PEO(U&W) Public Affairs
NAVAL AIR SYSTEMS COMMAND, PATUXENT RIVER, Md. – The Department of the Navy recently declared the Joint Standoff Weapon (JSOW) C-1 ready for full operational capability.
All U.S. squadrons are now outfitted with JSOW C-1, the Navy’s first air-to-ground network-enabled weapon capable of attacking stationary land and moving maritime targets.
“Formal declaration of full operational capability for JSOW C-1 is the final step in a phased approach to introducing this weapon and its capabilities to the fleet,” said Cmdr. Sam Messer, JSOW deputy program manager. “It is the culmination of a complete team effort to deliver not only the hardware, but the training, tactics development and support infrastructure to ensure we field a meaningful warfighting capability.”
JSOW C-1 reached initial operational capability in 2016. The program then began a series of four fleet-wide exercises that demonstrated the capabilities of the weapon in increasingly complex scenarios.
The road to full operational capability began with RIMPAC 2016 where the JSOW training team executed a virtual network-enabled weapon mission during the harbor phase. The two-day training mission culminated in the loading of Super Hornet mission cards with the appropriate keys and JSOW files for Carrier Air Wing Nine (CVW-9) to fly a JSOW C-1 mission.
A month later, using real-time lessons learned from RIMPAC, CVW-5 executed the first operational shots of live JSOW C-1's during the Valiant Shield 2016 SINKEX, resulting in high-order impacts and sinking of the former USS Rentz.
This event included multiple firsts for JSOW including the first ever operational employment of an air-launched network-enabled weapon and receipt of targeting data from the Littoral Surveillance Radar System (LSRS).
http://www.navair.navy.mil/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.NAVAIRNewsStory&id=6658
