Defense contractor Northrop Grumman recently announced that they have successfully created and tested a 100kW electric solid state laser. The 100kW threshold is important as it is considered powerful enough to be weapons-grade and is a major step-up from the single 15kW Firestrike Laser unit they developed last year.

While chemical laser systems such as those being developed by Boeing still out-power the electric variety, they are not very practical, requiring large quantities of toxic fuels.

Northrop reckons their solid state laser can be made even more powerful too thanks to its scalable design. The 100kW breakthrough itself was achieved by chaining seven smaller 15kW units together, proving that their design works not only in theory, but also in practice.

At 100kW, the level of light intensity achieved is comparable to focusing the light of 1,000 100W light globes on a small area. Work still needs to be done, however, to reduce the size and weight of the laser equipment – which is still too heavy and unwieldy to be practical on the battlefield. This is expected to take at least a few years and cost $100 million.

Check out the video below to see what the laser might look like in action.

Sources:
Northrop Grumman (Press Release) and LA Times and Wired

Remember Boeing’s Airborne Laser (ABL) which was designed to annihilate nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs)? Well, its first shots were fired through a calorimeter back in September and now, as Boeing announced today, has completed its first full-intensity ground test with the weapon integrated in its entirety inside a Boeing 747-400F aircraft.

This time the laser exited the craft through the nose-mounted turret and was focused onto an ICBM simulated target. The ray-gun equipped jumbo is now ready to try the deadly beam from the air on an intercept test and will do so in trials scheduled for sometime next year.

Though Boeing is the contractor for the ABL, the project is a collaborative effort with Northrop providing the laser, Lockheed Martin in the firing control department and Boeing sorting out battle management.

Full press release below:

EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif., Dec. 01, 2008 — The Boeing Company [NYSE: BA], industry teammates and the U.S. Missile Defense Agency last week fired a high-energy laser through the Airborne Laser’s (ABL) beam control/fire control system, completing the first ground test of the entire weapon system integrated aboard the aircraft.

During the test at Edwards Air Force Base, 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.

“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 shootdown demonstration planned for next year.”

Michael Rinn, Boeing vice president and ABL program director, said the next step for the program is a series of 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.”

The program has logged many accomplishments over the past several years. In 2005, the high-energy laser demonstrated lethal levels of duration and power in the System Integration Laboratory at Edwards. In 2007, ABL completed numerous flight tests that demonstrated its ability to track an airborne target, measure and compensate for atmospheric conditions, and deliver a surrogate high-energy laser’s simulated lethal beam on the target. In September 2008, the team achieved “first light” by firing the high-energy laser into a calorimeter aboard the aircraft.

Boeing is the prime contractor for ABL, which will provide speed-of-light capability to destroy all classes of ballistic missiles in their boost phase of flight.

The ABL aircraft is a modified Boeing 747-400F whose back half holds the high-energy laser, designed and built by Northrop Grumman. The front section of the aircraft contains the beam control/fire control system, developed by Lockheed Martin, and the battle management system, provided by Boeing.

Sources:
Boeing (Press Release)
Via and Image Credit: The Register

Weapons contractor Northrop Grumman have announced a breakthrough in battlefield tech with the creation of the world’s first weaponized solid-state laser. Called FIRESTRIKE, the ruggedized, high-energy, 15kW laser powers-up in less than half a second and is fully-developed, ready for action now.

The solid-state electric laser is still less powerful than its chemical counterparts also under development, such as the Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL) and Airborne Laser (ABL), but is well ahead in terms of logistical and safety considerations.

The chemical variety rely on large tanks of toxic fuel and emit corrosive gases as a by-product, but solid-state lasers have, up until now, been hindered by their limited strength. Each FIRESTRIKE unit weighs in at 400lb, which is still a long way from hand-held ray-guns, but a big improvement over previous tech.

One of the best features of the FIRESTRIKE (apart from its compact box-like size), is its scaling ability, where multiple units can be linked together to create a more powerful beam. This flexibility enables the assembly of a high-power defensive/offensive weapon with rapid tear-down time and easy transportation.

Source:
GlobeNewswire (Press Release)