Lockheed Martin’s long range development of its JASSM air-to-surface missile successfully completed its sixth test flight recently, giving it a 100 per cent test success rate to date.
The JASSM-ER, with a range of more than 800km, was launched from a B-1B bomber over the White Sands missile range in New Mexico and destroyed its intended target after flying a pre-programmed course.
“The JASSM-ER flight test confirmed the missile’s ability to be employed from the aft weapons bay of the B-1B,” said Randy Bigum, vice president of Strike Weapons at Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control. “The flight test also completed performance data collection that may be used to fine-tune navigation algorithms.”
Despite problems with the non-ER version of the JASSM which has recently successfully completed another round of test launches after several previous failures, the JASSM-ER will continue its test program next year prior to commencing Operational Test and Evaluation (OT&E) and low rate production in 2011.
