Lockheed Martin celebrated with the U.S. Army the delivery of critical ground equipment for its long range hypersonic weapon (LRHW) system—part of a rapid, multi-year hypersonic weapons development program supporting the service’s focus on long range precision fires.

“With this delivery, we’ve taken another leap in advancing this capability to support the U.S. Army’s long range precision fires vision in support of joint all domain operations,” said Eric Scherff, vice president for Hypersonic Strike Programs at Lockheed Martin Space. “We’re achieving great efficiencies by supporting this program and the U.S. Navy’s Conventional Prompt Strike hypersonic program through the use of a common missile. We’ve invested heavily in creating digital factories across the corporation that employ advanced materials and precision capabilities needed for hypersonic strike, and bringing this digital factory approach to hypersonics means shorter delivery spans and greater affordability.”

In a ceremony held at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, the U.S. Army and industry team celebrated this delivery of ground equipment, including the battery operations center and four transporter erector launchers. The overall system is being developed in partnership with the U.S. Army’s Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office and its Hypersonic Project Office. Led by Lockheed Martin, other industry teammates include Dynetics, General Atomics, General Dynamics, i3, Moog, Northrop Grumman, Penta Research, Raytheon and Verity Integrated Systems.

The Lockheed Martin LRHW contract was originally awarded in 2019. Future flight tests are slated for fiscal year 2022-2023, and the program remains on track.

Earlier in October, Lockheed Martin opened an intelligent, advanced hypersonic production facility at its Courtland, Alabama location. Designed and constructed with the latest digital tools, factory work there will focus on producing much of the company’s hypersonics portfolio, including LRHW.

Hypersonic weapons are a key aspect of the long range precision fire modernization effort for the Army and the national security strategy to compete with and outpace potential adversaries. Lockheed Martin is an established industry leader in the development of hypersonic strike technology and our experience also serves as the cornerstone for hypersonic defense systems.