Royal Australian Navy Discussions and Updates 2.0

[Todjaeger]

Obviously NSM has a much better range than Penguin could ever manage, but it's also a much heavier missile and an MH-60R likely could only ever carry one of them per mission. Ship-launched NSM comes with a substantial booster motor, which the air-launched variant wouldn't have. Would this offset the additional range and altitude capability of the MH-60R as it did with Harpoon Block II? Quite possibly given NSM's reported "substantial" range improvement over Harpoon Block II...

Ehhh... The NSM has a slightly greater mass than the Mk 2 Mod 7 Penguin, with a weight of 407 kg per Kongsberg, vs. a weight of ~385 kg for that variant of Penguin. I would not consider a weight increase of slightly more than 5% "much heavier" given that it is an increase of just about 20 kg. Earlier on in the NSM development history, it had been planned to have helicopter-launched versions, to replace the Penguin AShM in that role like NSM was intended across Norwegian service IIRC.