Air Force to deploy ground-based lasers in first field test of ‘directed energy’ weapon
Lasers are going operational fast. Just in time to counter hypersonic weapons.
Read the rest of the article at the link.The Air Force announced Friday it will soon deploy two ground-based laser weapons to an undisclosed location to test how they can be used against small drones, the service’s first “operational field test” of an experimental “directed energy” weapon.
On Friday afternoon, the Air Force announced a $23 million sole-source contract for two of Raytheon’s High Energy Laser Weapons Systems, through which the systems are to be tested for 12 months in an undisclosed “contested environment” outside the continental United States.
“What we really want to do is figure out how we can deploy these systems in an environment where our warfighters work and train every day,” said Evan Hunt, director of high energy laser and counter-UAS at Raytheon. (UAS stands for unmanned aerial system.)