• What problem does your design idea solve?
Future Aircraft Carrier Battle Groups (ACBG) will be facing the very real threat of swarm attacks by dozens or even hundreds of hypersonic missiles. With the ongoing advancement of modern missile technology, it will become increasingly difficult to destroy missiles before they are launched. For example, the cost of upgrading Aegis cruisers and destroyers to counter missiles such as the Chinese DF-21 D will be about $10 billion. The ranges and speeds of anti-ship missiles are continuously increasing, making it impossible to destroy them before launch in constrained areas such as the Persian Gulf. With future projected velocities exceeding Mack 5 (6,200 kph at sea level) current defense systems will not be able to react in time. Also, the MK 15 Phalanx Close-In Weapons System could be overwhelmed by using a swarm attack by simultaneously firing hundreds of missiles at one aircraft carrier...The defensive system would soon simply run out of ammunition. Since the one material that is infinitely available to ships at sea is water, it makes sense to consider using it as a defensive system.

• What are the potential benefits?
The proposed defensive system that could protect an entire ACBG from a broad spectrum of present and future threats, including torpedoes. The great advantage is that the speed of the threat is irrelevant because the system does not need expensive tracking and targeting systems. Also, since the system uses sea water, it will never run out of ammunition.

• How is your idea novel or an improvement on what is currently available in the marketplace?
Unlike the existing MK 15 Phalanx or other track & fire systems, the new system does not need a tracking system, so it will be far cheaper. It will also never exhaust its ammunition. Unlike laser defensive systems, it is also immune to interference by heavy clouds, fog, smoke or other adverse atmospheric conditions.

• Where would this idea be applied?
Protecting billion dollar ACBGs, destroyers and other valuable ships & naval bases.

• What is the market potential?
It could be used to protect a wide variety of naval assets.

• How does your design work?
Using high energy electromagnetic rail gun driven piston combined with next generation, nano-composite technology, thick walled, hydraulic cylinder, it is possible to pressurize water to incredible pressures exceeding 100,000 psi. When projected through a nozzle at these high pressures, the water column will remain laminar and coherent for great distances before dissipating. Anything attempting to pass through such a column of coherent water (such as a missile) would be destroyed instantly. A ship equipped with an array of such nozzles on each side could set up an impassible picket of water columns extending for several kilometers in each direction, making it impossible for any incoming missile to reach the ship before being destroyed.