Lockheed Martin to scale its highest powered laser to 500 kilowatts power level to support military platforms.
Lockheed Martin will scale its laser technology to a new benchmark: a 500 kW-class laser, the most powerful laser Lockheed Martin has produced, topping its 300 kW-class laser power level developed under a contract from the Department of Defense.
The 500 kW-class laser, developed under a new contract just awarded by OUSD (R&E), is the second phase of the High Energy Laser Scaling Initiative (HELSI).
This phase of HELSI aims to increase the laser’s power level while achieving excellent beam quality and optimizing efficiency, size, weight, and volume for the continuous-wave high-energy laser sources. Proving this capability will reduce the risk for the Department of Defense acquisition and fielding of high-powered laser weapon systems for all six military branches.
Rick Cordaro, vice president of Mission Systems & Weapons at Lockheed Martin, said:
“OUSD (R&E) has invested to mature high energy lasers in support of America’s warfighters. At the same time, Lockheed Martin has invested in our production infrastructure in anticipation of the Department of Defense’s demand for laser weapons that have additional layers of protection with deep magazines, low cost per engagement, high speed of light delivery and high precision response reducing logistics requirements. The 500-kW laser will incorporate our successes from the 300-kW system and lessons learned from legacy programs to further prove the capability to defend against a range of threats.”
Images credit Lockheed Martin
source Lockheed Martin
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