October 5, 2010: Recently, the U.S. Navy successfully tested a
laser weapon that pierced the hulls of small boats hundreds of
meters away. But this was a static (on land) test against
immobile targets. Next, the MLD (Maritime Laser Demonstration)
will be mounted on a ship for more realistic tests. MLD is
scalable (it can use higher energy levels) up to 100 kilowatts.
This raises a major issue; power supply. MLD will only work
effectively in an all-electric ship (where the engines produce
just electricity, and all ship equipment is electric powered.)
Some all electric warships are already in service, and most
navies are planning to build only this type of shipboard power
plant in the future. At that point, MLD will be a practical
weapon. MLD was developed based on the earlier THEL (Tactical
High Energy Laser) system. This was a joint U.S.-Israel project
from the 1990s. Israel eventually dropped out because of the
cost, and slow progress. But by 2005, THEL was looking good, and
a smaller, commercial version, Sk