The U.S. Army's most advanced Patriot missile misfired during a major test of the Army's Integrated Battle Command System, an Army official confirmed.

A hit-to-kill Patriot Advanced Capability-2 Guided Enhanced Missile was used against a cruise missile target last week in alive-fire exercise at the Army's White Sands, N. M., Missile Range, but failed, Col. Phil Rottenborn, IBCS project manager, told Defense News on Wednesday.

Two interceptors were fired at a target missile, and although "the system did what it was designed to do," he said, the Capability-3 Patriot Missile Segment Enhancement missile misfired.

An older variant of the Patriot missile brought down the target, part of the common test practice of firing two missiles at a target in the event the first missile misses.

In an earlier test of the ICBS that day, the new missile "successfully intercepted a high-performance, high-speed tactical ballistic missile target and a cruise missile target," the Army said in a statement. It did not issue a statement pertinent to the misfire.

"Root cause analysis on the MSE misfire is ongoing, but preliminary indications are that all IBCS commands to the launcher were executed successfully," Rottenborn said. "The error may lie within the missile, but further analysis is required to determine that with certainty."

The ICBS system is built by Northrop Grumman, while Patriot missiles are built by Lockheed Martin.

The missile defense system test will be conducted through September, and a production decision is anticipated by the end of the year.

ICBS is the cornerstone of the Army's Integrated Air and Missile Defense strategy, Northrop Grumman has said. It is intended to replace legacy systems with a network-centric approach, integrating disparate radars and weapons for a more complete weapons enterprise.

Related Links
Learn about missile defense at SpaceWar.com
Learn about nuclear weapons doctrine and defense at SpaceWar.com
All about missiles at SpaceWar.com
Learn about the Superpowers of the 21st Century at SpaceWar.com

Tweet

Thanks for being here; We need your help. The SpaceDaily news network continues to grow but revenues have never been harder to maintain. With the rise of Ad Blockers, and Facebook - our traditional revenue sources via quality network advertising continues to decline. And unlike so many other news sites, we don't have a paywall - with those annoying usernames and passwords. Our news coverage takes time and effort to publish 365 days a year. If you find our news sites informative and useful then please consider becoming a regular supporter or for now make a one off contribution.
SpaceDaily Contributor $5 Billed Once credit card or paypal		SpaceDaily Monthly Supporter $5 Billed Monthly paypal only

Lockheed nets $18.8M to support Japan's Aegis Ashore system
Washington DC (UPI) Aug 26, 2020
Lockheed Martin won an $18.8 million modification contract for planning and risk reduction of the Aegis Ashore defense system in Japan. The modification of the contract with the U.S. Missile Defense Agency was announced on Tuesday and increases its value from $3.27 billion to $3.29 billion. Lockheed Martin Rotary and Mission Systems will continue performing engineering design support and analysis of services of the Aegis Ashore Japan system. The land-based missile defense system i ... read more