed-energy weapons on its Stryker vehicles, the Air Force has hit some speed bumps. "For the Air Force, the challenge is size, weight and power," Obering said. "They need to be able to use them in either pods under the wings, or on unmanned drones." The difficulty will be to get enough power for the size of the weapon should it be mounted to the aircraft.

The Afloat Forward Staging Base (Interim) USS Ponce (ASB(I) 15) conducts an operational demonstration of the Office of Naval Research (ONR)-sponsored Laser Weapon System (LaWS) while deployed to the Arabian Gulf

Obering said he is pleased to hear the Air Force may test laser weapons on F-15 Eagle fighter jets this summer. Citing a conversation Jeff Stanley, deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force for science, technology and engineering, had with reporters Tuesday, The Japan Times reported the F-15 will use 50-kilowatt lasers for drone zapping exercises as part of the Self-protect High Energy Laser Demonstrator project, known as SHiELD. "The Air Force in the past has certainly been on the forefront in research and development, and put a lot of money into the Airborne Laser program," Obering said, referencing a now-defunct, multi-billion-dollar program dating back to the early 1990s. "But they got a little gun shy … because of some of the limitations we found with that system," mainly how complex and restrictive it was for its awkward, massive weight and size, he said.

Obering's comments come as the military service secretaries have begun meeting to discuss how to better collaborate on technology, lasers included. He noted, however, each service will have contrasting applications for laser tech no matter what conclusions are reached in those meetings. "Anywhere you need the speed of light, it makes it ideal because the weapons operate at the speed of light," Obering said. "The ranges we're talking about, it's instantaneous … at 186,000 miles [per] second." But "for the application, you may want a different lasing source: a different wavelength, a different frequency," he said. "I don't see that everybody's going to go to the same lasing source, but they all have power requirements, they have to generate cooling capability, they're going to have size requirements, and power input requirements," Obering said.

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Raytheon's Laser Dune Buggy Set to Fry Enemy Quadcopters
20 Mar 2018 - The funny-looking vehicle promises to give maneuver formations defense against drones.

It may look like R2-D2 from Star Wars slapped on top of a dune buggy, but Raytheon says its new laser weapon holds the promise of providing maneuver formations with portable air defenses against drones. "This can identify a quadcopter out to five clicks," or 5,000 meters, and then fry it with a laser, said Evan Hunt, business development lead for high-energy lasers at Raytheon. Hunt spoke as he stood in the Pentagon's courtyard Monday in front of a Mad Max-style Polaris off-road vehicle mounted with a Raytheon Multi-Spectral Targeting System, a combination of electro-optical and infrared sensors with a high-energy laser (HEL). The system can operate remotely or as part of an integrated air defense network, he said. "You can park it at the end of a runway or at a [forward operating base]," Hunt said.

But one of its main advantages, he said, is that the laser can be carried by an off-road vehicle with maneuver formations to provide defense against unmanned aerial systems, or drones. "Basically, we're putting a laser on a dune buggy to knock drones out of the sky," Dr. Ben Allison, director of Raytheon's high-energy laser product line, said in a company release. The company says the concept grew out of a meeting between Allison and Raytheon Chairman and CEO Tom Kennedy on adversaries' increased use of small drones for surveillance and as weapons when fitted with small explosives. In the siege of Mosul last year, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) used small drones extensively to target the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF).

Raytheon mounted a high-energy laser on a dune buggy that may offer maneuver formations defense against drones.

Kennedy told Allison he had heard that a Patriot missile had been used to shoot down a cheap drone fitted with a grenade-type munition, and they both began thinking there had to be a better cost-to-kill ratio, Raytheon said. The quadcopters used by ISIS are worth a few hundred dollars, while Patriot missiles cost about $2 million apiece. "So, the question became, 'What can we do for a counter-UAS system using a high-energy laser, and do it quickly.' We wanted to take the assets and capabilities Raytheon has today and use them to really affect this asymmetrical threat. We settled on a small system that's hugely capable," Allison said.

Art Morrish, vice president of Advanced Concepts and Technology at Raytheon Space and Airborne Systems, said of the system, "Right now, it's a shoot-on-the-halt capability. You drive the vehicle wherever you're going to drive it. You stop, and then you fire up the laser. "That makes it great for protecting forward operating bases and places where convoys have to stop. The next step is to set it up so you can actually shoot on the move," he said. Raytheon is expected to demonstrate the system at the Army's Maneuver Fires Experiment at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, this December. The Polaris mounted with the laser was part of a number of corporate displays in the Pentagon's courtyard in a sign of the military's growing interest and investment in directed energy weapons to defend against an array of threats.

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Pentagon seeks laser armed drone to bring down ICBMs by 2023

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Pentagon seeks laser armed drone to bring down ICBMs by 2023

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