Industry officials have one last chance to influence the U.S. Army’s strategy for acquiring a family of vehicles, payloads and mission systems for Air-Launched Effects, scheduled to become operational in fiscal 2025.
The U.S. Army has started shopping for a new airborne radar to equip a new class of air-launched, uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS) expected to operate alongside rotorcraft.
The Multi-Domain Operations Radar for Air-Launched Effects (ALE) has entered the competitive phase of the acquisition process, with a request for project proposals released by Army Contracting Command on March 30. Responses are due via the Sensors Communications and Electronics Consortium on May 1.
The C5ISR Center in U.S. Army Development Command is looking for a “complete, functional prototype of a radar system” for ALEs, according to a special notice released on the System for Award Management website.
The functions of the radar appear similar to those of the General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Lynx radar, which is integrated on the Army’s MQ-1C UAS. The MQ-1C, however, is significantly larger than what the Army plans for future ALEs. Some ALEs, in fact, are intended to be launched from the MQ-1C.
“In a future conflict, [the] ALE will conduct the [detect, identify, locate and report] mission to enable long-range, stand-in and stand-off reconnaissance, surveillance, and target acquisition sensing across multiple scenarios and domains in a constantly changing operational environment,” the Army soliciation says.
The ALE radar also will be used for battle damage assessment, the Army says.
