ANALYTICAL COMPARISON OF THE OPTIMIZATION OF SMALL CALIBER PROJECTILES AND AIRBURST MUNITIONS FOR COUNTERING sUAS

Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems have evolved to become full-fledged weapon systems in contemporary conflicts, posing a significant threat in specific scenarios that may necessitate absolute neutralization. Unguided kinetic effectors belong to a category of countermeasures that offer a viable solution for this absolute neutralization, at a justifiable cost. Small caliber projectiles and airburst munitions are two subcategories of unguided kinetic effectors considered in the present study. The intended projectile categories are the common small calibers 5.56mm and 7.62mm and the medium calibers 30, 35 and 40mm. The aim of the work is to provide elemental insights in the operational use of the two subcategories for countering small Unmanned Aircraft Systems in an optimal configuration. The optimization process attempts to obtain a firing sequence that requires an acceptable amount of rounds for an acceptable hit probability. Since operational use require the need for prompt results, the methodology balances model accuracy and parameter value availability with computational efficiency. The present study focuses on the methodology proposition.