USS Savannah conducts containerised SM-6 demonstration

Austal-built USS Savannah (LCS 28) has conducted a live-fire demonstration in the Eastern Pacific Ocean using a containerised launching system that fired an SM-6 missile from the ship at a designated target. It’s not clear whether this was an air or surface target.

“The exercise demonstrated the modularity and lethality of Littoral Combat Ships and the ability to successfully integrate a containerized weapons system to engage a surface target,” said US INDOPACOM in a statement. “The exercise will inform continued testing, evaluation and integration of containerized weapons systems on afloat platforms.

The missile launcher seems to have been sited on the flight deck aft of the superstructure – its siting seems to have been deliberately obscured in available photographs.

The USS Savannah is an Independence-class LCS whose combat equipment is known to include the SAAB AN/SPS-77(V)1 Sea Giraffe 3D air and surface search radar, a Sperry Marine BridgeMaster E navigational radar, AN/KAX-2 electro-optical sensor with TV and FLIR and a Northrop Grumman ICMS (Integrated Combat Management System). I

t’s not stated in the US Indo-Pacific Command statement how the target was designated nor how the missile was controlled.