The Air Force authorized full rate production (FRP) of Northrop Grumman’s [NOC] next-generation Infrared Missile Warning System (MWS), according to a company statement.
The Infrared MWS, which was approved for FRP this month, is the sensor that is used with a laser-jammer for infrared missiles and replaces ultraviolet missile warners on the Air Force’s large aircraft Infrared Countermeasures (IRCM) system, according to Jack Pledger, program director for IRCM at Northrop Grumman. The Infrared MWS will be deployed on the service’s C-17, EC-130 and HC/MC-130J cargo planes, according to a statement.
Pledger told Defense Daily in a phone interview the Infrared MWS is especially useful against heat-seeking, man-portable missiles, such as MANPADS.
In addition, Carl Smith, vice president of IRCM programs at Northrop Grumman’s land and self-protection systems division, said in a statement the Infrared MWS will provide a longer detection range and fewer false alarms.
The FRP contract follows a previously-issued Low-Rate Initial Production (LRIP) contract, under which Northrop Grumman produced 179 sensors for the Air Force, according to Pledger. Pledger said as part of the FRP authorization, Northrop Grumman has entered into a calendar year 2012 Large Aircraft Follow-On (LAF) contract, which specifies the equipment and quantities for the Infrared MWS program. Pledger said the company has 293 sensors in the 2012 LAF contract.
The beauty of the Infrared MWS is it operates on the same spectrum as the infrared missiles themselves, allowing the system to jam the incoming missile’s own infrared seeker. The legacy missile warners operate on the ultraviolet spectrum. Pledger said there is an infrared signal set into the missile seeker and when that signal hits the seeker, it forces the missile to make a “violent” maneuver away from the plane.
“It’s near instantaneous,” Pledger said. “As soon as that laser hits the seeker, it makes this abrupt turn away from the airplane.”
Pledger said Northrop Grumman used a “two-color” process to divide the sensor that the infrared uses into halves and put a filter, one red, one blue, over each half to see the same image in a “stereo” format. Pledger said by doing a simple divide across that, anything with a “positive number” will be processed as a missile with the same level of processing capability and complexity that was needed in the legacy ultraviolet missile warner.
“The process we developed for the next-gen missile warner gave it the advantage of using the infrared spectrum and reduced the complexity that you needed to process the information it received,” Pledger said. “So you can find the missile, identify it as a threat very quickly (and) activate the system.”