Interceptor shield

Interceptor Shield Report

Nathan J Hunt

March 25, 2009

After a month of preparation the North Korean Government has moved their Taepodong-2 from the arrival and assembly buildings and has now erected the long range Taepodong-2 missile that the North Korean government has said is a Satellite launch vehicle on the launch pad at the Musudan-ri missile test site. This move comes after weeks of speculations from the surrounding area’s governments and from the United States on if the North would continue to move forwards with the launch.

Now that the missile is placed on the launch pad the question is when will they launch? The North Korean Government stated a week ago that they intend to launch their missile between the 4th and 8th of April and designated a travel path that the missile will take. But the North could launch the missile at any time once fueling is completed sooner than later since the fuel that the Taepodong-2 uses is a corrosive fuel and the longer the missile is left standing the greater the chance of the fuel corroding seals on the missile.

Interceptor Shield Report

Nathan J Hunt

March 19, 2009

 On March 17, 2009 The Missile Defense Agency conducted the sixth successful test of the THAAD “Terminal High Altitude Area Defense” system at the Pacific Missile test range facility off Kauai Hawaii. Soldiers of the 6th Air Defense Artillery Brigade took part in the successful test and conducted Launch, fire control and radar operations of the THAAD system as part of the test.  The Target threat missile was launched from a naval boat and was detected and tracked by the THAAD system, two THAAD missiles were launched simultaneously at the Incoming test missile, the two THAAD missiles were fired in a two missile salvo to increase the chance of one missile intercepting the missile and to mimic a combat environment were in combat multi missiles could be fired to intercept incoming threats. The first fired THAAD missile intercepted and destroyed the dummy war head section that had separated from the test missile and demonstrated the THAAD’s ability to discriminate and identify the dummy warhead that had separated from the booster, with the success of the first fired THAAD missile the second fired missile was destroyed in air for safety reasons.

Below Image is from the March 17th 2009 THAAD test and was released to Interceptor Shield News report by the MDA.

March 17th 2009 THAAD Test