As small unmanned aircraft systems become an increasing menace on modern battlefields, Northrop Grumman is promoting gun-based air defense solutions intended to shoot down large numbers of incoming aerial threats.
At the Association of the United States Army’s annual meeting, the company unveiled its newest 50mm gun system for air defense, called Raid Hunter, alongside an updated version of the M230 chain gun.
Both weapons are members of Northrop’s patented Bushmaster Chain Gun family — medium-caliber, vehicle-mounted automatic guns that are driven by an external power source rather than by the firing cycle alone.
Kenn Todorov, Northrop’s vice president and general manager for command and control & weapons integration, described Raid Hunter as an economical and adaptable option to “decisively defeat evolving threats,” engineered to cope with situations that can overwhelm other defenses.
According to the manufacturer’s documentation, the Raid Hunter pairs artificial intelligence–assisted targeting with precision-guided 50mm ammunition that uses proximity fuzes to detonate near a threat, increasing the likelihood of destroying small, agile aerial targets.
Todorov said the system fills a vital short-range defensive void by providing fast, high-volume protection against complicated, massed aerial attacks — examples he cited include cruise missiles and swarms of drones.
Introduced in August, the Raid Hunter has already completed aeroballistic trials — live-fire tests against airborne targets — and those trials validated the pre-launch predictions about its behavior and effectiveness, Northrop reports.
The updated M230, branded the M230 Link Fed Dual Feed Bushmaster Chain Gun (M230LF), is an evolution of the M230 cannon used on Apache attack helicopters and can be installed on a wide range of platforms, from light 4×4 vehicles to larger ground vehicles and patrol craft.
Its defining feature is a dual-feed mechanism that lets crews switch quickly between two ammunition types: proximity-fuzed 30x113mm rounds optimized for intercepting drones, and high-explosive dual-purpose projectiles intended to engage armored targets.
That dual-feed capability allows an operator to change ammunition type on the fly without removing or reloading the gun, and the new dual-feed variant retains about 60% commonality with the single-feed version in terms of parts.
Northrop’s published specifications say the M230LF can sustain a rate of fire of roughly 200 rounds per minute and boasts a mean rounds between failure figure of about 22,000, which the company characterizes as highly reliable.
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Jamal Peterson reports on defense, aerospace, and tech policy. With a military background and a strategic mind, he dissects complex subjects with clarity, offering readers sharp, reliable insights.
