Surveillance: Raytheon corners Australian radar market

1 May 2007

By Gregor Ferguson

Raytheon has managed to get a headlock on Australia's airborne radar market, one that won't be broken until the Wedgetail and JSF enter service.

American radar manufacturer Raytheon has secured a strong position in Australia: two new platforms about to enter service in Australia - the RAAF's new Super Hornets and Coastwatch's Dash 8 surveillance aircraft - use Raytheon radars.

Plus there are another two platforms which could well enter Australian service over the next decade, the Global Hawk UAV and Boeing's P-8A Poseidon patrol aircraft.

In fact the only major combat and surveillance platforms due to enter RAAF service which doesn't have Raytheon radars are the Wedgetail Airborne Early Warning & Control (AEW&C) system, which uses Northrop Grumman's unique MESA radar; and the F-35A Joint Strike Fighter, which will be equipped with Northrop Grumman's APG-81 Active Electronically Scanned Antenna (AESA) sensor.

The RAAF's new F/A-18F Block 2 Super Hornets will be equipped with Raytheon's new APG-79 AESA radar, while the 10 Bombardier Dash 8 surveillance aircraft operated by Surveillance Australia Ltd under contract to Coastwatch will equipped with Raytheon's SeaVue radar.

If Australia chooses to buy the RQ-4B Global Hawk UAV under Phase 1B of Project Air 7000 this will almost certainly come already fitted with Raytheon's Enhanced Integrated Sensor Suite (EISS), which includes an X-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR), while the P-8A Poseidon, which is a contender to replace the RAAF's 18 AP-3C Orions, will be equipped with Raytheon's AN/APY-10 SAR.

In each case the radar represents a critical component of the total capability inherent to the platform in question. The driver for much of the capability in these radar sensors has been a growing list of capability requirements by the US Navy and its allies, including Australia.

Over the past 30 years navies have demanded enhanced capabilities such as periscope detection, multiple target tracking, Inverse SAR (ISAR) modes, and more recently, overland SAR and the ability to integrate a sensor platform and the data it generates seamlessly into a network-enabled force.

The region's growing population of quiet, diesel-electric submarines requires enhanced submarine detection capabilities in particular the ability to detect periscopes in high sea states against strong background clutter.

The ISAR mode helps increase the mission effectiveness of an airborne platform. Previously when radar detected a surface contact, the patrol aircraft was required to deviate from its planned course to investigate and classify the target.

In ISAR mode, a radar can build up an image of the target that enables classification from a discreet distance; this keeps platforms out of range of enemy defences, enables covert surveillance and crucially, enables more rapid coverage of extended patrol and search areas.

The key to detecting and classifying increasingly small targets at extended ranges in unhelpful sea states, says Raytheon, is multi-fold: higher peak transmitted power to place more energy on small targets, and to detect bigger targets at much longer range; high range resolution (down to 1-foot range cells in periscope detection mode) in order to reject ocean clutter; a very high antenna scan speed - up to 300rpm - to place more 'hits' on small and fleeting targets such as periscopes and very small craft; and smart processing, on a scan by scan basis to further reject clutter.

Over the past 30-40 years, Raytheon has applied all of these techniques in some form across its family of surveillance radars and as a result, has created a strong position for itself in several major new platform programs.

One of its 'flagship' programs is the AN/APY-10 radar, derived from the AN/APS-137 and 148 family of maritime surveillance radars, and currently under development for Boeing P-8A Poseidon Maritime Patrol Aircraft.

This is designed to detect very small targets at extended ranges in high sea states and clutter. Raytheon says it can detect a 1m to 2m target - typical of a periscope - at a range of 29nm in sea state; a life raft at 40 nm; a wooden fishing boat at 47nm; a landing craft at 125 nm and a container ship at 200nm.

The APY-10 is a nose-mounted sensor with a 270 degree field of view; this passed its Critical Design Review in May last year and first deliveries are scheduled next year to achieve first flight in 2009. Importantly, says Raytheon, it is exportable in certain configurations - some elements are just not as exportable as others.

