By Dave Ahearn
The Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defense system Wednesday scored another success when it killed a separating target missile, the Missile Defense Agency said.
Separately, a Lockheed Martin [LMT] official said he expects a contract to be signed late this year or early in calendar 2009 for more THAAD interceptors, and added that the current production line easily can accommodate increased output, such as a doubling of the interceptors production rate. “We expect a contract late this year,” said Tom McGrath, Lockheed Martin vice president–THAAD.
That afternoon test in the Pacific Missile Range Facility near Kauai, Hawaii, began when an Air Force C-17 transport aircraft launched the target missile with a mock warhead that separated from the booster rocket.
The Army operated the THAAD system. The interceptor is a product of Lockheed Martin, while Raytheon [RTN] makes the X-band radar.
Preliminary indications are that planned flight test objectives were achieved, MDA reported.
Interception of the target–a mock warhead separating from the booster rockets–occurred in the mid-endoatmosphere, or inside the atmosphere.
After the plane launched the target missile, the interceptor launched about six minutes later from a mobile launcher at the THAAD launch complex on the range facility.
Upon hitting and demolishing the target, the THAAD added to an overwhelmingly successful record in tests.
This was the 35th successful hit-to-kill intercept of 43 attempts in the atmosphere and in space since 2001, and was the 29th of 30 successful tests conducted since September 2005, MDA noted.
The hit-to-kill success drew plaudits from the Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance (MDAA).
This test marked the evolution of THAAD from taking out a single stage Scud-like target to a two-stage missile, Riki Ellison, MDAA president and founder, said.
He added that the THAAD test “allows the United States to move from a rogue nation missile defense position to a regional strategic evolution for missile defense.”
That is because “the THAAD system offers mobility and much larger areas of protection than the current terminal deployed systems such as the PAC-3 and SM-2 that the United States has deployed today.”
“This infusion of proven layered mobile missile defense systems…dissuades those that threaten both the civilian populations and military forces in the respective regions,” Ellison said. “The world needs non-escalatory and non-lethal missile defense systems like what was demonstrated [in the test] to provide global counter-proliferation and protection from those with intentions to threaten or harm with ballistic missiles.”
The next THAAD test will occur “before the end of the year,” McGrath said in responding to a question. This will involve a single target that will be pursued by two THAAD interceptors in a salvo shootdown.
This use of two or more interceptors is the sort of operation the United States would execute if an enemy missile has come close to its target and U.S. forces only have one last chance to kill it before it strikes.