U.S. Navy's MH-60 helicopters to be equipped with electronic warfare pods
NewsJanuary 13, 2017
SYRACUSE, N.Y. U.S. Navy Officials selected Lockheed Martin for a new development contract to provide the MH-60 helicopters with its electronic warfare (EW) surveillance and countermeasure capabilities against anti-ship missile (ASM) threats.
Under this contract, if all options are exercised, Lockheed Martin will deliver up to 18 Advanced Off-Board Electronic Warfare (AOEW) Active Mission Payload (AMP) AN/ALQ-248 pods to the U.S. Navy. Engineers will equip the helicopters with the AOEW AMP AN/ALQ-248 system, which is a self-contained EW pod hosted by an MH-60R or MH-60S.
Work on this contract will be performed in Syracuse, New York and is scheduled to begin in early 2019 to meet the program’s 2021 initial operational capability goal. The Owego, New York team will integrate the system onto the MH-60 helicopters, which are built by Sikorsky.
The AOEW AMP AN/ALQ-248 system can work independently or with the ship’s onboard electronic surveillance sensor, SEWIP Block 2 AN/SLQ-32(V)6, to detect an incoming missile and then evaluate where it is going. AOEW then uses radio frequency countermeasure techniques to deter the missile, explain officials.
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