The US Air Force has purchased a Counter Unmanned Aerial System (C-UAS) radar system from Black Sage Technologies.
The system, a state-of-the-art drone detection and elimination platform, allows “precise targeting data for the Air Force Research Laboratory’s (AFRL) Tactical High Power Microwave Operational Responder (THOR)” to effectively combat 21st-century enemy Unmanned Aerial System threats.
To allow the air force to utilize its pre-existing THOR system to more effectively target and defeat adversary drones, Black Sage employed its exclusive DefenseOS software “to receive and process data from the C-UAS radars and export the data to the US military’s Forward Area Air Defense Command and Control (FAAD C2).”
The integration of C-UAS radar, FAAD C2, and THOR successfully targeted and defeated drones in several tests of the new platform.
AFRL’s THOR system is a “counter-swarm electromagnetic” platform for air base defense. The system allows the “non-kinetic defeat of multiple targets.” Operated with standard electricity supply, it uses High Power Microwaves to disable enemy drone electronics by identifying targets and discharging a silent electromagnetic pulse instantaneously.
As countries around the world, particularly China, have made great leaps in their development of drone technology, it has become imperative for the US to develop countermeasures against these relatively inexpensive, disposable weapons. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) with attack capabilities have proven especially effective in disabling air defenses.
Most dangerous among these UAVs are drone swarms which can overwhelm air defenses through sheer force of numbers, neutralizing a country’s air defenses to prepare the way for more devastating attacks.
