New 155mm artillery ammo tipped to give British Army more lethality and range

The new 155mm artillery rounds set to be given to the British Army will deliver more lethality, range and performance, the manufacturer has told Forces News.

The Next Generation Adaptable Ammunition (NGAA) being produced by BAE Systems will replace the Army's ageing L15 family of ammunition.

Each NGAA shell will have a course-correcting electronic fuse and offers three times the range of the Royal Artillery's current 155mm shells. The rocket-assisted version of the shells will have a range of 65km.

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BAE says it plans to test-fire the next-generation round later this year, and while the futuristic ammunition might not arrive in time to make a difference in Ukraine, it will help restock Nato's bare shelves.

Phil Cardew, strategy director, munitions, at BAE Systems, told Forces News: "I think we recognise that ammunition manufacturing has been unchanged for probably the best part of 100 years. Actually, the conflict in Ukraine forced us to rethink how we approach that.

"The reality is there are a whole bunch of new technologies that we could be employing to manufacture ammunition which are common with other sectors.

"If we can harness that, what it allows us to do is to use a broader range of facilities for production and therefore scale ammunition much more quickly than we're able to do today - and that’s the focus from us with NGAA.

"In addition, NGAA will deliver more range, it will deliver more performance and it will deliver more lethality than perhaps what you can buy today on the market."

Watch: Inside an ammo factory racing to replenish dwindling Nato stocks

The MOD has already delivered 300,000 artillery shells to Ukraine and says it will send thousands more by the end of the year.

Ukraine is burning through an estimated 4,000 to 7,000 shells a day, while the Russian number is possibly four times that.

Defence experts say Kyiv needs more than one and a half million shells a year to sustain its fight against the Kremlin.

BAE Systems is rapidly expanding production of existing 155mm shells, increasing capacity at its factories and building a new one in South Wales.

Earlier this year, the company was awarded a £400m contract to produce new ammunition.

Mr Cardew added: "Our role was to offer innovation in terms of how we could quickly scale production and meet the demands the UK MOD was placing on us.

"It is a significant uplift. We’re designing our facility to be an eightfold increase over what we had previously."