BAE Systems, WHITE SANDS: The Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system detected an incoming ballistic missile target using a BAE Systems seeker and achieved a successful intercept in a July 12 test firing at White Sands Missile Range. The test was conducted by the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, the U.S. Army and Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor and systems integrator.
The event was a “seeker characterization test” to examine how the interceptor and its seeker detect an incoming target missile in order to destroy it. BAE Systems' seeker provides infrared imagery of the targeted warhead to the missile computer for use in guiding the interceptor to its target.
“The test objective was to collect imagery of a unitary warhead target,” said John Watkins, BAE Systems' THAAD program manager in Nashua, N.H. “This was the first flight test that the THAAD seeker had a target in its view, the seeker and the entire THAAD system did the job.”
The seeker met all required test parameters along with all the other elements of the THAAD system, paving the way for another intercept test later this year.
THAAD is designed to defend U.S. and allied soldiers, military assets, and population centers from the threat of ballistic missile attacks. To achieve the lethality required to defeat ballistic missile warheads, THAAD destroys them through direct “hit-to-kill” targeting.
BAE Systems began work on the THAAD seeker demonstration and validation contract in 1991. The current seeker development program started in 2000. A manufacturing contract is anticipated in 2007 that leads to the deployment of the first THAAD fire unit to the Army in 2009.
BAE Systems is the premier trans-Atlantic defense and aerospace company, delivering a full range of products and services for air, land and naval forces, as well as advanced electronics, information technology solutions and customer support services. BAE Systems, with more than 100,000 employees worldwide, had 2005 sales that exceeded $28 billion.
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