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AESA Radar Reaches One Year Flight Test Milestone

Navy NewsStand

Story Number: NNS040825-16
Release Date: 8/25/2004 3:47:00 PM

PATUXENT RIVER, Md. (NNS) -- More than a year since its first flight, Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) Strike Fighter Program office's F/A-18 Hornet Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) APG-79 Radar program continues to rapidly advance toward equipping the fleet with cutting edge radar technology.

Since its inaugural flight July 30, 2003, the AESA system has undergone successful testing that has exceeded the expectations of both government and industry.

AESA is far more advanced than the APG-73 radar that is currently installed and fielded on the F/A-18. When fully integrated into the U.S. Navy's F/A-18E/F and EA-18G aircraft, the AESA radar will support Network Centric Warfare, Sea Shield, and Sea Strike missions as one of several systems that provide robust forward deployed sensor capabilities.

The AESA radar will enhance the warfighter's situational awareness regarding the air and ground operating picture, increase targeting levels, and provide superior air-to-air and air-to-ground target detection and tracking capability.

"The radar itself has little contribution to Network Centric Warfare," said Cmdr. Aaron Bowman, F/A-18 Radar Integrated Product Team (IPT) lead. "However, when you surround that radar with all the onboard systems, it drives a tremendous capability toward linking in the future of Network Centric Warfare combat operations.

"AESA's contribution to network centric warfare will be through the generation of target information, which in turn will be distributed to multiple users," he said. "Getting that combat information down to the ground troops near real-time can be a life-saver."

An agile solid state radar, AESA far exceeds the performance of its mechanically steered predecessors.

"AESA is infinitely more responsive in its ability to track and scan a volume of airspace, in comparison to our legacy mechanically scanned radars that are limited by the drives associated with moving the radar dish around," Chip Guffey, F/A-18 Radar deputy IPT lead said. "AESA is an electronically steered array of smaller sensors that can point and move the radar beam at near-light speed."

What the pilot will see in AESA is more range capability, better resolution, and the capability to perform several missions at the same time. Automation of radar operations via a resource management system provides operators reduced workloads during normal operations, and increased flexibility to support multiple tasks in high workload environments.

"AESA will revolutionize the way the warfighter employs the Super Hornet," said Guffey. "AESA represents not only a new radar, but the potential to create significant opportunities to improve how we use the airplane itself."

Looking back over the past year and further, Bowman believes one of the factors that has enabled the radar program to enjoy success thus far is the support it has received from the entire naval aviation community.

"We've had an incredible amount of support from the Navy's top leadership all the way down throughout the Navy," he said. "Also, the three main players, Navy, Boeing and Raytheon, truly operate as an integrated team."

AESA is scheduled for operational evaluation in 2006. The first deployment is expected at the end of FY07.