Lockheed Martin to build launchers for future long-range rockets to attack targets on land and at sea
REDSTONE ARSENAL, Ala. – Tactical missile designers at Lockheed Martin Corp. will build launchers for next-generation surface-to-surface rockets designed to destroy enemy targets as far away as 300 miles. under terms of a $160.5 million order announced last week.
Officials of the Army Contracting Command at Redstone Arsenal, Ala., are asking the Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control segment in Grand Prairie, Texas, for production of M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS).
HIMARS launchers will fire the Army's future long-range Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) -- a surface-to-surface, all weather, precision-strike guided missile fired from the M270A1 Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) and the M142 HIMARS. PrSM should enter service in 2023.
PrSM is to replace non-insensitive and cluster munition versions of the Army MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS). It will provide Army and U.S. Marine Corps field artillery units with long range and deep strike capability. The PrSM will destroy, neutralize, or suppress targets at ranges from 43 to 250 miles using indirect precision fires.
The baseline missiles will be able to engage a wide variety of targets at ranges as long as 310 miles. It will emphasize imprecisely located area and point targets. Primary emphasis for follow-on upgrades will be on increased range, lethality, and ability to attack time-sensitive, moving, hardened, and fleeting targets.
By 2025 the Army will be able to use the long-range PrSM to attack and destroy moving enemy ships operating offshore at ranges out to about 310 miles. While the weapon primarily has surface-to-surface applications for use against enemy air defenses, troop fortifications, and armored vehicle columns, the PrSM is being configured with an advanced targeting multi-mode seeker to include maritime strike.
The new targeting seeker has completed a captive carry test wherein it flew aboard an aircraft against representative targets in preparation for further testing and ultimate deployment.
On this order Lockheed Martin will do the work in Boca Raton, Clearwater, and Palm Bay, Fla.; Whippany, N.J.; York and Archibald, Pa.; Jackson, Mich.; Brownsboro, Ala.; Jackson, Miss.; Dallas; Camden, Ariz.; and Taiwan, and should be finished by April 2023.
For more information contact Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control online at www.lockheedmartin.com, or the Army Contracting Command-Redstone at https://acc.army.mil/contractingcenters/acc-rsa.
John Keller | Editor-in-Chief
John Keller is the Editor-in-Chief, Military & Aerospace Electronics Magazine--provides extensive coverage and analysis of enabling electronics and optoelectronic technologies in military, space and commercial aviation applications. John has been a member of the Military & Aerospace Electronics staff since 1989 and chief editor since 1995.
