First SM-6 Delivered

Raytheon has delivered the first Standard Missile-6 production round to the Navy, the company announced this morning. According to a statement:

"Five years ago, Raytheon promised the U.S. Navy that SM-6 would be delivered in March 2011, and we delivered on that promise," said Frank Wyatt, vice president of Raytheon's Air and Missile Defense Systems product line. "Raytheon delivered the SM-6 to our customer and met cost expectations for system development and demonstration. Now the U.S. Navy has a missile that provides an umbrella of protection against the full spectrum of air threats."

SM-6 leverages the legacy Standard Missile airframe and propulsion elements while incorporating the advanced signal processing and guidance control capabilities of Raytheon's Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile.

"SM-6 is a remarkable missile because it combines the reliability of time-tested systems with all the latest advancements in missile technology," said Wyatt. "This missile can use both active and semiactive modes, giving the warfighter an enhanced ability to reach remote targets."

According to a Raytheon executive, the company is under a three-year, low-rate initial production contract to provide the first lot  of 29 missiles using fiscal year 2009 funds, 11 in FY-10 and 59 in FY-11. Full-rate production will begin in FY-12, the executive added.

Producing the SM-6 has not gone without its share of hitches however, as InsideDefense.com reported in January:

The Navy has resumed at-sea testing of the Standard Missile 6 (SM-6) system in Hawaii, hoping to verify engineering changes made following failures last summer, according to Navy officials and Pentagon documents.

Success in the at-sea testing is seen as essential to avoid a delay in plans to field the first operational systems in fiscal year 2011.

“Testing is currently under way at Pacific Missile Range Facility,” Chris Johnson, a spokesman for Naval Sea Systems Command, told InsideDefense.com.

Operational and developmental testing of the Raytheon-built SM-6 Extended Range Active Missile -- a $6.6 billion program that began low-rate production in August of 2009 -- was suspended last year following a series of mishaps, according to the Pentagon's top weapons tester. The testing being conducted includes missions at the range in Kauai, HI, that were put on hold after a series of firing attempts last summer were deemed deficient.

“The suspension of developmental/operational testing exhausted the schedule margins that existed in the SM-6 schedule,” Michael Gilmore, Pentagon director of operational test and evaluation, wrote in his office's recent assessment of the SM-6 program.