December 14, 2005 :: The Missile Defense Agency :: News
Four years to the day after President Bush gave official notice to Russia that the United States would be withdrawing from the ABM Treaty, the MDA conducted a successful, “important” test of a Ground Based Interceptor. The interceptor was launched from the Ronald Reagan Test site, located in the Kwajalein atoll of the Marshall Islands, in Pacific Ocean. The interceptor traveled northeast, toward a location of a simulated target missile launch from Kodiak, Alaska. The data fed the interceptor about the location of the simulated target was based on previous launches.
The importance of the launch is several-fold, not the least of which is that it is the first launch of a GBI since October 2002. On the last two attempts at a launch (in December 2004 and February 2005), minor hardware or software glitches resulted in the missile shutting itself down, and therefore never leaving its silo. A “variety of components and subcomponents” were also tested. A Boeing press release called the event the “first flight test of an operationally configured interceptor.”
Today’s test was designed Flight Test-1 (FT-1), which would seem to indicate a new nomenclature, or numbering of flight tests. Integrated Flight Test-7, for example, took place in December 2001; the test attempt which had been planned for February 2005 had been designated IFT-14. A new nomenclature could be the product of the thorough reassessment said to have taken place in recent years about the program’s testing. (Article)
» December 13, 2001: Bush gives six month notice for U.S. intent to withdraw from ABM Treaty
» More stories on: Testing - American
» Missile system details for: Ground-Based Interceptor (GBI), Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD), Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site (RTS)
