German Media is reporting that during the Engagement of several Houthi One-Way “Suicide” Drone yesterday in the Southern Red Sea, the Hessen (F-221), a Sachsen-Class Frigate of the Germany Navy currently Deployed to the Southern Red Sea as part of the E.U. Maritime Coalition dubbed “Operation Aspides” was claimed to have Accidentally Locked-On to a U.S. Air Force MQ-9 “Reaper” Surveillance Drone, with the Ship launching 2 SM-2 Surface-to-Air Missiles which Malfunctioned and fell into the Ocean.
https://twitter.com/sentdefender/status/1762886171862983159
Pretty embarrassing screw up. Sounds to me like the Weapons Control System was unable to establish a datalink with the missiles after launch. You wouldn’t fire a salvo of 2 missiles at a drone, so after the first engagement failed, they tried again without performing some failure analysis to figure out what happened. I doubt the missiles were at fault. Possibly a configuration error.
Simplified, once you launch an SM-2, the radar searches where it expects the missile to be, and once it finds the missile, it establishes a data link between the missile and the Weapons Control System. Without that data link, the engagement is terminated.
Here's some educated guess work:
Why did a NATO war ship accidentally Lock-On to a U.S. Air Force MQ-9 “Reaper” Surveillance Drone?
Was the MQ-9 flying where he wasn't supposed to?
Not following safe passage procedures?
Improper IFF modes & codes?
WRT the missile/data link failure...hopefully there's enough data for fault analysis (blame assessment).
In my day, this would be called a "Fish Killer".
German Frigate Mistakenly Fires On MQ-9, Downs Two Houthi Drones
FGS Hessen’s downing of the drones at very close range came after it mistakenly fired at a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper the day before.
https://www.twz.com/news-features/german-frigate-mistakenly-fires-on-mq-9-downs-two-houthi-drones