By RICHARD R. BURGESS, Managing Editor

After having declined to upgrade its Boeing-built Harpoon antiship cruise missiles to the Block II configuration, the Navy is supporting development and deployment of the precision-guided Block III version.

The Navy’s 3,600 ship- and air-launched Harpoon missiles use radar homing to attack ships, but lack discriminating capability for precise terminal targeting in a cluttered littoral environment. With its own funds, Boeing developed a Block II version that features a Global Positioning System and software to improve accuracy. The Block II was sold to several foreign navies, but  was not purchased by the U.S. Navy because of other budget priorities.

The Block III builds on the Block II configuration, adding a two-way data link that receives updated target positions in flight as the missile heads toward the target area, and sends radar images back to the launching platform. Global positioning coordinates generated by a kit developed for the company’s precision-guided Joint Direct-Attack Munition would guide the missile to the target’s precise location.

The missile can be diverted to another target if its seeker is locked onto the wrong ship, according to Steve Sherrick, Boeing’s business development director for Harpoon III. 

The Navy has proposed $36 million in the fiscal year 2007 budget to upgrade 400 of its surface-launched Harpoons to the Block III configuration. Boeing expects to receive a contract later this year for a two-year development and demonstration program, with the goal of reaching initial operational capability in 2009 and production in 2010-2012.

The Navy is considering funding the upgrade for air-launched Harpoons in fiscal year 2008. The Block III also will be offered to other nations. 

Improved Prowler Whets Appetite for Growler

The success of Northrop Grumman’s latest EA-6B Prowler electronic attack aircraft upgrade in missions in the Middle East has the Navy looking forward to the service entry of the Prowlers’ successor, the Boeing-built EA-18G Growler.

The Improved Capability III (ICAP III) version of the EA-6B features a new electronic jamming suite that is being adapted for the EA-18G. Northrop Grumman is fielding two block upgrades for the suite.

“The ICAP III is doing so well it’s giving everyone a taste of what they’re going to get” in 2009 with the Growler, said Capt. Steve Kochman, the Navy’s deputy program manager for the EA-18G.

Only two of the Navy’s 10 operational carrier-based electronic attack squadrons are equipped with the ICAP III Prowler. Northrop Grumman has been awarded a contract to modify five more Prowlers to the ICAP III configuration, enough to equip another squadron.

The first flight of the EA-18G is scheduled for September.

Defense Industry Notes

• San Diego-based National Steel and Shipbuilding Co. (NASSCO) — a unit of General Dynamics — is teaming with South Korea’s Daewoo Ship Engineering Co. (DSEC) to build ships for the U.S. commercial market under the Jones Act, which requires ships that haul cargo between U.S. ports be built in the United States. DSEC has agreed to provide detailed designs, support services and some materials for construction of the ships. NASSCO will procure most of the materials and build the ships at its shipyard in San Diego.
• Lockheed Martin Systems Integration and Sikorsky Aircraft have been awarded a full-rate production decision from the Navy for the new MH-60R multimission helicopter and are expecting a contract this year for 12 MH-60Rs. Low-rate production examples were introduced into fleet service in January.
• Sikorsky has been awarded $3 billion to proceed with system design and development of the new three-engine CH-53K heavy-lift helicopter for the Marine Corps. The CH-53K would replace the service’s overworked CH-53E versions.
• Raytheon’s SeaRAM antiship missile-defense system is slated to be installed on the Independence-class Littoral Combat Ship being built by General Dynamics. The SeaRAM combines the Rolling Airframe Missile launcher with the fire-control system of the Phalanx close-in weapon system.