Arthuristan Dynamics Raven

Raven
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Role	Attack helicopter
Manufacturer	Arthuristan Dynamics
Introduction	1985
Status	In service
Primary user	Commonwealth Army, Commonwealth Navy, Eagleland Army, Lion's Rock Army

The Raven is an attack helicopter of Arthuristan origin. It began as a project to develop a dedicated anti-armour helicopter gunship with performance superior to the existing Westfields Cheetah. The Raven is capable of carrying sixteen heavy anti-tank missiles, originally the AGM-114 Hellfire before the switch to the Belfrasian Scorpion missile in recent years. It is capable of withstanding hits from 23mm anti-aircraft guns. In the early-90's, they were upgraded with the Longbow attack radar, enabling a Raven to simultaneously process and engage multiple armoured threats at once. A navalised version, the Raven-M, is in service with the Fleet Air Arm to support the Commonwealth Marines in amphibious operations, as well as conduct littoral sea control missions.

Networking

The helicopter is able to network with the three battlenets of the Arthuristan services (ARTEMIS of the Commonwealth Air Force, ATHENA of the Navy and ARES of the Commonwealth Army) via two methods. The first is simply using the ubiquitous Link 16. The second, a stealthier option, involves using MADL to provide secure data-linking with other stealthy aircrafts via frequency-hopping and anti-jamming technology. These mechanisms not only allows the helicopters to share information with other units, but also enable the aircrafts to share tracking, targeting and other data over the battlenet, allowing them to warn each other of potential dangers immediately after detection by one platform and guide each others' weapons towards their targets. Especially important is the ability to network with the air force's NOVA drones, allowing the platforms to share a real-time picture of the battlefield and even work as hunter-killer teams, with the stealthy UCAVs identifying targets for the Ravens to attack safely from stand-off range.

Countermeasures

Like many of the latest attack helicopter designs on the market, the Raven is fitted with a raft of advanced softkill systems. Besides the usual chaff dispensers to confound radar, flares to defeat heatseakers and smoke to obscure the aircraft from lasers, it also has a high-energy laser-bloomers to destroy any laser designator that targets the aircraft, as well as the ERIS-B EW suite, originally developed for fighters (in turn a derivative of the Thales Spectra system intended for the Rafale). It has the ability to conduct stealthy jamming, or "active cancellation" - by sampling and analysing incoming radar, then transmitting the signal to the enemy’s radar slightly out of phase, thereby cancelling out the returning radar signal.

Specifications

• Crew: 2
• Length: 13.6m
• Rotor length: 14.6m
• Height: 4.1m
• Empty Weight: 2.9 tonnes
• Propulsion: 2 x DME-2 Turboshafts (1,300kW each)
• Maximum Speed: 338 km/h
• Service ceiling: 3,720m
• Combat Radius: 500km on internal fuel
• Ferry Range: 2,000km
• Armament: 1 x 30mm tri-barrel gatling gun (1,200 rounds), up to sixteen AGM-114 Hellfire or Scorpion missiles stub-wing hardpoints, or eight missiles and two CRV7 rocket pods, ACCM Taipan air-to-air missiles.
• Sensors: Longbow attack radar, Isis IR/optical sensors suite, Hydra-B passive antenna array
• Countermeasures: ERIS-B EW suite, Britecloud, chaff/flare launchers, laser bloomers, smoke dispensers