Rheinmetall has fired its FV-014 loitering munition from its Containerized Missile Launcher (CML) for the first time, launching munitions from a CML mounted on an HX-series truck both while the vehicle was stationary and while it was moving, the German defense giant says. The company demonstrated the milestone for a customer audience in July 2026 and confirmed it publicly on August 13; trade outlets Janes and The War Zone published details of the test on August 17 and August 14, respectively.
The test took place at the German Aerospace Center's (DLR) National Test Centre for Unmanned Aerial Systems in Cochstedt, in the state of Saxony-Anhalt. Rheinmetall attributed the demonstration to its Weapon and Ammunition and Digital Systems divisions and described it as a successful customer presentation, though it has not named which customer or customers observed the launch.
From a Container to a Live Fire, on the Move
The launcher in question is Rheinmetall's Containerized Missile Launcher (CML), a system the company first showed publicly at Eurosatory 2026 in Paris in June. The CML is built into a standard 20-foot ISO shipping container that can hold up to 18 FV-014 munitions at once, and it is designed to be resilient to GNSS interference — a nod to the electronic-warfare-heavy conditions loitering munitions are increasingly expected to operate in. For the Cochstedt test, the container was mounted on a Rheinmetall HX-series truck.
According to The War Zone, the Cochstedt event marked the first time Rheinmetall has fired the FV-014 from the CML at all — not simply the first time it was fired on the move. Notably, the truck-mounted demonstration included shots fired both from a stationary position and while the HX truck was in motion, per Janes' and The War Zone's reporting — a shoot-on-the-move capability that matters for units that need to fire and immediately reposition rather than stopping to set up a static firing position.
Once ejected by its booster, the FV-014 unfolds its wings and, per The War Zone's reporting, switches to electric propeller propulsion for the remainder of its flight. Rheinmetall did not disclose the exact number of munitions fired during the Cochstedt demonstration.
What the FV-014 Brings to a Fight
The FV-014 is built for stand-off strikes rather than short-range harassment fire. Its published range is 100 kilometers, and The War Zone reports an endurance of up to 70 minutes on station — enough time for an operator to loiter over a target area, wait for a clear shot, or search for a better one. The munition weighs roughly 50 pounds at launch and carries a high-explosive dual-purpose (HEDP) warhead of about 13 pounds, rated to penetrate roughly 24 inches of steel — enough to threaten armored vehicles as well as fortified or unarmored targets.
Rheinmetall has built human-in-the-loop control into the weapon: according to The War Zone, ground-station operators identify targets, authorize attacks, and retain the ability to abort an engagement. That control loop is designed to reduce the risk of misidentified targets, a persistent concern with loitering munitions that has drawn scrutiny in other programs and conflicts.
The system is also built for scale. Because the CML stores up to 18 rounds in a single container, it appears well suited to firing the FV-014 individually against a single target or launching multiple munitions in a coordinated attack — a swarm-style tactic increasingly favored elsewhere in the loitering-munition field to overwhelm point-defense systems or strike several targets simultaneously, though Rheinmetall has not detailed how many rounds were fired in salvo during the Cochstedt test.
Quick Facts: FV-014 / CML
- Range: 100 km
- Endurance: up to 70 minutes
- Launch weight: ~50 lbs
- Warhead: ~13 lb HEDP, penetrates ~24 in of steel
- Launcher capacity: up to 18 munitions per 20-foot ISO container
- Launch platform: Rheinmetall HX-series truck (this test); static container deployment also possible
- Control: human-in-the-loop, with abort authority retained by the operator
Why It Matters
Containerized launch systems have become one of the more consequential trends in European land warfare procurement, largely because they let munitions ride in standard shipping containers that can be trucked, railed, or shipped without attracting the attention a dedicated missile launcher would. Mounting that container on an HX truck and demonstrating a launch while the vehicle is moving pushes the concept further: a battery could theoretically fire and displace in the same maneuver, complicating an adversary's ability to locate and target the launcher in return — the classic "shoot and scoot" problem that has shaped artillery doctrine for decades, now applied to loitering munitions.
The FV-014's mix of 100 km range, high-capacity container storage, and human-in-the-loop targeting also puts Rheinmetall squarely inside a European loitering-munition market that has expanded rapidly since Russia's invasion of Ukraine demonstrated the battlefield value of cheap, precise, operator-controlled strike drones. Where many loitering munitions on the market today are shorter-range, man-portable systems, the FV-014's stand-off range and armor-penetrating warhead position it closer to a vehicle- or infrastructure-killing weapon than a tactical harassment tool — while the CML's container format keeps logistics and deployment flexible for customers who don't want a bespoke launch vehicle.
Neither Rheinmetall nor the reporting outlets named a launch customer for the Cochstedt demonstration, and it remains unclear whether the moving-truck launch capability will be integrated into any confirmed procurement program or was purely a technology demonstration. As with most such customer presentations, the next signal to watch will be whether an order follows.
