BOSTON, May 25 (UPI) -- The radar system penciled in for the next class of U.S. aircraft carrier successfully underwent its first sea trials, it was announced Thursday.
The AN/SPY-3 acquired and tracked a live controlled aircraft during the series of tests, Raytheon said in a news release.
The multi-purpose system will be the used on the transformational CVN-21 aircraft carrier as well as the Navy's next-generation destroyers.
"SPY-3 embraces new ship-design requirements for reduced radar cross-section, significantly reduced maintenance and manning requirements, and total-ownership cost reduction," Raytheon Vice President Vice President Mike Hoeffler boasted. "No other naval radar delivers such an array of capabilities and benefits in a single package."
The SPY-3 will be integrated with a higher-frequency S-band volume search radar that monitors aircraft and activity on shore. The United States plans to make to combined punch of the SPY-3 and the S-band radars a major naval asset in the 21st Century.
The system will be deployed aboard the CVN-21 carrier class, which used to be known as the CVX and will begin replacing the Nimitz-class nuclear carriers in the next decade. The system is also part of the new destroyers planned for a variety of missions in the 21st Century, not the least of which are traditional roles as shore support and providing cover for carrier battle groups.
