Orbital ATK, a global leader in aerospace and defense technologies, achieved a significant milestone with the delivery of the 500th Advanced Anti-Radiation Guided Missile (AARGM) to the U.S. Navy. AARGM provides a key capability to U.S. and allied forces to defeat enemy surface-to-air radar systems. The occasion was marked with a ceremony at the Orbital ATK production facility in Northridge, California, on May 31. Attendees included 30th Congressional District U.S. Representative Brad Sherman, Program Manager for Direct and Time Sensitive Strike Weapons (PMA-242) Capt. Al Mousseau, and other Navy senior executives and industry suppliers.

“Orbital ATK has steadily increased production and delivery of AARGM’s much-needed capability to the U.S. Navy,” said Cary Ralston, vice president and general manager of Orbital ATK’s Defense Electronic Systems division of the Defense Systems Group. “Our dedicated workforce coupled with our close partnership with the U.S. Navy, Italian Air Force, our industry partners and suppliers has been paramount to our success. We look forward to our continued collective success.”

“The delivery of the 500th weapon represents a commitment by this government-industry team, from the supply base to the prime contractor, to deliver a weapon system with a significant warfighting capability in the Suppression/Destruction of Enemy Air Defense mission area,” stated Mousseau.

AARGM is a supersonic, air-launched tactical missile system, upgrading legacy AGM-88 HARM systems with advanced capability to perform Destruction of Enemy Air Defense missions. AARGM is able to rapidly engage traditional and advanced land- and sea-based air-defense threats, as well as non-radar time-sensitive strike targets. Leveraging a digital receiver set, GPS/INS guidance, digital terrain data base and the game-changing millimeter wave (MMW) terminal guidance seeker, AARGM provides the most advanced system that can also provide pilots with in-cockpit, real-time electronic order of battle situational awareness against today’s modern surface-to-air threats.

AARGM is a U.S. Navy and Italian Air Force international cooperative major acquisition program with the U.S. Navy as the executive agent. AARGM is currently deployed and supporting operational requirements for the U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps. The missile is integrated into the weapons systems on the FA-18C/D Hornet, FA-18E/F Super Hornet and EA-18G Growler aircraft. AARGM is anticipated to achieve Initial Operational Capability on the Italian Air Force’s Tornado ECR aircraft in 2017.

Orbital ATK’s Defense Systems Group is an industry leader in providing innovative and affordable precision and strike weapons, advanced propulsion and hypersonics, missile components across air-, sea- and land-based systems, ammunition and related energetic products.