By Carlo Munoz
Deliveries of a new, precision-guided version of the Marine Corps’ legacy air-to-ground Hydra rocket are set to begin this summer, with the weapon slated to hit the skies above Afghanistan and elsewhere by September, according to a senior industry official.
Marine Corps rotary-wing units will begin getting the Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System (APKWS) in July, once the weapon clears initial operational testing and evaluation this summer, BAE Systems Business Development Manager for Electronic Solutions George Adamakos said.
The APKWS is an advanced guidance system developed by BAE Systems that can be attached to the Marine Corps current stockpile of Hydra 70 rockets used on the service’s AH-1 SuperCobra attack helicopters.
Once attached, the APKWS will allow SuperCobra aircrews to precisely engage moving and stationary targets within a 40 degree field of view, utilizing the four-pronged sensor suite attached to the APKWS guidance system.
Navy acquisition officials inked the initial low-rate initial production agreement for the advanced guidance platform with BAE Systems last year. That deal covered 325 guidance units for the Marine Corps. In January, service officials came to terms on the second LRIP tranche of APKWS weapons, this time acquiring 600 systems, Adamakos said.
But in both LRIP deals, the Navy agreed to only buy the APKWS guidance system, opting to retrofit the Marine Corps backlog of Hydra 70 rockets already in the service arsenal. That said, company officials are also offering full-up APKWS missiles, including both the Hydra 70 munition and guidance system as a single package.
To date, according to Adamakos, BAE Systems is close to completing a direct sale for 5,000 APKWS weapons to an undisclosed foreign military. The company official declined to comment on which country was acquiring the system, but he did note the sale would only be for the guidance system and not the complete weapon package.
Aside from weapon sales, the company has also been contracted by the Air Force and Navy to develop a Joint Capability Technology Demonstrator that would allow a full-up APKWS to be mounted on a Marine Corps’ AV-8 Harrier and an Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt, according to Adamakos.
The JCTD deal was signed in February, with BAE Systems agreeing to provide roughly 92 full missile units for the effort, he said. The program is still in the very preliminary phases, with company and military officials still trying to gauge the necessary capabilities and system attributes needed to fire a helicopter-based weapon from a much faster fixed-wing fighter.
Even though the test demonstrator is focused only on the AV-8 and the A-10, company officials are already exploring possible applications for the weapon on board the Navy’s F/A-18 and the Air Force’s F-16 fighters.