My Birthday Present Courtesy of U.S. Tax Payers
The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) will conduct a developmental
flight test to include the planned intercept of a long-range
ballistic missile target in support of the Ground-Based
Midcourse Defense (GMD) test program on Saturday, Aug. 24, 2002.
The test will involve the launch of an Orbital Suborbital
Program (OSP) long-range missile from Vandenberg Air Force Base,
Calif. The OSP, a modified Minuteman II intercontinental
ballistic missile, will carry a mock warhead and decoys. About
20 minutes after the target missile is launched, and about 4,800
miles away, a ground-based interceptor carrying a prototype
exoatmospheric kill vehicle (EKV) interceptor will launch from
the Ronald Reagan Missile Test Facility at Kwajalein Atoll in
the Republic of the Marshall Islands. About 10 minutes later
the intercept is planned to take place at an altitude of
approximately 140 miles above the central Pacific Ocean during
the midcourse phase of the target warhead's flight.
