The American company used a standard 3-meter transport container to house the GRIZZLY launch system, which launches Hellfire missiles.
Lockheed Martin engineers took the M299 launch system, used on AH-64 Apache helicopters and MQ-9 Reaper drones, and modified it to create the GRIZZLY launch system. It is designed to be housed inside a standard transport container to launch AGM-114 Hellfire missiles, writes Focus.
Small, inexpensive drones are becoming a real nightmare for the military, who can never be sure if there is a nearby quadcopter with a camera conducting surveillance. As a result, there is a shift in military tactics and the emergence of an arms race between new types of weapons and new means of defense against these new types of weapons.
One way to counter drones is to create devices capable of detecting, neutralizing, and destroying them. In recent years, there has been an increase in missiles, electronic warfare systems, and directed energy weapons designed to destroy drones. But there is another approach demonstrated by Lockheed Martin.
During World War II, the Allies made special efforts to confuse the Axis powers. They disguised entire aircraft factories and other important facilities as fake villages, creating entire bases with wooden planes and inflatable tanks. The goal was to create a strong sense of uncertainty for the enemy. If successful, the enemy would waste precious time and resources trying to contain or destroy non-existent threats while ignoring real threats.
Lockheed Martin engineers took the battle-tested M299 launch system, used on AH-64 Apache helicopters and MQ-9 Reaper drones, and modified it to create the GRIZZLY launch system. It is designed to be housed inside a standard transport container along with the AGM-114 Hellfire missile.
This container not only allows for easy transport and installation of a complete launch system in various locations and on different platforms, but also creates a complex challenge for the enemy: such a launch system is difficult to detect. More precisely, it is hard to understand that a standard transport container, which can be placed anywhere, can be a weapon. There are many places to hide such a container and launch a missile from it.
The GRIZZLY container launch system was created from already tested components, uses a platform-independent control and monitoring system, and the development cycle took only six months. In addition to the Hellfire missile, it can also be armed with the AGM-179 (JAGM) air-to-ground missile.
