TRW Space & Electronics of Redondo Beach, Calif., announced that its Mobile Tactical High-Energy Laser has destroyed an artillery shell in midair. The US Army conducted the live-fire tests of the system at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico.

The laser weapon is an updated version of the company's Tactical High-Energy Laser/Advanced Concept Technology Demonstrator, itself an outgrowth of the megawatt-class Mid-Infrared Advanced Chemical Laser that it designed for the US Navy. The system, under development for the Army and the Israel Ministry of Defence, will be a more easily transportable CW deuterium fluoride laser intended to intercept artillery and mortar rounds, unmanned aerial vehicles, short-range ballistic and cruise missiles, and air-to-surface munitions.