Edwards[AFB]: Airborne laser system right on target

Valley Press on ^ | Saturday, March 17, 2007. | ALLISON GATLIN

[BenLurkin]

The airborne laser ballistic missile defense system successfully fired its tracking laser during a flight test Thursday night.

Testing of the ABL is based at Edwards Air Force Base, and the laser test took place over the Pacific Ocean off the California coast.

The weapons system is designed to use a high-energy laser mounted in a highly modified 747 aircraft to destroy a ballistic missile while it is still in the boost phase, shortly after launch.

A high-energy chemical laser is used to puncture a hole in the missile's pressurized fuel tank, causing it to rupture. In this way, the laser uses the missile's own fuel and pressure to bring it down.

Other lasers are used for targeting purposes.

One of these targeting lasers, the track illuminator laser, was tested Thursday, aimed at "Big Crow," a C-135 aircraft with a missile painted on the side.

The solid-state laser gathers target-tracking data for the system.

"That's the first time we did that test, and it was very successful," said Rick Lehner, spokesman for the Missile Defense Agency.

The test included multiple firings of the tracking laser, which also identifies the most vulnerable part of the missile, he said.

Upcoming flights will test the second solid-state laser in the beam control/fire control system, officials said.

This beacon illuminator laser measures turbulence in the atmosphere and adjusts the high-energy laser accordingly.

"This first firing confirms that ABL can find an airborne target, precisely fix the track illuminator laser onto that target and use the laser firing results to track the target," said Pat Shanahan, vice president and general manager of Boeing Missile Defense Systems.

The Boeing Co. provides the modified aircraft, battle management and overall systems integration and testing for the program.

[BenLurkin]

"It's Buck Rogers and the Jetsons, but we're really on the verge of ushering in a new class of weapon, controlled energy out of a flying airplane," Shanahan said.

"ABL is the pathfinder" for other directed-energy defense systems.

[johnny7]

I would like to see them installed on satellites...

[street_lawyer]

Is there the slightest possibility that this laser might burn a hold in the ozone layer and cause further global warming, becasue if that is the case then we will need to organize a million man march on the Capital to defund this dangerous weapon.

[BenLurkin]

Maybe but ... it poses no threat to the whales...

[Wurlitzer]

This must be a lie. The dems and the media told us R.R. was an idiot and this could never work. Seems old R.R. was much smarter than American communists will ever admit.

[gcruse]

" Seems old R.R. was much smarter than American communists will ever admit."

Maybe so, but if this system requires having a 747 in the area to fire during the missile's boost phase, it's mostly PR at this stage.

[Wurlitzer]

Maybe so, but if this system requires having a 747 in the area to fire during the missile's boost phase, it's mostly PR at this stage."

So I guess we never needed the SAC bombers. The nattering nabobs who cannot fathom technology on this front will constantly improve just help our enemies.

[gcruse]

Explain to me how you'd get a 747 into Chinese airspace in time to target a missile at boost phase, and I'll take it seriously.

[pissant]

Even gaggles of republicans scoffed at Reagan. Flippin idiots all.

[GoDuke]

"Explain to me how you'd get a 747 into Chinese airspace in time to target a missile at boost phase, and I'll take it seriously."

Not a 747 but a hypersonic plane, and plenty of them, 20 to 30 years down the road, I would guess.

[fremont_steve]

Well - China isn't our initial concern. This is for places like Iran or N Korea where you can orbit outside their their airspace and be within 100-250 miles of the launch site. So think rogue nation defense instead of taking out Russian or China's missles.

One of these orbiting outside your airspace pulls you're nuclear teeth!

[Yossarian]

Explain to me how you'd get a 747 into Chinese airspace in time to target a missile at boost phase, and I'll take it seriously.

Let's use North Korea as an example.

1. Keep two of these planes in Japan;
2. If we find out they're fueling up their missiles, send one ABL 747 up;
3. Use air refueling to keep it up for, say, 16 hours;
4. When it is time for one ABL 747 to come down, send the other one up

That isn't too hard, is it? You have to be careful during air refueling, so maybe have a third bird for overlapping coverage. But the expense of creating and operating 3 ABL 747s is far less than an urban nuclear detonation clean-up....

[bullfeather]

The real capabilities of this system are not released. just the boost phase. We don't give everything away!!

[Doc91678]

If I remember correctly it was the Democrats who opposed the research and use of our technology into creating this Defensive instrument. I wonder why?

[Vince Ferrer]

Is there the slightest possibility that this laser might burn a hold in the ozone layer and cause further global warming, becasue if that is the case then we will need to organize a million man march on the Capital to defund this dangerous weapon.

In the 70's, the "leading cause" of ozone depletion was rocket exhaust from the supersonic concord and projected to be the Space Shuttle. (Somehow the Soviet Union's rockets never polluted, but I digress)

Since this is a laser that destroys rockets before it reaches the ozone layer, I would argue that it is in fact a green technology, and maybe Greanpeace should buy their own and shoot down everything they can find.

[ASOC]

COIL powered DEW bump

[Gandalf_The_Gray]

Explain to me how you'd get a 747 into Chinese airspace in time to target a missile at boost phase, and I'll take it seriously.

For aircraft at 50000 feet, the line of sight is about 316 mi. (275 nmi.) That gives you stand off range well into international airspace.

Regards,
GtG

[DuncanWaring]

Furthermore, if one assumes "boost phase" lasts one minute and ends at a terminal velocity of 15000 mph, the altitude at burn-out is about 100 miles, considerably extending your "line-of-sight distance".

[JohnBovenmyer]

I wonder how high the boost phase missile can get before it is too late to start a successful laser shot. You might have significantly longer range than your line of site to their ground base. JFK could have used a couple in 1962. A few might suffice for North Korea. Maybe a few more could handle Iran. I bet India would love to have a few tasked to Pakistan. Obviously this won't suffice against China or Russia, but it's a nice test bed towards a satellite based system. It also keeps the pressure on the bad guys, just as did the thought of Reagan's original proposal.

[street_lawyer]

Since this is a laser that destroys rockets before it reaches the ozone layer, I would argue that it is in fact a green technology, and maybe Greanpeace should buy their own and shoot down everything they can find.

Shouldn't we send this important information to AlGore so that he can incorporate it in An Inconvenient Truth II?