Piranha III Vehicles Protected Against New Threats

General Dynamics,

 In cooperation with Saab Avitronics, MOWAG GmbH, a General Dynamics European Land Systems Company – integrated for the first time the LEDS (Land Electronic Defence System) Active Protection System on a PIRANHA VEHICLE. This Active Protection System enhances significantly the survivability. The system defeats threats as encountered on the battlefield today, such as e.g. RPGs without affecting the overall mobility of the armoured vehicle.
 
The core competences as claimed by MOWAG in the areas of mobility, survivability and system integration have been further underlined with the latest integration of an Active Protection System into the PIRANHA IIIC 8×8. New, omni-directional threats, besides the conventional ballistic and mine threats, such as various types of IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices), with the effect of blast, fragmentation, EFP (Explosively Formed Projectiles), SC (Shaped Charge) respectively CE (Chemical Energy) have to be defeated also by light and medium armoured wheeled vehicles in order to provide the required level of protection to the vehicle crews in today's military operations. Furthermore, greater threats from the so-called “conventional” or “symmetric” warfare such as RPG (Rocket Propelled Grenades) as well as ATGM (Anti Tank Guided Missiles) are more frequently encountered even in Peace Keeping Missions.
 
MOWAG's approach in the definition of an adequate solution concerning the protection of its vehicles follows different stages: Firstly with an assessment tool, a customized “Threat Map” to identify the required protection technologies. Secondly by a selection of the most suitable protection technologies and suppliers for the threats as defined by the customer. Thirdly by a comparison of the additional overall weight for the proposed protective suit with the relevant threat protection.

Concerning Active Protection MOWAG performed an in-depth study of 20 different APS (Active Protection Systems) as available on the world market at that time. Based thereupon, MOWAG finally selected for various reasons, the Land Electronics Defence Systems (LEDS) of Saab Avitronics as the APS element in the protective suit.
 
LEDS – a customized solution
The LEDS like the PIRANHA VEHICLE follow the same system design concept regarding survivability in so far that both concepts are modular, interchangeable, up-gradable and scalable to meet different customer's demands. LEDS combines soft-fill, hard-kill and active signature management to provide hemi-spherical and full spectrum active protection to land vehicles. It is designed to be an integral part of the vehicle. The LEDS consists of a sensor suite, central active defence controller, high speed directed dispensing system and counter measure options ranging from fast deploying multi-spectral smoke, active signature management devices and hard-kill options to defeat attacking threats. The active signature management options also include the protection against petrol bombs and secondary fires resulting from IED attack. Sensor options include laser warning and an active threat acquisition and tracking system.

EAGLE and DURO to follow
MOWAG – in partnership with Saab Avitronics – has integrated the LEDS on an armoured amphibious PIRANHA IIIC 8×8 vehicle which will be displayed on General Dynamics European Land System's Stand during DSEi 2007. Validation firing tests will be performed in late 2007 so that pre-series integration work of the LEDS can be launched as from early 2008 on different PIRANHA vehicle variants. Furthermore integration studies for LEDS into the other MOWAG vehicle families such as EAGLE and DURO will be pursued in 2008.