Israeli Navy Tests Iron Dome Air Defence System at Sea from Sa’ar 5 Corvette

: Posted On Saturday, 28 May 2016 09:57

Naval Forces News - Israel

Israeli Navy Tests Iron Dome Air Defence System at Sea from Sa’ar 5 Corvette

By Stelios Kanavakis - Senior Defence Analyst
The Israeli Navy (Heil HaYam HaYisraeli) has taken the Iron Dome air defence system to the sea and recently completed a live test fire. The naval version of the system will be used to protect strategic assets at sea, such as oil/natural gas rigs. Israel’s hydrocarbons fields and drilling installations in the East Mediterranean Sea have increased the requirements for security.

The Israeli Navy has taken the Iron Dome air defence system to the sea and recently completed a live test fire. The naval version of the system will be used to protect strategic assets at sea, such as oil/natural gas rigs. Israel’s hydrocarbons fields and drilling installations in the East Mediterranean Sea have increased the requirements for security.

Iron Dome firing its interceptors from the helicopter deck of a Sa’ar 5 corvette (Photo: Israeli Navy)

The test of the Tamir Adir Missile Defence System, as it is being called, proved its ability to operate on a highly dynamic, moving platform. Multiple short-range rockets were fired from the shore. The Adir radar identified and targeted them with the Tamir missile system.

The Israeli Navy’s Head of Combat Systems Development, Col. Ariel Shir said, “all the threats shot toward our assets were targeted by the Adir radar – one of the most advanced naval radars that exists today – and interception was accomplished by Iron Dome.”

It was revealed that the Tamir Adir system would be capable of working along with the Barak 8 missile defence system, which can eliminate sea-skimming missiles and aerial platforms. Therefore, it will offer a complete air defence protection of the fleet and of the maritime assets.

The next step will consist in testing the C-DOME Naval Point Defense System from a ship VLS at sea. C-DOME, the naval variant of Iron Dome was unveiled at Euronaval 2014.

Rafael C-DOME Naval Point Defense System unveiled at Euronaval 2014

Comment by Xavier Vavasseur, Navy Recognition's Chief Editor:

The next step will consist in testing the C-DOME Naval Point Defense System from a ship VLS at sea. C-DOME, the naval variant of Iron Dome was unveiled at Euronaval 2014.

Rafael's C-DOME is designed to effectively protect combat vessels against a large set of modern threats. C-Dome handles saturation attacks by engaging multiple targets simultaneously. Reaction time is very short and enables automatic and semi-automatic engagements. C-Dome components include a multi-round launcher assembly loaded with vertically-launched canisterised interceptors. The launcher is installed under the ship deck.

The future platform for C-DOME will likely be the Israeli Navy Sa'ar 6 MEKO A100 Corvette which is expected to be heavily armed: Likely 32x VLS cells for surface to air missile system Barak 1 by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and C-DOME naval point defense system by Rafael, 16x anti-ship missiles and the MF-STAR multifunction AESA radar by IAI.

Israeli Navy Video of the test