Emulates Realistic Near-Peer Jamming
Mercury Systems’ new mPOD – a rapidly-programmable electronic attack (EA) training system – has successfully completed initial flight testing, the company announced on 25 October.
Designed to train pilots using realistic, near-peer jamming capabilities, the mPOD was tested for three days onboard F-5 aircraft from Tactical Air Support in scenarios that ran beyond-visual-range tactical intercept training engagements, replicating adversary tactics. It successfully broke, delayed, and denied opposing fighter radar locks, created multiple false targets on opposing fighter radar, and conducted other electronic attack techniques.
Pilots need to train in mock air-to-air combat with other pilots operating as adversaries, in order to sharpen combat skills. Using mPOD, ‘adversary’ pilots can emulate enemy jamming techniques accurately, conditioning aircrews to evolving threat scenarios and better preparing them for real combat. “Our aircrew need to train against realistic, threat-representative systems,” explained R C Thompson, CEO of Tactical Air. “Our close working relationship with Mercury has resulted in a state of the art, internally configured EA capability fully integrated with our open architecture sensor suite. The result is threat realism with no performance penalty on our aircraft. It has been a pleasure to work with such an innovative and dynamic company”.
“mPOD is an innovative solution that can be programmed quickly and will help US and allied military pilots develop tactics to maintain a strategic advantage over adversaries. It will also increase pilot and aircraft survivability and reduce training costs through integrated threat presentations,” added Mark Bruington, VP Mercury Mission Systems
mPOD is built with proven technology for electronic warfare training, test, and evaluation:
- Simultaneously emulate multiple National Air and Space Intelligence Center (NASIC)-validated threats with proven Filthy Buzzard digital RF memory (DRFM) technology, developed and validated over 35 years in partnership with the US Air Force and Navy;
- Quickly reprogramme missions and threats for different aircraft and radar systems in minutes, via an intuitive software interface;
- Speed integration with the aircraft display and control panel, via the user interface or an integrated cockpit control panel;
- Attach the mPOD to any aircraft weapons pylon, or integrate it within the aircraft to reduce drag and maintain aircraft performance;
- Decrease overall sustainment cost through scalable, modular design, with six swappable high MTBF hardware components, including a wideband Meggitt antenna.
