Latest news with #IntegratedOpticalDazzlerandSurveillance
Yahoo
06-02-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
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.
Yahoo
04-02-2025
- Yahoo
US Navy hits drone with HELIOS laser in successful test
The U.S. Navy successfully tested its High-Energy Laser with Integrated Optical Dazzler and Surveillance, or HELIOS, system on one of its warships in fiscal 2024, according to a recently released report. The Arleigh Burke-class destroyer Preble fired its HELIOS system to zap an aerial drone during a weapons testing exercise in 2024, according to an Office of the Director, Operational Test and Evaluation report published in January. The report, which did not provide a date or time of the laser's deployment, included a black-and-white photo showing a streak of white light beaming out from the vessel into the sky. The Center for Countermeasures — a program developed in 1972 to gauge the Defense Department's ability to combat emerging technological threats — conducted 32 tests in fiscal year 2024, which included the 'development and evaluation of directed energy weapons,' according to the report. This test conducted on the Preble was run 'to verify and validate the functionality, performance, and capability' of the HELIOS system, the report said. It's unclear where the test took place. The Preble departed Naval Base San Diego, California, in September 2024 and arrived in Yokosuka, Japan, on Oct. 12, 2024. Behind the headlines: Lessons from the Red Sea crisis Lockheed Martin delivered the 60-plus-kilowatt laser to the Navy in August 2022, when it became the first tactical laser system to be installed in existing ships. Unmanned warfare, especially in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, where Navy ships have intercepted drones and missiles launched by Iran-backed Houthi rebels since fall 2023, has underscored the need to accelerate the technology's deployment for the Navy, Military Times previously reported. In 2024, Vice Adm. Brendan McLane, acknowledging the Navy did not have a laser it could field, noted a directed-energy weapon would assist U.S. warships against Houthi combatants. The integration of lasers on Navy vessels would also allow crews to conserve munitions, Military Times previously reported. The Defense Department has spent $1 billion annually to develop high-energy lasers and high-power microwaves, but without the tangible results that Navy leadership craves, according to the same report. The service has faced challenges in developing and implementing directed-energy weapons for myriad reasons, including difficulty determining laser use in the field and concerns the system won't meet operational needs. Overall tech development, finding a power source aboard ships and potential obstacles presented by the environment, like fog and wind, have also proved challenging. Currently, the Navy has eight Optical Dazzling Interdictor, or ODIN, laser dazzlers, which disrupt enemy sensors, integrated into Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, according to the Congressional Research Service's December 2024 report on Navy lasers. There is also a 150-kilowatt Laser Weapon System Demonstrator, or LWSD, installed on a San Antonio-class amphibious transport ship.
