UAVs-mounted aircraft defense system demonstrated
Until now there have been two leading approaches to protecting civilian aircraft from shoulder-fired missiles: One approach proposed placing the defensive systems on the planes to be protected, the other advocated surrounding airports with a protective umbrella; a third approach has now been demonstrated: Mounting defensive systems on UAVs loitering high in the sky
Northrop Grumman has demonstrated a missile defense system that is attached to a UAV and watches for missiles as it circles approximately ten miles above an airport. The system uses sensors to detect missile launches and lasers to blind the infrared seekers that home in on a hot jet exhaust. RFDesign reports that the method was demonstrated in tests on 8-9 September at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico. From an altitude of 50,000 feet, an infrared sensor was able to detect a missile launch, relay the information to an on-board missile tracker and then hit the missile with a blast from a laser.
This news is important because cost has been a major obstacle in the effort to protect commercial airliners from the threat of shoulder-fired missiles. A UAV-mounted missile defense systems may well make protecting airports more affordable as it would be cheaper to build a fleet of missile-jamming UAVs than to install missile defenses on each of the U.S. 6,800 commercial airliners.
DHS has spent about $230 million since 2004 on contracts with Northrop and BAE Systems, and with companies such as United Airlines and FedEx (these companies were testing the defensive systems) to develop and test missile defense systems. Laser jammers that would be installed on individual aircraft emerged as the preferred technology and the department set a goal of reducing the cost of missile-jamming systems to $1 million or less per airliner. Northrop has met that goal, but equipping the U.S. airline fleet with missile jammers would cost approximately $6 billion. Airlines, reeling under increased fuel costs and massive financial losses, are in no position to purchase this defense systems. The deficit-plagued U.S. government is also unwilling to do so.
Looking for ways to cover the most aircraft with the least money, DHS hit on the idea of putting missile defense systems on UAVs. Cruising at 65,000 feet, a single UAV could monitor an area 50 miles across. In the Washington, D.C. area, for example, a single UAV could provide missile defense for Dulles, Reagan National and Baltimore-Washington airports.
A ground-based system, such as the one proposed by Raytheon, might not be able to protect an entire airport where planes are landing at one end and taking off at the other (unless, that is, the protective umbrella is extended for miles beyond the airport itself to defend the airplanes’ take-off and landing paths).