The U.S. Air Force plans to upgrade its F-16 and F-15 fighters
with new instrumentation and sensor pods that would bolster their
ability to strike moving targets with laser-guided bombs from high
altitudes.
The goal is to replace the 30-year-old technology currently in
use—the low-altitude navigation targeting infrared night pods,
known as Lantirn. Systems such as Lantirn use forward-looking infrared
(FLIR) imagers and lasers to help aircrews accurately deliver precision-guided
bombs.
“When the Lantirn pod was conceived, it was a low-level attack
capability. We flew it at 200 or 300 feet. That is what was required
under the doctrine of the Cold War,” said Retired Air Force
Gen. Lawrence F. Skantze. Today, the Air Force wants to be able
to hit targets from 30,000 feet. That is not possible with Lantirn,
which has a first-generation FLIR, he said.
Satellite-guided bombs increasingly have become the weapon of choice
for precision strike, but the Air Force still plans to continue
using laser-guided weapons, because they are more effective against
moving targets, for which precise satellite coordinates are difficult
to obtain.
Skantze recently participated in a Defense Science Board panel
that concluded that the Air Force and the Navy should pursue separate
programs for an advanced targeting pod.
The Defense Department originally considered combining both programs.
The Navy had begun, in 1997, the development of its advanced targeting
FLIR (AT-FLIR) for the F/A-18. The service awarded a contract to
the Raytheon Co. for the development of AT-FLIR, and the system
now is beginning low-rate production. The Air Force, meanwhile,
launched a separate program, called Advanced Targeting Pod (ATP).
It plans to award a contract this month.
There were several downsides to combining the two programs, said
Skantze. The most significant one was that if the Navy had to terminate
its contract with Raytheon, protests would result, and the Navy
would be financially liable, he explained.
The Navy will spend about $1.8 billion for 574 AT-FLIR systems.
This month, the Air Force plans to award a seven-year $260 million
contract for 168 ATP units. Any system proposed for the ATP program
must be already fully developed, the Air Force said. The plan is
to buy 505 pods, each estimated to cost about $1.5 million.
Three companies are vying for the ATP award: Lockheed Martin Missiles
& Fire Control, the Raytheon Co. and a team of Northrop Grumman
and Israel’s Rafael.
To be able to recognize targets at longer range and fly at higher
altitudes, the fundamental technology in ATP is the 3rd generation
FLIR, explained Dan Fischoff, program director for Sniper XR, the
system being proposed by Lockheed Martin.
The technology in Sniper XR has much in common with the Hawkeye
target sight system that Lockheed Martin developed for the Marine
Corps Cobra gunships. “The FLIR, the laser spot tracker, the
target tracker are all common,” said Fischoff.
The company developed the original Lantirn, but Fischoff stressed
that there is not much in common between Lantirn and Sniper. Lockheed,
nevertheless, has proposed to the Air Force a plan to upgrade the
Lantirn pods using Sniper technology.
The Northrop Grumman/Rafael team is proposing the Litening II+
targeting and navigation pod. The company already has sold these
systems to the Air National Guard.
Rafael originally developed Litening for the Israeli Air Force.
The Marines use Litening in the Harrier jump-jet. The Spanish and
Italian air forces employ the pods as well. Norway tested it on
the F-16 Block 40.
“It’s a modular, simple architecture, easy to maintain,”
said Michael W. Lennon, Northrop Grumman’s vice president
for targeting programs.
“We can operate at 40,000 feet. Other systems are limited
to 25,000 feet.” The 3rd Gen FLIR used in the company’s
ATP proposal is more advanced than other versions of Litening, said
Lennon. This technology, he said, would make it possible to determine
whether a potential target is a military or civilian vehicle.
In addition to the FLIR, Litening has a CCD camera, to improve
daytime performance, a laser designator and rangefinder. The laser
detects the laser energy from a secondary source, enabling ground
or airborne forward-air controllers to designate the targets for
the fighter aircraft.
Raytheon’s ATP proposal is a modified version of the Navy’s
AT-FLIR, which is part of a line of targeting pods called Terminator,
said Mark Day, a company spokesman.
The system has a 3rd Gen FLIR focal plane staring array, said Vic
Taber, Raytheon’s program manager for AT-FLIR. The hardware
in the Air Force ATP is 80-90 percent common with the Navy AT-FLIR.
The Terminator pods also are used on the V-22 Osprey, the Royal
Australian Navy’s SH-2G and the U.S. Air Force Global Hawk
unmanned aircraft.
The primary difference between the Navy AT-FLIR and the Air Force
ATP is the cooling system, explained Taber. The Navy pod gets cooling
from the platform aircraft, the F/A-18. “The F-16 is not capable
of doing that, so we have added an on-board environmental conditioning
system in the pod itself,” he said.
The Navy employs the targeting pod in a specific weapon station.
That location dictates the design and the dimensions of the pod,
said Taber. The Air Force is not limited to the same size and dimension
as the Navy. For the Air Force ATP, Raytheon developed a pylon adapter,
which the Navy does not need because its pods are mounted in a missile
cavity.