Feral Jundi

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Aviation: Drone Archer Weapons– The MBDA TiGER Tactical Grenade Extended Range

     This weapon sounds very cool, and it is a real life version of exactly what I was talking about in my ‘drone archer’ post.  With a UAV like this, you could give a platoon or squad some very interesting options on the battlefield.

     The first one that came to my mind, was the idea of taking advantage of these small little engagements with the enemy.  If you can keep an enemy machine gunner or whomever busy with return fire, you could have two or three drone archers flying TiGERs right on top of the guy in order to solve that problem.  Better yet, you could use these TiGERs up to two miles away and solve problems from strategically positioned drone archers with access to a ‘quiver team’ (truck load of TiGERs and support crew). These crews could also fly TiGERs up to the front line to feed the drone archers plenty of arrows to use.

     What I really liked though, was the guidance systems. Supposedly it has GPS guidance, and you can use the camera in the nose for more precise targeting or last minute changes to an attack.  That is crucial, because if your target is running or tries to fool the drone archer, the TiGER could be stopped last minute and then flown back up for another attempt at a kamikazi attack. With precision guidance and a ‘top down attack’ with a small one pound warhead, I would also say that collateral damage is minimized to the extreme.  That would make this a good COIN weapon. And hey, it still has a camera which makes it a standard UAV as well.

     Swarming these things is another option that would take some figuring out. If the company created a bunch of practice TiGERs, then military units could experiment in exercises about how best to use these things.  I really think some radical platoon and squad level tactics could evolve from the use of such a weapon. It is also cool that the company is putting some ‘elephant chisel’ mechanisms on the TiGER and I would be very interested if the feeds are encrypted or not.

     Finally, I would not be surprised if MBDA has a mobile application to integrate this drone with an iPhone or similar device. Tactical Life did mention that laptops or handhelds are being considered. That would put this weapon on the PMC 2.0 list. –Matt

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TiGER Tactical Grenade Extended Range. Photo by Tactical Life.

TiGER Tactical Grenade Extended Range 

TiGER is a small, man-portable, hand-launched, extended-range weapon designed for a rapid response employment to protect deployed troops.

TiGER is a candidate for the U.S. military’s LMAMS (Lethal Miniature Aerial Munition System) program.

TiGER is the solution for small tactical units as a counter sniper weapon or destruction of  Improvised Explosive Devices (IED’s), targets beyond effective small arms range, and targets obscured by walls, buildings, or ditches.

TiGER can be used to identify and attack key positions and targets posing an immediate threat to tactical units. With a warhead more effective than a standard grenade, TiGERTMcan effectively kill enemy machine guns, personnel, cars, trucks, tactical vehicles, and crew served weapons.

•Hand launched, precision weapon with 2 mile attack range

•GPS & Inertial Guidance with Man-in-the-Loop targeting

•Employed by the on-site commander, 1lb warhead

•Targets: light vehicles, mortar crews, snipers

PDF for TiGER here.

Company website for MBDA here.

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MBDA “TiGER” Tactical Grenade – Extended Range

From Tactical Life.com

     Countering indirect fire, such as a mortar behind a hill or a suspected rocket launcher, usually involves blanketing an area with artillery or calling in an air strike that might or might not arrive in a timely manner and might or might not cause collateral damage. Now, on the Battalion level, a squad in the field can prep, launch, direct and attack a target up to two miles away with the new MBDA TiGER Tactical Grenade Extended Range, a candidate for the Army’s Lethal Miniature Aerial Munition System program. The TiGER can be used to counter a sniper or the destruction of VBIEDs and IEDs using two on-board 40mm grenade warheads.

The TiGER warhead. Photo by Tactical Life. 

    The TiGER is guided by a miniature, nose mounted video camera equipped using a laptop or handheld keypad with a visual display. It can be quickly deployed and launched by hand to visually seek out and then “kamikaze” the target by an operator on the ground simply tapping on the target’s location on the video screen and BOOM–one less crew-served mortar, IED, sniper or rocket launcher. Put the computer away and carry on with your day. For additional information please view mbdainc.com or call 818-991-0300×132.

Story here.

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