In 1989, BAE Systems was awarded prime contractor on the Air-5140 project for the installation, test and upgrade of the Electronic Support Measures (ESM) equipment for the Royal Australian Air Force's (RAAF's) AP-3C Orion Maritime Patrol aircraft.
At that time, this represented the largest Electronic Warfare project ever contracted to the Australian Defence Industry. As prime contractor, BAE Systems were responsible for all aspects of the aircraft modification, including systems engineering, design and development of software and hardware interfacing between the ESM system and the Data Management System and completion of the certification and type acceptance.
Integration and installation work on the AN/ALR2001 ESM system was performed on a total of 19 aircraft in addition to the provision of a Software Support Facility, Operational Mission Simulator, Ground Support Equipment, as well as associated training and support system.
The AN/ALR2001 ESM system is an integral part of the AP-3C's sensor suite and is used to passively detect, locate, classify and track surface and airborne Radio Frequency (RF) emitters.
