Navy shells out for development of missile-killing free-electron laser

You may think that the Navy's just the baby brother to the two other US Armed Forces, but its weapon development record definitely shows otherwise. Just over two years after building an 8-Megajoule railgun, the branch has penned two $7 million checks to defense contractors Boeing and Raytheon for the design and development of a free-electron laser (FEL). For what it's worth, such a device has been yearned for since a day after the dawn of time, as unlike chemical-based lasers, the FEL would be 100 percent electric and easier to move. For those unaware,this stormy petrel of a weapon would be used to blast down missiles in mid-flight, all while putting on a pretty impressive light show. 'Course, the Navy must also figure out how to build a massive energy generating ship in order to use it, but let's not get too far ahead of ourselves here, okay?

[Image courtesy of AIP]

[Samurai Jack Posted Apr 24th 2009 8:32PM]

If you really want to be pedantic you should say that the Air Force separated from the Army in 1947. They existed before that as the Army Air Corps, founded in 1926. Still the youngest branch of the service, unless you want to use the Army's founding date for them too.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 24th 2009 11:22PM]

It may be the youngest, but the air force is the coolest. What other branch of the military has a stargate?

[Samurai Jack Posted Apr 24th 2009 8:33PM]

"Excuse me. Can you tell me where the nuclear wessels are?"

[paul34 Posted Apr 24th 2009 10:50PM]

+1, I just thought about that! LOL

[blogwhitesitescom Posted Apr 24th 2009 8:45PM]

The navy loves nothing more than building weapons that will not be utilized by the USAF. Any energy weapon that needs that much power would need a nuclear reactor to supply it. Guess what the USAF planes don't have? Nuclear reactors. The Navy and USAF are consistently competing for defense dollars. If 7 million is all it takes to build a working prototype, I think that will be a huge win for Navy over USAF. Considering the USAF can't build the same thing for a price tag anywhere close to it. IT costs a lot more to maintain USAF bases than Ships. The real question is how can we get one of these on a satalite so we can play "Shoot fish in a bucket"

[Wwhat Posted Apr 25th 2009 6:48AM]

Navy is also very vulnerable, once a missile hits a ship it's pretty much screwed, and many nations have pretty good missiles, and the phalanx certainly isn't foolproof, so yeah you can see a rationale other than some silly fight with the USAF can't you?

[blogwhitesitescom Posted Apr 24th 2009 8:47PM]

Looks like these are Destined for mounting on a Carrier
"The US Navy outlined a requirement for a minimum 150% increase in the power-generation capacity for the CVN 21 carrier compared to the Nimitz Class carriers. The increased power capacity is needed for the four electro-magnetic aircraft launchers and for future systems such as directed energy weapons that might be feasible during the carrier's 50-year lifespan."
http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/cvn-21/

[TheAngryIntern Posted Apr 24th 2009 8:58PM]

too bad the CVN-21 program got scrapped. The new class of carrier (Ford class) will start with the Gerald Ford and be the CVN-78.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 24th 2009 8:47PM]

How is it a Free-Electron Laser when the Navy paid $7 million to Boeing and Raytheon?

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 24th 2009 9:17PM]

Remember kids, "Marines" stands for "my ass rides in Navy equipment" and that the Coast Guard isn't military (but they own the fucking waves - USCG steps on any American sea vessel, and they own that bad boy instantly, from a Navy ship on down to a six-pack or a PWC) because they're in the Department of Homeland Security (formerly Interior, IIRC) as someone stated up above.

But the Navy has really cool toys.

[paul34 Posted Apr 24th 2009 10:51PM]

Doesn't the CG fall under the DoD at times of war, if the DoD chooses to do so?

[Acqua206 Posted Apr 25th 2009 1:44AM]

Oh come on, the Coast Guard is a joke and you know it. They used to be in the Department of Transportation for crying out loud. You think you'd board my submarine and own it? Ok sure, go right ahead. The thought of any Coasty as the OOD or the EOOW is hilarious.

[DirtySocks85 Posted Apr 24th 2009 10:08PM]

Surprised that this hasn't been said yet but...

pew pew!

[benahad Posted Apr 25th 2009 1:08PM]

lol i was reading all the posts first before i posted. I've gotta say it anyway..

Errr.. Pew pew pew?

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 25th 2009 1:11AM]

Anyone with half an IQ should ignore falconz for his complete and utter lack of shame in spreading complete crap.

