Defence Online

Leonardo introduces BriteCloud 55-T to safeguard military transport aircraft

Air June 12, 2018

At the Electronic Warfare Europe 2018 conference in Lausanne, Switzerland, Leonardo officially announced the next variant of its BriteCloud missile decoy system, the BriteCloud 55-T.

Manufactured in Luton, BriteCloud 55-T employs sophisticated miniaturised jamming technology to protect large-scale military transport aircraft – such as Leonardo’s own C27-J Spartan and a host of third party platforms including the Airbus A400M Atlas – from advanced radar-guided missiles.

Its predecessor, BriteCloud 55, is the size of an aluminium can and houses a miniaturised Radio-Frequency (RF) jamming module, capable of convincing incoming radar-guided missiles to miss their intended targets. The system is now in service with the Royal Air Force on-board its fleet of Tornado GR4 fighter jets. Bigger aircraft require more elaborate decoys however, in order to mask the larger radar return they generate.

Hence BriteCloud 55-T, which is able to produce a more powerful ‘ghost’ radar signature, drawing the most advanced radar-guided threats away from the aircraft. The 55-T variant is roughly the same size as BriteCloud 55. It can be slot into an aircraft’s standard 55mm chaff and flare dispenser, or be fitted to a square format dispenser using an adapter magazine, with no further integration work required.

BriteCloud 55-T is currently in the final stages of development and it will be commercially available in early 2019. Leonardo is now engaging in active discussions with export customers to ship the technology across the globe.

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A400M Atlas BriteCloud 55-T C27-J Spartan Leonardo Royal Air Force

Post written by: Robert Atherton