30 April 2021

Thales ramps up Antares production for French Army AFVs

by Christopher F Foss

Thales LAS France SAS is ramping up the production of the Antares laser warning and local situational awareness system (LWLSAS) for the French Army, the company told Janes in April.

By early April 2021 just over 80 had been completed, and a typical Antares LWLSAS production rate is to be 100 units a year, the company added.

Antares weighs less than 20 kg, and can be integrated with a platform’s NATO Generic Vehicle Architecture (NGVA).

Thales’ Antares LWLSAS provides laser warning and local situational awareness through 360 degrees. (Christopher F Foss)

It was accepted by the French Army following trials with a number of prototype systems that were delivered from 2016 under funding from the French Direction Générale de l’Armement (DGA).

Antares is usually mounted on the roof or turret of an armoured fighting vehicle (AFV), and provides information if targeted by a laser rangefinder or designator, thereby enabling the crew to take action.

According to Thales, LWLSAS is accurate to within 1.5 degrees, and has a low false-alarm rate. Antares provides coverage through 360 degrees in azimuth and from -15 to +75 degrees in elevation, and is run from the platform’s 20/30 V DC power supply.

The high-resolution sensor is 5.5 megapixels and associated with a distortion-controlled fish-eye optics, and the video can be colour for daylight operations or black and white for night operations at 25 frames per second with a built-in zoom capability to highlight specific areas, the company said.

Detection range would be up to 150 m for a human, 500 m for an AFV, and 250 m for a small unmanned aerial vehicle, the company added.

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