Raytheon and Boeing just shot one down for the Gipper, on September 1st they took out a missile in space with their GMD system and the Exo-Atmospheric Kill Vehicle: (Don’t you love engineer-speak? Just call it EKV for short.)
Raytheon Company components played key roles in the destruction of a ballistic missile target in the latest successful flight test of the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system conducted Sept. 1. The Raytheon-built Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle (EKV) intercepted the ballistic missile target in space over the eastern Pacific Ocean. The Raytheon-developed Upgraded Early Warning Radar (UEWR) at Beale Air Force Base, Calif., successfully tracked the target system for approximately 15 minutes during its flight downrange to the test several hundred miles west of California. The test marked the first time an operationally configured ground-based interceptor was launched from an operational GMD site, Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The target was launched from Kodiak, Alaska. This test, designated Flight Test-2 (FT-2), did not have a target interception as a primary objective, but it demonstrated the EKV’s ability to successfully detect, track, discriminate and destroy a target in space. “This highly successful test of the GMD system demonstrates Raytheon’s systems performance and reliability,” said Louise Francesconi, Raytheon Missile Systems president. “FT-2 clearly demonstrates the maturity of our technology and our ability to provide this critical capability to the nation.”
Kudos also to Northrup-Gruman.
Continue reading “Missle Shot down in Space by Raytheon, Star Wars Does Work”