material, reducing the weight by more than 20%. The Mexican Navy will be one of the customers of the Mk 56, using an 8-cell launcher on their Sigma-class design frigates. Specifications: Mark 57 (Mk 57) The Mk 57 Peripheral Vertical Launching System (PVLS), an evolution of Mk 41 VLS, is used on Zumwalt-class destroyers. It is designed to be installed on the ship periphery instead of centralized magazines. It comes in 4-cell launcher modules and provides backwards compatibility with existing missiles, while allowing new missiles with significantly increased propulsion and payloads. AMRAAM-ER The AMRAAM-ER is an Extended Range upgrade to the AIM-120 AMRAAM missile for the NASAMS ground-based air defense system, which combines ESSM rocket motor with the AMRAAM two-stage seeker head. Operational history US operational evaluation was conducted in July 2002 aboard . Initial operational capability did not occur until later. In October 2003, at the USN Pacific Missile Range Facility near Hawaii, Australian frigate conducted a successful firing of an ESSM. The firing was also the first operational use of the CEA Technologies CWI for guidance. In November 2003, approximately from the Azores, the Royal Netherlands Navy (RNLN) frigate conducted a live fire test of a single ESSM. This firing was the first ever live firing involving a full-size ship-borne active electronically scanned array (i.e. the APAR radar) guiding a missile using the Interrupted Continuous Wave Illumination (ICWI) technique in an operational environment. As related by Jane's Navy International: During the tracking and missile-firing tests, target profiles were provided by Greek-built EADS/3Sigma Iris PVK medium-range subsonic target drones. [...] According to the RNLN, ... "APAR immediately acquired the missile and maintained track until destruction". [...] These ground-breaking tests represented the world's first live verification of the ICWI technique. In August 2004, a German Navy completed a series of live missile firings at the Point Mugu missile launch range off the coast of California that included a total of 11 ESSM missile firings. The tests included firings against target drones such as the Northrop BQM-74E Chukkar III and Teledyne Ryan BQM-34S Firebee I, as well as against missile targets such as the Beech AQM-37C and air-launched Kormoran 1 anti-ship missiles. Further live firings were performed by the RNLN frigate HNLMS De Zeven Provinciën in March 2005, again in the Atlantic Ocean approximately west of the Azores. The tests involved three live-firing events (two of which involved the ESSM) including