Missile tracking system yields positive results

17 Jun 2002

The Midcourse Space Experiment (MSX) - a Ballistic Missile Defense Organization (BMDO) satellite launched last April to gather data for future space- andground-based missile defense systems -- has tracked two medium-range missiles, known as Low Cost Launch Vehicles (LCLV). Part of the Combined ExperimentsProgram, these LCLV flights were designed to demonstrate the ability of space-based optical sensors, on MSX, to perform key missile defense functions --acquisition, tracking and discrimination in the mid-course phase of missile flight -- on realistic targets against realistic backgrounds.

Program officials report that the primary MSX sensors collected several minutes of high-quality data that is now undergoing preliminary analysis at the U.S. ArmySpace and Strategic Defense Command (USASSDC), Huntsville, Ala. "The CEP flight experiments have been extremely successful," says Max Peterson, MSXProgram Manager at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), Laurel, Md. "The two LCLVs performed according to plan and the MSXsatellite performed flawlessly. MSX collected data with all of its sensors and the program achieved all of its objectives for this mission."