March 30, 2007: The JDAM (GPS guided smart bomb)
now has a new set of wings, developed by an Australian firm, that gives the
unpowered bomb a range of over 70 kilometers. The original JDAM, developed a
decade ago, had a glide range of about eleven kilometers. In 2000, an Italian
firm developed a JDAM kit with set of small wings added. This extended JDAM
range to about 40 kilometers. The new kit extends the glide range even more,
without increasing the cost of the JDAM kit (currently about $20,000) by more
than about ten percent. Both of the longer range JDAMs are called JDAM ER (for
Extended Range.)
This longer range is not always needed, or wanted,
because it takes the bomb several more minutes to reach the target. If there
are friendly troops involved, they usually want the JDAM to land sooner, rather
than later. Thus JDAM ER is used mainly for attacking heavily defended (by
anti-aircraft missiles) targets.