If 20Kg of nuclear material was leaked, the IAEA would know. Tolerances for leaked radioactive materials are basically 0. The Navy has to and will report any such problems, because the alternative if the world finds out the wrong way is shutting down all nuclear subs. Leaks are also very rare, and when they happen generally, we're talking milligrams. Grab a pinch of salt, you've got more salt then radioactive material was probably leaked by all Nuclear Reactors in the world over past 10 years total. I can't emphasize enough how anal reactor safety is in the nuclear world, because they understand that one screw up and nuclear is done for.

Secondly, do you even know what a reactor produces? Do you even know what it means for something to be radioactive? Lead isn't even a fission product. What exactly have you been smoking? Lead lining barely has enough radioactivity to show up on a geiger counter, let alone the fact that it will decay away in a few weeks. Not to mention that any thermoelectric cycle uses water these days. You know those coal plants, they heat water too. Don't like it, fine run Helium as your coolant. Gas Reactors are rather effective as well. It's no longer the 1970's. Many of nuclear's so called problems have or can be solved on the technical side. It's the moronic premonitions and blatant mis-information of people like falconz that's the problem

[Acqua206 Posted Apr 25th 2009 1:49AM]

I don't know about that man. We did purified overboard discharges of primary coolant all the time to maintain chemistry and whatnot. It was "purified" but that shit was still hot. I know we sure as hell didn't make any potable water when we were discharging.

[mRichardy629 Posted Apr 25th 2009 1:16AM]

2 branches? there is 5

Navy
Coast Guard
Army
Marine Corps
Air Force

[Wwhat Posted Apr 25th 2009 7:00AM]

They said 2 additional, so 3 total, and coastguard is either considered navy or more a 'cops' kind of thing, and marines are soldiers of the navy.

So the 3 are:
Navy
Air force
Army

Seems simple enough, and usable enough for normal people.

[rudolfo2 Posted Apr 25th 2009 5:10AM]

And what do you do if Chinese carrier killer missile flies towards you with 10-12 mach speed ?? You're dead before you blink,no time to power the laser gun.

[Wwhat Posted Apr 25th 2009 6:51AM]

There's a limit to speed in atmosphere without the missile breaking up and while it still having range, also even at high speed if the distance is right you can prepare, and obviously you'd use some sort of capacitor (superconducting ring?) to pre-charge it in stress situations.
Not that the navy won't screw it up in practise, they have a proud history of screwups.

[FuturePastNow Posted Apr 25th 2009 11:37AM]

The point defense laser arrives :)

Nothing hits its target faster than light, so lasers are obvious anti-missile weapons, if they can be made powerful enough.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 25th 2009 2:12PM]

The technology is cool but...

The advantage of some of the current anti-missile tech is that they also use missiles. The range and targeting of which can be used in "over-horizon" situations giving you extra time to react to incoming threats. I'm am in no way an expert but it as far as I'm aware a beam weapon can only be used as a line-of-sight weapon. Are we going to fly big mirrors to bounce them off of? I'd hate to be on that AWAC flight. This limits its effective range and compresses available reaction time. Granted, the beam travels much much faster than a missile or projectile so maybe the final time to react is a break even deal or better but it makes me wonder.

Additionally, aren't some intercept missiles a "close-enough" sort of thing. Get them within a certain kill-zone range and you're still effective without actually hitting the target. With a laser don't you have to hit the object?

I would also assume that the "barrel" of this thing would have to be mounted relatively high on a given ship. Would this make it more vulnerable to a missile system? What's the heat signature of this thing when it fires? If you've got a sub hunting for your carrier group isn't this like turning on the grand-opening spotlights? How are its energy levels affected by bad weather and fog? Because that never happens on the ocean.

I'm sure this has all been addressed in staff meetings but It would be interesting to hear the arguments on these points. It seems a safe bet this would play a part with other weapon systems.

Now as far as nuclear power on aircraft, the Airforce did experiment with the idea a couple decades ago, using the reactor to drive turbine engines if I remember right. They also went very quiet about it a little while after. Now, more that likely it turned out to be a bad idea and the research was canned. Or it might have turned into a black program. I'd be willing to bet though that someone's looking at the idea again for autonomous aircraft as it would provide a huge gain in loiter times over target. With no crew on-board your only limiting factor is fuel. If enough power can be generated to also power an on board laser system it would seem like a good idea. Now you don't need to re-crew, refuel, or rearm. Hmm, a year over target with a weapon that's highly selective, very accurate, and functions essentially indefinitely? Sounds useful to me.