Feb 16 2011
The United States Air Force has given a contract worth $257 million to Textron Defense Systems, adhering to which, Textron will provide 512 units of CBU-105 Sensor Fuzed Weapons (SFW) to the Government of India. This comes in accordance with the Foreign Military Sale agreement between the two countries.
Senior vice president and general manager of Textron Defense Systems, Ellen Lord, has stated that the Sensor Fuzed Weapon has been created after a thorough research, checking and analysis, and the weapon is deemed as safe, reliable and meets present day battlefield clean standards.
Intended for clean battlefield operation, SFW has been designed to eliminate the danger of deplorable harm to non-combatants or civilians. Meeting the Unexploded Ordnance (UXO) criteria for cluster munitions, with less than 1% unexploded ordnance; it is the only air-delivered weapon.
Textron Defense Systems' combat-proven battlefield weapon, the SFW contains Skeet TM warheads equipped with active laser and dual-mode passive infrared sensors and BLU-108 submunition. One of the three safety modes is activated, if the Skeet warhead is unable to detect a valid target in the lofted trajectory. The Skeet can self-destruct within 15 meters (50-meters) of elevation above the ground or after eight seconds from initiation, a function enabled by its first two modes. Together, both the features deliver more than 99% reliability. The third mode in the Skeet makes the Skeet inoperable by deactivating itself within moments of hitting the ground.
Source: http://www.textron.com/