While the P-8A is designed primarily to meet the US Navy's Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) and littoral Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) needs, the APY-10 has inherent overland surveillance capabilities which would likely be capable of meeting the RAAF's much broader requirements for overland as well as littoral and open ocean surveillance.

If the RAAF were to select the P-8A it would reduce integration risks considerably if the aircraft were equipped with the same radar as the US Navy - or as similar as ITAR export restrictions allow.

In parallel with the APY-10, Raytheon has been growing its SeaVue family of lightweight maritime surveillance radars for small and para-military platforms. The six Coastwatch Dash 8-200s and four Dash 8-300s will be equipped with the latest version of SeaVue, the SV-2022S.

This will be SeaVue's second 'tour' with Coastwatch - the existing Coastwatch fleet employs SeaVue SV-1022 sensors on its Dash 8s and Reims 406s.

The SeaVue family also equips the Royal Air Force's upgraded Nimrod MRA.4s, US Customs' Dash 8s, P-3 Orions operated by the US Drug Enforcement Agency and the Norwegian Coastguard, and ATR-42s and Piaggio P.166s operated by the Italian Coastguard and Guarda di Finanza; it is their ATOS mission system that has been adopted by Coastwatch as the Surveillance Information Management (SIM) system for its new fleet of Dash 8s.

The SeaVue, like the APY-10, is a synthetic aperture radar capable of operating in both coherent and non-coherent modes to carry out search, Inverse SAR, Spot SAR and Strip SAR functions.

It has been developed progressively to detect increasingly small targets such as small wooden boats; it weighs just 200lb and has three principal elements - the antenna (parabolic or flat plate), transmitter and Receiver Exciter Synchroniser Processor (RESP).

Its range is undisclosed; the antenna can be nose- or belly-mounted, tilt-stabilised or fixed-tilt, with multiple scan speeds, including searchlight mode. Aboard Coastwatch's Dash 8s it is belly-mounted with a 360 degree field of view and a single operator console in the cabin.

It also incorporates Maritime Moving Target Indicator (MMTI) mode. Production of the new sensors is under way with deliveries scheduled to begin next month and continue through early-2008.

Raytheon's Space & Airborne Systems division at El Segundo in California is responsible for manufacturing the RQ-4 Global Hawk Enhanced Integrated Sensor Suite (EISS). This includes an X-band SAR sensor and Multi-spectral Targeting System (MTS-B) electro-optic/infra red system.

The current Global Hawk sensor suite has flown more than 7,500 hours in all weathers, day and night, carrying out overland, maritime and even air surveillance operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Back in 2001, Global Hawk was deployed to Australia for a maritime demonstration program and incorporated several maritime surveillance modes developed by DSTO at Edinburgh.

The US Navy has largely adopted these and updates were tested during Exercise Trident Warrior in 2005. These upgrades consisted of software rather than hardware modifications and included three principal modes:

* Maritime Surveillance (MS) - all-speed moving target detection and tracking over ranges of 11nm to 108nm+

* Maritime Target Acquisition (MTA) - limited area scan for cueing ISAR mode, with a 4-5 second update rate

* Inverse SAR (ISAR) - derived form the capabilities in Raytheon's APS-137 radar with littoral enhancements for ship classification

Aboard Global Hawk the radar is belly-mounted and the MTS-B is chin-mounted, providing a 360 degree field of view. It's not clear what synergies Raytheon, and Australia, could reap if all of these radars entered service with the ADF.

But there's no doubt Raytheon would be, for a while at least, Australia's pre-eminent supplier of radars for both aircraft and surface ships: it provides various marks of the SPS-49 search radar for the Navy's FFG and Anzac frigates and will provide the Mk99 fire control radar for at least one of the Navy's three Air Warfare Destroyers.

Would Australia's inventory of sensors be enough to justify setting up a significant in-country support and software development capability? That would be an interesting response to the challenges set by Australia's new defence industry policy.