WASHINGTON, Feb. 8 (UPI) -- Raytheon has tested a small vehicle-mounted missile that intercepted a rocket-propelled grenade in a simulation of an ambush on the streets of Iraq.
The test of the Quick Kill "hit avoidance system" could lead to a deployable counterpunch to the ubiquitous weapon employed against U.S. troops before the end of the year.
"Quick Kill's speed, precision and effectiveness are truly amazing," boasted Raytheon Combat Systems Vice President Glynn Raymer. "It offers our current force a level of battlefield protection that no one has ever seen before."
The Feb. 7 test carried out at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology test range involved an RPG fired at close range against a Stryker combat vehicle equipped with the Quick Kill system. The Stryker is a wheeled armored car that is projected as a mainstay of the Army's future order of battle; Stryker brigades have already been deployed to Iraq.
The Quick Kill includes a scanning radar that can detect an incoming threat and immediately vertically launches a precision-guided missile that pitches over, homes in on the RPG round, and then destroys it in the blink of an eye with minimal concussion and risk to the Stryker crew.
Raytheon called it the "equivalent of firing a weapon around a corner and hitting another weapon, while both speed through the air at hundreds of meters per second."
The company said it developed the system with its own funds and brought it from drawing board to field testing in about six months.
