September 26, 2005 :: The Missile Defense Agency :: News
The Missile Defense Agency today announced the successful completion of a test of the Cobra Dane radar located at Shemya, Alaska, and of the fire control system which relays information to Colorado Springs or Fort Greely Alaska, which would control the launch of an interceptor against an incoming missile.
A missile was launched by parachuting it from a C-17 aircraft over the Pacific some 800 miles (1280km) from Shemya, and then having the missile’s engines ignite and travel across the face of the Cobra Dane radar. The exercise was the first test of the Cobra Dane radar for missile defense purposes. The often-traveled trajectory of missiles and interceptors going between Vandenberg Air Force Base, California and the Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific is sufficiently south to be out of range of the Cobra Dane radar. Designed to track Russian missile launches during the Cold War, its northern location also makes the Cobra Dane radar of especial use for tracking missile launches coming from North Korea or China.
From MDA:
After the missile was dropped from the aircraft, a parachute deployed to stabilize and slow the missile. The missile’s first stage rocket motor then ignited, sending the missile downrange. The target missile’s flight was successfully tracked by the Cobra Dane radar, and the data obtained by Cobra Dane was then used to construct a Weapon Task Plan, or firing solution, that was fed into the systems fire control system manned by military “warfighters” in Colorado Springs, Colorado and Ft. Greely, Alaska, who currently operate the interceptor missiles now deployed in Alaska and California, as well as the sensors and radars that provide operational detection and tracking information. …
Launching a missile from an aircraft provided an operationally realistic trajectory and an opportunity to fly across the face of the Cobra Dane radar. The radar has not been available for use during previous flight tests because it is well outside the area of the existing missile test range that stretches between the Marshall Islands in the central Pacific Ocean to the California coast. …The exercise completed today marks the first time that data obtained from an actual missile tracked by Cobra Dane was fed into the missile defense fire control system to obtain a firing solution.
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