Congress still undecided on how to protect airliners from missiles.

• Author: Magnuson, Stew
• Position: IN FOCUS: DEFENSE AND TECHNOLOGY NEWS

LOS ANGELES -- Tests of a system designed to protect commercial aircraft from shoulder-fired missiles have showed some improved performance in areas such as maintenance. But the system still fails short of goals acceptable to airlines, said the Department of Homeland Security official in charge of the program.

Congress has mandated that the department's science and technology directorate find a system capable of defeating man-portable air defense systems, or manpads. Earlier this year, DHS officials and contractors conducted a pilot program to see if a directed infrared counter-measure (DIRCM) system could withstand the rigors of flying on a commercial airliner.

Results showed that the typical DIRCM pod could fly for about 1,000 hours before it had to be swapped out, said Jim Turtle, head of the directorate's explosives division. That is a 10-fold increase from the 100 hours that the system is able to operate aboard military aircraft, he said. The problem is that these numbers need to get up to about 5,000 hours.

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"We [improved] an order of magnitude, but we still have to do another order of magnitude," Tuttle told National Defense.

Studies have shown that operating these systems will be costly for either the airlines or taxpayers--about $1 million to outfit one plane, Tuttle added. That excludes maintenance costs. Who would foot the bill has yet to be determined.

Tuttle said the DIRCM can shoot down missiles successfully, but maintenance and logistics issues are still the sticking points.

These issues are major concerns for the airline companies. Industry studies estimate that it could cost between $300 and $400 to operate the counter-manpads system per flight. That figure is far too high for a business that operates on thin profit margins, the studies have said.

"It still goes back to the issue of maintainability, reliability and supportability," Tuttle said.

A nine-month test last year using a Northrop Grumman-built counter-man-pads system aboard 12 Federal Express transports showed that if there was a malfunction, the modular design made them easy to swap out. The process took about 10 minutes, Turtle said. But that would mean pre-positioning $1 million replacement modules around the country and flying broken DIRCMs back to a repair depot.

"If these things could last four or five years, then it's reasonable that you could do that," Turtle said. A typical jetliner undergoes a routine overhaul every four to five...