HMAS Sydney fires Royal Australian Navy's first Standard Missile 6 during Exercise ‘Pacific Dragon' 2024. (Commonwealth of Australia)
Australia's third Hobart-class destroyer Sydney has carried out a first-of-class firing of the Standard Missile 6 (SM-6), the country's Department of Defence (DoD) disclosed in a 10 August statement.
It was fired in August and carried out as part of Exercise ‘Pacific Dragon' 2024 in the vicinity of Hawaii, the DoD added without revealing the exact date of the event.
In its statement, the DoD described the firing as a “step-change in the lethality, air and missile defence, and long-range strike capability of the navy's surface combatant fleet”.
“The Standard Missile 6 will be progressively deployed across navy's Hobart-class destroyers and, in the future, the Hunter-class frigates,” the DoD said.
“The addition of the Standard Missile 6 augments integrated air and missile defence-capable platforms. Australia has three guided missile destroyers in service and will add the Aegis Baseline 9 combat system, which will provide the ability to counter airborne threats, including ballistic missiles,” the DoD added.
Sydney is the third of the Royal Australian Navy's (RAN's) three Hobart-class destroyers, which were commissioned between September 2017 and May 2020.
The class displaces about 7,000 tonnes at full load and has an overall length of about 147 m.
Main features
The SM-6 is a 6.55 m anti-air missile that can also undertake anti-surface warfare and ballistic missile defence, or sea-based terminal missions.
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