USN successfully fires a test bed railgun

[tomahawk6]

Its not headed to sea anytime soon.Rather it seems that the gun will be first developed on land to be an operational weapon before going to a ship.Seems practical to me.

http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/us-navy-railgun-tests-%E2%80%9Cblow-the-top-mountain%E2%80%9D-14869

While the U.S. Navy had announced last year that it would take a prototype railgun to sea onboard the expeditionary fast transport USNS Trenton (JHSV-5) in 2016, the service may have to scupper those plans.

If the Navy does take the railgun out to sea on a fast transport, it will be in 2017 at the earliest. In lieu of testing the prototype rail gun in an at-sea environment, the Navy might instead proceed directly to developing an operational weapon system.

 

[CougarKing]

While the USN test is delayed, the US Army and General Atomics conducted their own tests with the rail gun:

World Defence News blogspot

Monday, 11 January 2016
General Atomics Railgun successfully achieved Critical Open Range Tests

General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems (GA-EMS) announced today that projectiles with prototype components for a Control and Actuation System (CAS) successfully performed programmed actions and communicated component performance to a ground station via a telemetry link in tests carried out 7-10 December 2015 at the U.S. Army’s Dugway Proving Ground in Utah.

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[CougarKing]

The latest on the USN railgun:

Defense News

US Navy Keeps Electromagnetic Cannon in Its Sights

WASHINGTON — The US Navy is quietly pushing ahead with a radical new cannon that one day could transform how wars are fought, even though some Pentagon officials have voiced concerns over its cost and viability.

Named the railgun, the weapon in question represents a paradigm shift in ballistic technology. Instead of using gunpowder and explosive charges to shoot a shell from its barrel, it employs vast amounts of electromagnetic energy to zoom a projectile along a set of copper-alloy rails.

Thanks to four small fins on its rear, the hefty round can then be guided toward a moving object — such as an enemy ship, drone or incoming ballistic missile — relying purely on the kinetic energy from its vast momentum to destroy the target.

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