Arena Active Protection System

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

ARENA
Type	Active Protection System
Place of origin	Russia
Service history
Used by	Russia
Production history
Designer	Kolomna-based Engineering Design Bureau (KBM)
Designed	1993^[1]
Unit cost	US$300,000
Variants	ARENA-E (export)
Specifications
Weight	1100 kg

1. Protective siloes
2. Radar
3. Protective ammo
4. Incoming anti-tank guided missile
5. Tracking phase

The Arena Active Protection System (APS) is an active countermeasure system developed at Russia's Kolomna-based Engineering Design Bureau to protect armoured fighting vehicles from light anti-tank weapons, ATGMs, and missiles with top attack warheads. It uses a millimeter-wavelength doppler radar to detect incoming warheads. It then fires a defensive projectile which is timed to detonate immediately above the target and spray it with a submunitions--thereby defeating the threat.

The system protects the vehicle in a 220-270 degree arc in front of the turret, which traverses depending on where the turret is pointing. The zone of protection extends to around twenty to thirty meters around the tank, allowing infantry to operate nearby^[2]. It should be noted that this system is prone to creating large amounts of shrapnel. When the system is activated, a warning signal is activated to alert nearby personnel to take cover or keep their distance^[3].

Arena was designed partly in response to vulnerabilities of the Russian tanks, discovered during fighting in Chechnya in the 1990s^[4]. There, many Russian armored vehicles and BTRs had fallen prey to anti-tank missiles and RPGs launched by Chechen fighters.

The cost of the system on a single armoured vehicle is approximately $300,000. It was first employed on the T-80UM1 Main Battle Tank. The export version is referred to as the ARENA-E^[5].