US zaps drone using powerful laser weapon with 5-mile range in secret tests
The United States Navy (the Navy) has reported testing its High-Energy Laser with an Integrated Optical Dazzler and Surveillance (HELIOS) system to take out an aerial target drone. The test was conducted onboard the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Preble and occurred at an undisclosed location in 2024.
According to the Navy, the test was conducted 'to verify and validate the functionality, performance and capability' of HELIOS. It is also a critical stepping stone to operationalizing these high-tech futuristic weapon systems, which reportedly have a maximum power output of 150 kW.
Little other information has been publically released, but it is known that the ship was relocated from San Diego to Japan in September of 2024. HELIOS, a 60-kW directed-energy weapons platform, was installed aboard the Preble in 2022.
The weapon has replaced one of Preble's pair of Mk 15 Phalanx Close-In Weapons System (CIWS) just in front of the bridge. Beyond its high-energy blasting abilities, the weapon is also a "dazzler" to blind and confuse optical-seeking missiles and drones.
It also has a set of powerful optical sensors that can serve a secondary intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) role. HELIOS is designed to engage, destroy, or turn off aerial targets like drones or small boats (both manned and unnamed).
The weapon allegedly has a maximum range of 5 miles (8 km), but environmental factors and atmospheric interference influence the range. However, the upside is that shooting it is relatively cheap, with each blast costing pennies in electricity.
This is a rounding error compared to the guided-missile destroyers' other situations, especially its stockpile of missiles.
According to The War Zone (TWZ), HELIOS has already been integrated into the Navy's Aegis Combat System, dramatically improving its utility.
"We're continuously upgrading the multi-source integration infusion capability of the Aegis weapon system and looking to bring in new weapons and sensors and coordinate hard kill and soft kill," said Rich Calabrese, director of Surface Navy Mission Systems at Lockheed Martin, told TWZ.
"We're already integrating the HELIOS Laser Weapon System with the Aegis Weapon System CSL [Common Source Library] in our lab here in New Jersey. In fact, we've … The guy who's now managing the laser program … He let me know the other day that we recently fired a laser here under the control of the Aegis Weapon System computer program," he added.
Lockheed Martin was first contracted to develop HELIOS in 2018, and beyond the Preble is expected to install another system on one of Preble's sisters in the not-too-distant future.
Despite technological progress, such as the most recent test, such systems are limited. They can only shoot a single target at a time and have power and thermal limitations that prevent continuous fire like a projectile weapon.
To this end, many see them as low-volume point-defense systems for the foreseeable future until such limitations can be overcome. However, other innovations, like linking them to independent renewable power sources, would make them valuable additions to a warship's arsenal.
'These things are based on renewable energy so that I can recharge the system … I don't have to worry about payload [or] volume with directed energy. All those things appeal to a navy, [but] we just haven't matriculated that into a place … that's ready for prime time,' U.S. Fleet Forces Command head Admiral Daryl Caudle told Breaking Defense.
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