MSNBC is reporting the results of an Office of Naval Resarch (ONR) test conducted last week. In the test, “a high energy laser (HEL) has properly functioned as a weapon on the high seas. Offensive lasers often have problems in dynamic environments like the ocean, and have so far proven mostly useless in battle. Due to that dicey history, the lessons learned while developing the laser may prove more valuable than the laser itself.”
There is a brief video attached to the referenced article, showing the effects of a real-world laser weapon. That is, there’s no visible beam hitting the target, but the growing hole and the fire it caused are visible.
According to the ONR, “the test occurred near San Nicholas Island, off the coast of Central California in the Pacific Ocean test range. The laser was mounted onto the deck of the Navy’s self-defense test ship, former USS Paul Foster (DD 964).”
Called the Maritime Laser Demonstrator (MLD), MSNBC notes that “such lasers could one day protect military vessels from the same kind of tiny boat that almost sunk the destroyer USS Cole by augmenting the small machine guns already aboard American warships.
Peter Morrison, program officer for ONR’s MLD, said “This is the first time a HEL, at these power levels, has been put on a Navy ship, powered from that ship and used to defeat a target at-range in a maritime environment.”