Army awards AeroVironment nearly $500M contract for laser weapons

The Army awarded AeroVironment a $464.8 million deal for its Enduring-High Energy Laser (E-HEL) program, service and company officials announced, moving the system from a prototype to what the firm said was the first production contract for directed energy weapons in U.S. history. 

AV expects to deliver “well into the dozens” of its LOCUST X3 laser weapon systems to the service under the other transaction agreement over the next few years, said John Garrity, vice president of the company’s directed energy systems arm. He did not specify exact numbers when asked by reporters weeks ahead of the official announcement. 

The contract marks a shift in how common directed energy systems will become for the military, Garrity said, as the company begins “ramping up” production of the LOCUST, which AV officials boast can zap-down large to medium-sized drones using a 30-kilowatt laser beam at under $5 per shot. 

The military has been scrambling for low-cost counter-drone weapons, especially as the munition-draining Iran war reinforces how problematic it is to use expensive, hard-to-make interceptors against cheap unmanned aerial systems like Tehran’s family of Shaheds.

“The Enduring High Energy Laser Program is historically significant,” said Mary Clum, president of AV’s space, cyber and directed energy program. “It’s not simply about lasers defeating a drone, it is the transition of directed energy toward an enduring place in the Army’s force structure.”

The company said the LOCUST will be used on various Army platforms, such as its Joint Light Tactical Vehicle and on a palletized version. It’s also looking at putting the system on the service’s Infantry Squad Vehicle, according to a company press release.

Other AV officials said a key feature of the LOCUST was its ability to integrate with other systems, part of a push that the military — especially the Army — has been asking industry for. Garrity said the weapon can connect to Anduril’s Lattice system, a key component of the Army’s Next Generation Command and Control prototype. 

And when it comes to counter-drone tactics in general, military officials often talk about building a “layered defense” of these types of systems. In other words, employing an ecosystem of connected weapons, sensors and other tools that can detect and defeat a variety of drones at different distances, altitudes and sizes. 

“The key to successfully countering all levels of drones is a layered defense of sensors and effectors,” Under Secretary of the Army Mike Obadal, who is expected to act as the service’s top civilian official after Dan Driscoll resigned from his post this week amid reports of clashes with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, said in a press release. “AV and the Army have worked for years to develop directed energy solutions, and we are proud to give our soldiers a decisive edge against drone threats.”

Aaron Westman, senior director of AV’s business development effort, said LOCUST’s role in that layered defense is as an “apex predator” able to quickly destroy several systems at low cost.

“Its job is to really, let’s say, thin the herd to be able to kill high volumes of threats with effectors, so that you can save your more expensive effectors for more exquisite threats, and [so] … your layered defense system doesn’t run out of bullets as fast.”

That is exactly what has happened during the Iran war, where the U.S. military has significantly drained expensive interceptors, such as Patriot and THAAD missiles, against drones that Iran makes for tens of thousands of dollars per unit.

“We won’t go into hyper specifics on ranges, but several kilometers away, you’re able to take down drones instead of hundreds of meters away with traditional guns and other kinetic effectors, all for a much stronger economical effect per threat,” Garrity said.

LOCUST was involved in back-to-back air space closure incidents near the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas earlier this year, highlighting insufficient coordination between federal agencies in deploying these burgeoning technologies. Military officials have often said the border region has been a testbed for such counter-drone measures, citing alleged high UAS traffic from cartels. 

In mid-February, U.S. Customs and Border Protection used the laser, which was on-loan from the Pentagon, and erroneously shot down an object near El Paso, causing the Federal Aviation Administration to temporarily shut down airspace in the area.

Just weeks later, troops assigned to the military’s southern border task force blasted a CBP-operated drone near Fort Hancock, which the latter agency launched without notifying the military, and it caused another airspace incident. 

Lawmakers lambasted the federal government for their lack of coordination during the incidents, DefenseScoop reported.

The Pentagon, FAA and about half a dozen other agencies tested the laser at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico the following month, a fast-tracked exercise primarily to quell the FAA’s concerns that the directed energy system posed a danger to commercial airplanes. 

Officials dubbed the test a success and soon signed a joint-agency agreement calling the systems safe. DefenseScoop recently reported that the military’s southern border task force shot down three “cartel-linked” drones last week using an AV system known as the Army Multipurpose High Energy Laser (AMP-HEL) in the service’s parlance.

When asked last month about the LOCUST’s use on the southern border, Garrity declined to speak about “operationally relevant details” of the system for the service, but touted it as having a “very high adoption curve” with operators and advanced tracking systems.

The increased production of the LOCUST is bolstered by a $30 million investment in its manufacturing facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico, earlier this year.

“This first of its kind directed energy program will enable our formations to defeat unmanned systems and dominate from the outset,” Gen. Christopher LaNeve, who is acting as the Army’s chief of staff after Hegseth ousted his predecessor earlier this year, said in the press release. With the resignation of Driscoll this week, the service is left with no Senate-confirmed civilian or military leader amid renewed fighting in the Iran war and lawmaker concerns over Hegseth’s culling of the Army’s top general officer ranks.

LaNeve added: “Pairing human ingenuity with advanced technology is what ensures our Army will continue to outpace America’s adversaries.”