At least one AeroVironment LOCUST laser counter-drone system is part of the array of anti-air defenses that have popped up around President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, in recent weeks.

Versions of LOCUST have been seeing steadily increasing use within the U.S. military in recent years including deployments now along the border with Mexico Though there has been much progress in the development of practical laser directed-energy weapons in recent years, the technology has continued to face hurdles to more widespread adoption.

The LOCUST system at Mar-a-Lago, which is mounted on a 4×4 Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV), is seen in two pictures that Getty’s Andrew Harnik took on October 31. When exactly the laser-directed energy weapon was deployed is unclear. was the first to spot the system in one of Harnik’s pictures and confirm its deployment.

Harnik’s main focus was a pair of Humvee-based AN/TWQ-1 Avenger short-range air defense systems on a floating platform in Lake Worth Lagoon near the edge of the estate, which were first deployed there just over two weeks ago. Additional Avengers have also been positioned around Donald J. Trump International Airport, which is situated some three miles to the west. The U.S. military has also set up elements of Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System Fly-Away Kits including Ku-band radar, electronic support measures (ESM), jammers, and 360-degree infrared search and track systems nearby. covered the presence of the Avengers and the Fly-Away Kits in a report last Friday This heightened security comes amid signs that a new round of major hostilities with Iran could be on the horizon as well as the run-up to tomorrow’s mid-term elections.

The regime in Tehran has threatened Trump’s life several occasions over the years. The President has already been the subject of several domestic assassination attempts and threats.

“At the request of the U.S. Secret Service (USSS) and under NORAD [the U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command] and USNORTHCOM [U.S. Northern Command] authorities, NORAD and USNORTHCOM recently deployed ground-based air defense [GBAD] assets and Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System capabilities in and around Mar-a-Lago, Florida,” the commands told us in a statement last week. “These assets add a complementary layer of technology to enhance protection. Due to operational security, we are unable to provide additional details. For further detail, we refer you to the USSS.”

“The U.S. Secret Service is operating in a heightened threat environment, and we continuously adapt our protective operations to incorporate cutting-edge tools, technology, and methods to safeguard our protectees,” the Secret Service also told us in a prior statement. “At the request of the U.S. Secret Service, NORAD and U.S. Northern Command are providing Counter-Unmanned Aircraft System capabilities in support of our protective operations.”The U.S. Army began recieving the JLTV-based versions of LOCUST, along with examples mounted on the smaller 4×4 Infantry Squad Vehicle (ISV) last year through a program called the Army Multi-Purpose High Energy Laser (AMP-HEL).

This followed the delivery of palletized LOCUST systems under a rapid prototyping effort called the Palletized-High Energy Laser (P-HEL) in the early 2020s. The Army is now acquiring LOCUST X3 systems under its Enduring-High Energy Laser (E-HEL) program. LOCUST has become something of a star more broadly within the directed energy space across the U.S. military. The U.S. Marine Corps and the U.S. Navy have also been exploring the use of versions of LOCUST in ground-based shipboard contexts To date, all versions of LOCUST consist of a turret with the laser beam projector, as well as built-in electro-optical and infrared video cameras for target acquisition and tracking.

The complete system also includes power generation and cooling components. LOCUST variants can also be cued using offboard sensors, including small-form-factor high-frequency radars and passive radio frequency signal detection systems on host vehicles or located off-platform nearby, like what the Fly-Away Kit provides.

The stated power rating for LOCUST varies from version to version, with the latest X3 being a 30-kilowatt type. Though the system is categorized as a high-energy laser, this is at the lower end of the power spectrum for weapons of this type, and it is explicitly geared toward the countering small drones mission set. Layering LOCUST in with other hard- and soft-kill counter-drone and air defense systems in a potentially high-threat area, as we are seeing now at Mar-a-Lago, makes good sense.

As mentioned, Mar-a-Lago is not the first time a LOCUST has been deployed in a real-world context. In 2022, the Army confirmed the operational deployment of two of P-HEL systems to unspecified foreign locales. Earlier this year, JLTV- and ISV-based AMP-HELs have appeared along the border with Mexico. One of the systems was part of the chain of events that led to the shutdown of airspace around El Paso, Texas, in February. That incident, in turn, prompted the Pentagon to craft a new agreement with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regarding the use of laser directed energy weapons within the United States.

has written in the past Army officials just recently touted the benefits of laser directed energy weapons like LOCUST, while also acknowledging again that there is still work to be done at the Association of the U.S. Army’s (AUSA) main annual convention last month.

“Lasers are real. We can do it. We can go out. We can shoot things,” Kirk Williams, Chief Engineer at the Army’s Directed Energy Project Office, another one of the panelists, said. “But what we got to do now is make these systems reliable enough so that the soldiers have the faith in them when they need them, and that’s really the main point that we’re trying to go after right now.”

“We’re getting to the point where the systems are reliable enough, but we still have to make them maintainable and repairable because this is an Army system,” he continued. “It’s going to be on a battlefield. Things are going to break. We can break things in very creative ways, right? So if it’s not reliable, or if it’s not maintainable, if it’s not repairable, that’s a problem.”At least one LOCUST system is at least now participating in a very high-profile mission to help protect President Trump. The post Counter-Drone Laser Weapon Now Guarding Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Alongside SAMs