Another successful launch and intercept!

[Bruce Page]

A team of my coworkers have been up in Kodiak, Alaska for the last few weeks setting up for yesterday’s launch of our target vehicle. (they only send me up the in the dead of winter…)
The funky looking “skin” is a heater blanket to help keep the missile & payload warm while it is sitting on the pad. The blanket peels away during liftoff.

This is a link to some launch video and the actual intercept using IR video. It’s pretty impressive when you consider that each vehicle is traveling at +15,000 MPH.
http://www.mda.mil/vids/Sept_28_2007_Interceptvideo.wmv

[keith ouellette]

My brother in law worked on missle to missle type stuff at raytheon. He Did a lot of work on that missle we sold to Iran during the Iran contra affair (the name excapes me) and showed me some demonstration and test videos of it. You would not believe what it is capable of with a few upgrades (I didn't understand what the upgrades were). the videos were great and the missle moved so fast it looked like it was skipping across the screen even with the video slowed way down.

[Jim Dunn]

Bruce those designs on the body of the missile are they meant to signify anything?, and if you tell me and are obligated to have me killed, forget I asked.

[Bruce Page]

Jim, they’re the different organizations involved with the program, e.g. Missile Defense Agency, Kodiak Launch Complex, Sandia Nat’l Labs (where I work), ITT Industries, and others.

[John Schreiber]

An amazing achievement. It has received very little coverage in the press. Googling around, it seems the Xinhua news service was one of the first to report.

[Steve knight]

cool but lets hope it worked better then the patriot system did.

[keith ouellette]

cool but lets hope it worked better then the patriot system did.

The patriot system actually worked very well. If you are thinking of the two MIT pro.'s that claimed it didn't hit its targets, they were wrong. The first system wasn't designed to hit directly on its target but to explode in proximity to it. Bruce's missle is something completely differant though.

[Pat Germain]

I watched the whole thing live through computer displays. It was way cool. It's typical that the media are ignoring it. If it failed, they'd be all over it.

This system is nothing like the Patriot. It's not portable.

[Dave Sinkus]

.....the media did cover it. I saw the video and said "Cool....North Korea bring it!". Then the media reported what critics said, -- Pshaw, it hit the missle without counter measures and decoys, and the people sending the missle will use those. So a nice, balanced, ying/yang look with an unpolitical critic repsonding.


from MSNBC--"Once again, there were no countermeasures or decoys used, making this test one of the simplest, easiest, flight intercept tests they've ever tried," Philip Coyle, the Pentagon's chief weapons tester under former President Clinton, said in a statement e-mailed to Reuters."

[Pat Germain]

Oh no! Nobody in the entire missile defense program ever considered anyone might use countermeasures or decoys. What would we do without media consultants and critics who have sour grapes because their pet project wasn't funded and missile defense is?

This test was one of many which are incremental. If the Wright Brothers made their historic flight today, critics would say it's meaningless because it didn't include movies or drink service.

I am glad to hear the event did get some media coverage.

[Bruce Page]

Hey guys, I didn’t post this as a political statement. I thought you might enjoy seeing some high-tech science work.
Let it rest.

[Gary Keedwell]

Political???? Media?? Nawwww Everybody knows media isn't bias.
Gary K.

[Pat Germain]

Sorry, Bruce. I didn't mean to get political. I just don't like the way our media reports things these days.

Thanks for posting the video and pic!

[Joe Mioux]

All I know is that you get to build really big things, break them AND get paid for doing it.

How cool is that!

Oh yea the pics of the thermal images were really fun! Great colors.

Joe

[Matt Meiser]

Bruce, I think you made Yahoo News:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071002/...on_missiles_dc