THAAD, Aegis cooperate in anti-missile test

[unhappycamper]

THAAD, Aegis cooperate in anti-missile test
By Kris Osborn - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Aug 13, 2008 6:06:26 EDT

Traveling thousands of meters per second, a 20-foot Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptor missile destroyed an advanced, separating warhead dummy target just beneath the 60-mile envelope of the Earth’s atmosphere off the cost of Hawaii during a June test at the Pacific Missile Range Facility, Kauai.

The test intercept marked the first time the THAAD and Aegis radar systems worked together in a tactical scenario against a separating warhead, Missile Defense Agency officials said.

“A separating warhead is not like a Scud which is a unitary warhead but rather a separating target which means it releases its warhead. It is more like the North Korean No-dong missile,” said Rick Lehner, an MDA spokesman.

In the exercise, the THAAD and Aegis missile defense radar systems worked in tandem and cued one another rather than separately scanning a 360-degree field, MDA officials said. The Aegis radar enabled the THAAD radar to zero in on the target.

“THAAD uses transportable X-band radar which can get a cue from a variety of sources. The X-band radar can perform very precise tracking of a warhead. The THAAD radar was able to direct and cue the Aegis radar. It was very significant for the missile defense infrastructure to be able to pass along radar cues to other platforms like Aegis,” said Lehner.


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/08/defense_thaad_081208/