Navy Installing More Directed Energy Weapons on DDGs, Conducting Land-Based Laser Testing This Year
By: Megan Eckstein
April 7, 2021 3:37 PM
Artist’s concept of a HELIOS laser system aboard a U.S. destroyer. Lockheed Martin Image
RIVERDALE, Md. – The Navy continues to learn more about a pair of directed energy weapons, as the service installs the fourth and fifth dazzler system this year and begins land-based testing of a high-energy laser weapon, the program executive officer for integrated warfare systems told USNI News.
The Navy has been in parallel working on an Optical Dazzling Interdictor, Navy (ODIN) program, a nonlethal weapon that can confuse instead of shoot down drones, which will become part of the High Energy Laser and Integrated Optical-dazzler and Surveillance (HELIOS) program that Lockheed Martin has been developing since 2018.
“ODIN is unique because it’s a government-designed, -built, -tested, -installed system, which I think allowed us to go fairly quickly and meet that urgent need that came from the fleet,†Rear Adm. Seiko Okano told USNI News last week.
https://news.usni.org/2021/04/07/navy-installing-more-directed-energy-weapons-on-ddgs-conducting-land-based-laser-testing-this-year
