{"id":5280,"date":"2009-12-29T03:54:50","date_gmt":"2009-12-29T12:24:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/?p=5280"},"modified":"2009-12-29T03:54:50","modified_gmt":"2009-12-29T12:24:50","slug":"military-working-to-unleash-laser-weapons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/?p=5280","title":{"rendered":"Military working to unleash laser weapons"},"content":{"rendered":"

http:\/\/www.stripes.com\/article.asp?section=104&article=66915<\/a><\/p>\n

Military working to unleash laser weapons<\/h1>\n
By Mark Abramson<\/a>, Stars and Stripes
\nEuropean edition, Tuesday, December 29, 2009<\/span><\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n
Photo courtesy of Boeing<\/div>\n
The military is testing laser weapons and is developing a system that could be mounted on light vehicles. The Laser Avenger has the laser mounted on the left of the vehicle.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n
Boeing officials describe the High Energy Laser Technology Demonstrator, shown in this photo illustration. It would have a range of 8 to 10 kilometers.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\n

KAISERSLAUTERN, Germany \u2014 The military is inching closer to using laser weapons on the battlefield after recent tests in which lasers were used to shoot down a drone aircraft and were fired from an airplane to damage a vehicle on the ground.<\/p>\n

The Air Force recently test-fired its Advanced Tactical Laser from a C-130 Hercules, scorching a truck\u2019s hood. And last month the Army and Air Force teamed with Boeing Co. for a demonstration in which lasers on the ground shot down drones at China Lake, Calif., company officials said.<\/p>\n

Laser weapon projects in the works include the Navy\u2019s powerful Free Electron Laser; the Advanced Tactical Laser; the Laser Avenger, which was used to shoot down the drones at China Lake; and the Army\u2019s High Energy Laser Technology Demonstrator, or HEL TD.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe technology is there,\u201d said Scott McPheeters, senior research engineer at the Army\u2019s Program Executive Office Missiles and Space in Huntsville, Ala. \u201cWhat we need to do is get the systems put into more rugged configurations [to handle different environments].\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the reasons the Army is interested in lasers is because lasers travel at the speed of light, which means such systems have a quick reaction time, McPheeters said.<\/p>\n

Some laser weapons the Army is working on could be ready in as little as six months, but fielding those weapons would take longer due to procurement and production processes, McPheeters said. The HEL TD could take two or three years to put together, he said.<\/p>\n

Lee Gutheinz, Boeing\u2019s program director for High Energy Laser\/Electro Optical Systems for Directed Energy Systems, described HEL TD as a \u201cwheeled mobile laser cannon\u201d with a range of eight to 10 kilometers.<\/p>\n

Northrop Grumman Corp. and Textron Systems also are developing the lasers for the HEL TD, McPheeters said.<\/p>\n

The Navy\u2019s pursuit of lasers includes a special center at its Naval Post Graduate School in Monterey, Calif., opened this month, to test a Free Electron Laser on loan from Stanford University, said Bill Colson, a professor and FEL expert at the Navy school. The Air Force has shown an interest as well, he said.<\/p>\n

Air Force officials declined to be interviewed for this story.<\/p>\n

The Navy has spent $120 million on FEL research since 1997, and hopes to develop such a weapon to knock anti-ship missiles out of the sky and defeat other threats to its fleet by 2025, a release said. Other uses mentioned include taking out smaller ships, including pirate skiffs.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t destroy as much as a lot of other offensive weapons would, which is one of its advantages and disadvantages,\u201d Colson said.<\/p>\n

Laser systems do have drawbacks, officials said. Dirty, gusty, cloudy or rainy conditions could hamper lasers\u2019 ranges and cause other problems.<\/p>\n

To see the laser in action, visit the Boeing Web site at: http:\/\/www.boeing.com\/defense-space\/ic\/des\/videos\/index.html<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

http:\/\/www.stripes.com\/article.asp?section=104&article=66915 Military working to unleash laser weapons By Mark Abramson, Stars and Stripes European edition, Tuesday, December 29, 2009 Photo courtesy of Boeing The military is testing laser weapons and is developing a system that could be mounted on light vehicles. The Laser Avenger has the laser mounted on the left of the vehicle. Boeing … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Military working to unleash laser weapons”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5280"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5280"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5280\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5282,"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5280\/revisions\/5282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dmzhawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}