Sea Venom (missile)

Sea Venom/ANL
Type Light Anti-ship missile
Place of origin France
United Kingdom
Service history
Used by French Navy
Royal Navy
Production history
Manufacturer MBDA
Specifications
Weight 110 kg (240 lb)
Length 2.5 m (8.2 ft)
Diameter 0.2 m (7.9 in)
Warhead 30 kg (66 lb)
Operational
range
 20 km (12 mi; 11 nmi)[1]
Speed High-subsonic
Launch
platform
 AgustaWestland AW159
Eurocopter AS565 Panther
NHIndustries NH90
Airbus H160[2]

Sea Venom is an Anglo-French lightweight anti-ship missile developed by MBDA to equip the French Navy and the Royal Navy.[3] The missile is known as Anti-Navire Léger (ANL) in France and Sea Venom (formerly Future Anti-Surface Guided Weapon (Heavy)) in the United Kingdom. It is expected to enter service with the Royal Navy in late 2020.[4] The first test launch, conducted from an AS365 Dauphin owned by France's DGA defence procurement agency, successfully occurred on 21 June 2017.[5][6]

Design

Sea Venom is designed as a successor to the French Navy's AS 15 TT and Royal Navy's Sea Skua missiles. When in service, Sea Venom will equip Panther and NH90 helicopters in the French Navy and Wildcat helicopters in the Royal Navy. Due to shared characteristics with its predecessors, MBDA claims Sea Venom will be able to readily integrate onto platforms already carrying Sea Skua and AS 15 TT.[3]

Much like its predecessors, Sea Venom is designed to attack surface targets, such as fast in-shore attack craft (FIACS) ranging in size of between 50-500 tonnes, as well as larger surface targets of up to corvette size. With its 30 kg warhead, the missile is also capable of inflicting significant damage to larger vessels through precision aim point selection, and can also attack static land-based targets. Whilst its precise range is currently unknown, MBDA has stated that the missile has a "long" stand-off range enabling it to be launched from beyond the reach of most modern air defence systems.[3] The missile is capable of several attack modes including sea skimming and "pop up/top attack."[1] Sea Venom uses an IR Seeker with the option of man in the loop track-via-missile guidance via data-link;[3] the high speed two-way data-link transmits the images "seen" by the seeker back to the operator, enabling them to remain in control of the missile throughout its flight in addition to having an autonomous engagement capability.[1]

MBDA is also working on a surface-launched variant of the missile.[5]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 MBDA' Sea Venom/Anti-Navire Leger (ANL) Antiship Missile Testing Well On Track - Navyrecognition.com, 13 October 2016
  2. ↑ MBDA’s New Anti-Ship Missile Makes Progress. Aviation International News. 31 May 2018.
  3. 1 2 3 4 "SEA VENOM-ANL" (PDF). MBDA. Archived from the original (PDF) on 8 November 2014. Retrieved 12 December 2014.
  4. ↑ "FASGW(H) / ANL" (PDF). Retrieved 12 December 2014.
  5. 1 2 Successful First Test Firing for MBDA Sea Venom / ANL Anti-ship Missile - Navyrecognition.com, 4 July 2017
  6. ↑ Anglo-French anti-ship missile completes first test - Flightglobal.com, 5 July 2017

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