First Sea Venom missile firing from Royal Navy Wildcat Helicopter
Naval News
By Richard Scott
10 October 2024
Wildcat firing Sea Venom. UK Ministry of Defence picture.
MBDA’s Sea Venom helicopter-launched anti-ship missile has completed a first guided firing from a Royal Navy (RN) Wildcat HMA.2 helicopter.
Performed on the UK Ministry of Defence’s Aberporth range off west Wales, the live fire trial saw the Sea Venom weapon successfully impact a target barge.
A collaborative development between the UK and France – which calls the missile Anti-Navire Léger (ANL) – Sea Venom is being introduced to service to meet the RN’s Future Anti-Surface Guided Weapon (Heavy) – FASGW(H) – requirement. FASGW(H) is designed to give the Wildcat HMA.2 the ability to disable surface targets up to corvette size, while also offering a capability against coastal and land targets.
Sea Venom is a 110 kg-class high-subsonic missile carrying a 30 kg semi-armour piercing blast/fragmentation warhead. Powered by a boost/sustain propulsion package – a fixed aft boost motor aft and a mid-body rocket sustainer – the missile can fly a variety of different flight profiles, including sea skimming, and is credited with a maximum range of around 20 km.
Guidance uses an imaging infrared seeker, aided by a two-way datalink for operator-in-the-loop control. While the missile is capable of flying a fully autonomous ‘fire and forget’ profile, operator-in-the-loop control enables capabilities such as in-flight re-targeting, aimpoint correction/refinement, and safe abort.
Sea Venom missile impact on the target barge. UK Ministry of Defence picture.
The milestone guided test firing, performed at Aberporth on 5 October, saw a single Sea Venom missile drop-launched from the Wildcat’s starboard stores carrier. “Every aspect of the firing worked well, from the ease-of-use in-cockpit for crews, through the performance of the missile in flight, right up to the accuracy on the target,” said Lieutenant Commander Robin Kenchington from 744 Naval Air Squadron (the RN’s test and evaluation squadron).
The target, comprising a barge with three containers mounted atop, was designed and built by QinetiQ engineers. Each container wall was fitted with multiple individually controlled heating elements so as to generate a thermal signature representative of a real target.
Sea Venom was originally planned to achieve an initial operating capability on the Wildcat HMA2 by October 2020. However, the programme has suffered a series of slippages attributed to design and integration issues impacting key weapon subsystems.
Some Sea Venom weapons – at a limited clearance – were embarked for the Carrier Strike Group 21 (CSG21) deployment in 2021. A more developed capability is expected to be fielded as part of next year’s CSG25 deployment, with the weapon planned to achieve full delivery into service in 2026.
Sea Venom will complement the in-service Martlet anti-surface weapon system procured to meet the Future Anti-Surface Guided Weapon (Light) – FASGW(L) – requirement. An exploitation of the Thales Lightweight Multirole Missile, Martlet is a lightweight, laser-beam riding precision guided weapon designed to deliver effects against fast inshore attack craft.
Leonardo, as design authority for FASGW integration on Wildcat HMA.2, has developed a new winged stores carrier for both Sea Venom and Martlet. This features an aerofoil section to generate additional lift for the helicopter in forward flight, so offloading some of the mass, reducing the nose down moment, and reducing main rotor stress.
Each wing is able to carry two Martlet launchers (for a total outload of 20 LMM missiles across both wings) or two Sea Venom missiles (for a maximum outload of four). Alternatively, the Wildcat can carry a mixed load of one five-cell Martlet launcher cluster (inboard) and one Sea Venom missile (outboard) on either wing.
DGA file picture.
On the French side, earlier plans to integrate Sea Venom/ANL onto the new H160M helicopter have been suspended after the programme was not funded in the 2024-2030 Loi de programmation militaire (Military Programming Law). Instead, the Direction Générale de l’Armement is now exploring the integration of Thales-manufactured 68 mm laser-guided rockets into the H160M.