Purdue77 wrote: “And, what type of missile was used? TWA800 was reportedly at ~16,000 feet when the incident happened. No manpad had that altitude capability, at that time. If it was a larger missile, how did we miss it? And, manpads at that time were IR guided and probably still are. Why would this hit the underbelly of a non-manuevering a/c instead of one of the engines running in climb thrust.”
I would like to know the type of missile too.
It certainly wasn’t launched from shore. The aircraft was 10 miles off shore and at 13,000 feet. Takes a pretty good size missile, maybe HAWK sized, to hit that target. If it was launched from shore, where was the missile battery located? Why didn’t anyone notice the radars, launchers, etc.
Supposedly, the missile left a glowing trail till intercept. Really? Usually the motor burns out prior to intercept and after burn out there is no glowing trail.
No way a MANPADS will destroy a 747. The warhead is about the size of a handgrenade. It certainly isn’t big enough to blow the front end off.
Missiles these days all have solid rocket motors. The motor continues to burn until it has exhausted its fuel or if it hits something then the fuel will explode or burn. If the missile has a proximity fuse and the warhead explodes, the solid fuel still burns or explodes as well. The solid motor explodes because the collision or warhead detonation will damage the solid motor so that the burn rate increases thus the explosion. Even after previewing this it sounds confusing but I'm tired and too lazy to improve the writing.