Air Weapons: JDAM Glides Away

Archives

March 30, 2007: The JDAM (GPS guided smart bomb) now has a new set of wings, developed by an Australian firm, that gives the unpowered bomb a range of over 70 kilometers. The original JDAM, developed a decade ago, had a glide range of about eleven kilometers. In 2000, an Italian firm developed a JDAM kit with set of small wings added. This extended JDAM range to about 40 kilometers. The new kit extends the glide range even more, without increasing the cost of the JDAM kit (currently about $20,000) by more than about ten percent. Both of the longer range JDAMs are called JDAM ER (for Extended Range.)

This longer range is not always needed, or wanted, because it takes the bomb several more minutes to reach the target. If there are friendly troops involved, they usually want the JDAM to land sooner, rather than later. Thus JDAM ER is used mainly for attacking heavily defended (by anti-aircraft missiles) targets.

 

X

ad

Help Keep Us From Drying Up

We need your help! Our subscription base has slowly been dwindling.

Each month we count on your contributions. You can support us in the following ways:

  1. Make sure you spread the word about us. Two ways to do that are to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.
  2. Subscribe to our daily newsletter. We’ll send the news to your email box, and you don’t have to come to the site unless you want to read columns or see photos.
  3. You can contribute to the health of StrategyPage.
Subscribe   Contribute   Close