Oops! Multi-Million-Dollar Missile Test Failed Because a Sailor Pushed the Wrong Button

Oops! Multi-Million-Dollar Missile Test Failed Because a Sailor Pushed the Wrong Button



Last month an expensive test of a system designed to shoot down North Korean ballistic missiles failed. Now we know that failure was because of human error, according to a report by the U.S. Missile Defense Agency.
The test was the second involving the latest version of the SM-3 interceptor, a key platform in America's missile defenses. It took place off the coast of Hawaii at the Pacific Missile Range Facility on June 21, 2017 at 1:20 AM Eastern . The destroyer USS John Paul Jones—equipped with the SM-3 Block IIA ballistic missile interceptor, AM/SPY-1 radar, and version 9.C2 of the Aegis Combat System—was supposed to shoot down an incoming simulated ballistic missile.
Human error got in the way. According to Defense News, a tactical datalink controller accidentally marked the incoming missile as friendly, causing the SM-3 missile to self-destruct in flight.



In 2008 an earlier version of the SM-3 was also used to shoot down USA-193, a military spy satellite in a decaying orbit. A previous test conducted in 2016, also involving the John Paul Jones and the SM-3 Block IIA, successfully shot down a simulated medium-range ballistic missile. Here's footage of that test. (As you might imagine, footage of the failed June test is hard to come by.)
The Block IIA is the latest version of the SM-3 ballistic missile interceptor. Designed to shoot down ballistic missile warheads cruising through space in the so-called "midcourse" phase, the SM-3 is a joint project between the United States and Japan. Unlike previous versions of the missile, the Block IIA variant could be used to shoot down intercontinental ballistic missile warheads, which fly higher and faster than shorter-range missiles.

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