The US Navy and Safran together designed the non-lethal system to counter asymmetric threats at sea.
The idea came around three years ago. Tensions in the Persian Gulf were, once again, rising with Iran’s swarms of attack boats regularly harassing US Navy ships, tankers and other commercial ships. As use of conventional weapons is excluded to answer those provocative actions, the US Navy and Safran together worked on a non-lethal system : the Long Rang Ocular Interrupter-Compact Ocular Interrupter Laser (LROI-COIL).
Developed in less than two years hand in hand with US sailors, the LROI-COIL is a lightweight visible laser illuminator use to hail and/or suppress approaching watercraft or land threats. Handheld or tripod mounted, it relies on visible laser illuminators (VLI) composed of twenty paired high-power 1W green laser diodes.
Once combined, the lasers generate a eye-safe green beam capable of hail and suppression of approaching watercraft or land objects. « The device is designed for maritime security of high value assets and is capable to us anywhere where long standoff distances are required », the company explains. The system is effective up to 3.6 km for interdiction and more than 9 km for interdiction or suppression.
Dual laser range finders are integrated to adapt the VLI power and ensures adequate intensity to hail/suppress contact of interest (COI). The illuminator also add a wide field-of-view low-light camera for rapid target acquisition and pointing and a 2-eye Organic Light Emitting Diode (OLED) display with up to 4x digital zoom.
Developed and assembled in The LROI-COIL is already a success on the other side of the Atlantic, with around 300 units delivered to the US Navy over the past 18 months. And the interest is now growing, and not only with other US services but also abroad.
