Article Posted on : - Oct 27, 2010

Enhanced AN/TPQ-36 (EQ-36) counterfire target acquisition radar systems. Photo: Lockheed Martin

SYRACUSE (BNS): US Army has recently deployed the first Enhanced AN/TPQ-36 (EQ-36) counterfire target acquisition radar systems in Iraq and Afghanistan, built by Lockheed Martin.

EQ-36 systems have the ability to detect, classify, track and locate enemy indirect fire such as mortars, artillery and rockets in either 360- or 90-degree modes.

The AN/TPQ-36 and AN/TPQ-37 medium-range radars of US Army will be replaced by the new advanced EQ-36 systems.

“From the start, the EQ-36 programme has been about the soldier and the Army’s urgent need to protect them from daily indirect fire threats. With more than 40-years of radar experience, we developed the EQ-36 radar in fewer than 30 months -- less than half the time it traditionally takes to develop a new radar system,” Carl Bannar, vice president of Lockheed Martin’s Radar Systems, said.

Lockheed Martin has already delivered the first two EQ-36 systems to the US Army in July 2009, with a successful live-fire field testing at Yuma Proving Grounds in Arizona.

In January 2007, Lockheed Martin had received the original contract by the US Army's Programme Executive Office, Intelligence, Electronic Warfare and Sensors.