ABL laser fired through beam control system

WASHINGTON, Dec. 2 (UPI) -- Boeing announced Monday that the Airborne Laser successfully activated a high-energy laser through its beam control/fire control system last week.

The company said the test was the final stage of the first full ground test "of the entire weapon system integrated aboard the aircraft."

Boeing is the prime integrator for the ABL program. The company said the test was carried out at Edwards Air Force Base in California by its industry teammates, especially Lockheed Martin, which built the beam control/fire control system of the laser; by Northrop Grumman, which built the laser weapon itself; and by the U.S. Missile Defense Agency.

In the test, "the laser beam traveled through the beam control/fire control system before exiting the aircraft through the nose-mounted turret. The beam control/fire control system steered and focused the beam onto a simulated ballistic-missile target," the company said.

"This test is significant because it demonstrated that the Airborne Laser missile defense program has successfully integrated the entire weapon system aboard the ABL aircraft," said Scott Fancher, vice president and general manager of Boeing Missile Defense Systems.

"With the achievement of the first firing of the laser aboard the aircraft in September, the team has now completed the two major milestones it hoped to accomplish in 2008, keeping ABL on track to conduct the missile shoot-down demonstration planned for next year," Fancher said.

Michael Rinn, Boeing vice president and ABL program director, stated that the next goal for the ABL project would be to conduct several longer-duration laser firings through the beam control/fire control system.

"Once we complete those tests, we will begin demonstrating the entire weapon system in flight," Rinn said. "The team is meeting its commitment to deliver this transformational directed-energy weapon system in the near term."

Boeing said the latest success followed a series major breakthroughs in the formerly troubled program. It noted a 2005 test that confirmed the high-energy laser could be fired with deadly levels of duration and power in the System Integration Laboratory at Edwards AFB.

Last year the Airborne Laser was subjected to many flight tests that confirmed its ability to monitor, target, hit and destroy airborne targets, including taking offset readings to allow for atmospheric conditions, and then firing an effective high-energy laser's simulated lethal beam on the target.

In September the laser reached its "first light" milestone when the high-energy laser was shot into a calorimeter aboard the aircraft.

The ABL's goal is to produce a speed-of-light capability to all types of ballistic missiles including intercontinental ballistic missiles during their boost phase of flight.

Raytheon announced last week that two Japanese Patriot teams practiced targeting of the anti-ballistic missile interceptors in exercises carried out at Fort Bliss, Texas. The company said the tests came under its responsibilities to offer operational support for a once-yearly service practice carried out by Japan Air Self-Defense Force troops.

"From Raytheon's perspective, all visual indications and initial data readings support a successful mission," said Dan Smith, president of Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems. "The results of this annual service practice are indicative of the system's reliability and the high readiness of Japanese Patriot crews."

Raytheon said its Integrated Defense System engineers gave operational support to the exercise involving "intermediate maintenance and data collection and analysis validating intercept parameters."

Raytheon remains the prime contractor for the Patriot ABM system that provides defense against short-range and intermediate-range ballistic missile threats. Japan is now one of 10 nations that deploy the Patriot as a major element in their air and missile defense program.

Successive Japanese governments, starting with that of former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, have invested heavily in the Patriot program as a major element of Japan's layered ABM defense system to defend the densely populated island nation of 130 million people from possible nuclear ballistic missile attack from neighboring North Korea across the Sea of Japan.