[6] That is, whether the missile operated more like an aircraft (Air Force) or a rocket (Ordnance). The active seeker system was later dropped to lower costs. Each wing ended with a control flap which was separated from the wing by a short distance, leaving a gap. The crew on the LA, also under command of the BCO, was responsible for preparing and erecting the missile. Die Nike Hercules [ˈnaɪki ˈhərkjuli:s] (auch SAM-A-25 und später MIM-14) war eine Langstrecken-Flugabwehrrakete der Zeit des Kalten Krieges aus US-amerikanischer Produktion. You’ll see the old barracks that once housed 150 soldiers, painted in its or… As soon at the TTR was locked on to a target, an analog computer (later digital) continually computed a suitable intercept point in the sky and an expected 'time to fly' of the missile based on information from the TTR and basic performance information about the missile. [21] This was answered most forcibly not by the Army, but the Defense Secretary Charles Erwin Wilson, who wrote in Newsweek that "one hard solid fact remerges above them all: no matter what the Nike is or isn't, it's the only land-based operational anti-aircraft missile that the U.S. At this time the target information and the intercept point were displayed on the plotting boards and the BCO selected the right time to manually fire. Of the two, the warhead seemed like the simplest problem to address. [46] Early models cost about $55,250 each,[46] while most recent cost estimate, from Japan, was US$3.0 million. This used much less fissile material and was thus considerably less expensive. [11] In spite of the greatly increased explosive power, the WX-7 was only slightly heavier than the WX-9, about 950 lb (430 kg) for common XW-7 versions, as opposed to 850 lb (390 kg) for the XW-9.[12]. Any single battery could only launch a single missile at a time, due to the limited number of radars, computers and operators. A dual-launch followed on 24 July, with the first round destroying its target with the T45, and the second with the instrument package flying one second behind. The missiles remained deployed around strategically important areas within the continental United States until 1974. Engineers continued work on getting a second missile operational at McGuire, but the Air Force went ahead with plans to open the Suffolk County Missile Annex by 1 January 1960. The Nike Hercules was a surface-to-air or surface-to-surface missile system deployed around US cities and various locations in Europe and Japan. Don Bender's The Nike Missile System - A Concise Historical Overview. [32] Conventionally armed Nike Hercules missiles also served in the United States, Spain, Germany, Denmark, Japan, Norway, and Taiwan. Similar articles began appearing in papers around the country, invariably just before that city was to begin receiving their missiles. [40], The first deployment of the EFS/ATBM HIPAR was carried out between February and 20 April 1963, but during this time the Army decided not to deploy these systems in the United States. Whether you want a sarcastic t-shirt or a geeky t-shirt to embrace your inner nerd, CafePress has the tee you're looking for. [40], The first EFS sets arrived at White Sands late in 1962 and started testing in April 1963. The radar can continue to locate the target in elevation or azimuth because all of the signals come from the same location, but the receiver cannot easily determine which pulse was sent by the radar and which was sent by the electronic countermeasures (ECM) on the target aircraft. [51][verification needed] [52] The last versions carried the W31 Mod 2 warhead, with yields of 2 or 20 kt. [5] Nike tracked both the target and the missile using separate radars, compared the locations in a computer, and sent commands to the missile to fly to a point in the sky to intercept the target. Ajax's boosters were housed in steel tubes that fell near the base, presenting a serious range safety concern. This signal would be very difficult to jam because the jammer would have to broadcast across a wide set of frequencies in order to ensure they were returning on the frequency the receiver had actually selected. [53] There are slight differences in dimensions as reported in different sources, it is not known if this is due to different versions.[46]. The Nike Historical Society and the National Park Service are paying for the materials. This complexity added enormously to the cost and time required to maintain the missiles. [N 3] The first SNODGRASS round was launched on 14 July with its warhead replaced by an instrument package and launched against a 350-knot Q2A Ryan Firebee I drone. A new missile could be launched about 11 seconds after detonation or rejecting the previous missile. The photo at right shows Nike Hercules missiles in their down and up (launch) positions. Das System war vorgesehen für die Bekämpfung von Flugzielen in großen Höhen, insbesondere zur Abwehr strategischer Bomber der Sowjetarmee. [11], The competing implosion-type design is considerably more efficient and uses much less fuel to reach any given explosive power. The TRR solves this problem by providing a separate ranging system on another frequency. Unless the transmitter has encoded some additional form of information in the signal, the receiver cannot determine which pulse it sent out and which is from the jammer. The second best preserved Nike installation is site NY-56 at Fort Hancock in Sandy Hook, New Jersey. Launched against such a formation, the Nike would fly towards the center of the composite return. Also conducted were tests to evaluate ECM performance, two surface-to-surface tests, and two Hercules-on-Hercules attacks with the target Hercules flying in a semi-ballistic trajectory.[37]. Soon after design work started, the Army requested that the existing liquid fuel engine be replaced with a solid fuel design, for a variety of reasons. What Nike is all about. [48] On the IFC the status of the selected missile was given. In Anchorage, Alaska, Site Point (A Battery) was converted into a ski chalet for Kincaid Park. Its warhead also allowed it to be used in a secondary surface-to-surface role, and the system also demonstrated its ability to hit other short-range missiles in flight. The TTR was operated by three operators (range, elevation and azimuth). The booster was formed from four of the earlier Ajax M5E1 boosters held together in a frame. 29 sec. A short period after launch the actual location, i.e. The DoD invested considerably in upgrading the security of the storage areas of the launcher sections, ultimately installing significant towers that were capable of watching over all three sections within the "exclusion area". Nike Hercules Operations in Alaska 1 1 Anchorage had three Nike sites with a total of four batteries. Implosion designs are necessarily spherical, and thus less suitable for inclusion in a skinny fuselage like Nike's. Aurora packaged Nike Hercules Guided Missile with Launching Platform in their standard rectangular lid-tray box. Chicago was slated to shortly begin receiving its Hercules upgrades. A variety of problems, including one found in the W-7 warhead, caused delays in the testing programs, so a single launch of the T45-equipped Hercules was also added to the AMMO project. They returned two design concepts. Meanwhile, the TTR can continue offering location information, and in the case that is also jammed (difficult but possible), was upgraded to offer a home-on-jam mode that used the ECM system's own broadcasts as a location source. Nike Hercules crew in action at U.S. Army Air Defense Command missile site in Chicago Starttriebwerk wird gezündet (unterer schwarzer Teil) Starttriebwerk (Booster) fällt nach 3,4 sec, ab Zündung des Marschtriebwerks (oberer weißer Teil) Brenndauer: ca. [23], All of this was part of a larger fight going on over the Army's Jupiter missile, which the Air Force stated should be their mission. HIPAR would detect targets separately and "hand off" to the LOPAR and TTR so those systems could remain largely unchanged and able to launch either Hercules or Ajax. One of them was here - Missile Base HM-69. To increase range, the missile was normally boosted above the target into the thinner air and then descended on it in a gliding dive. Hercules would prove to be the last operational missile from Bell's Nike team; Zeus was never deployed, and Hercules' replacements were developed by different teams. When the missile neared the intercept point a command signal was sent to the missile to explode.[48]. One of these locations was directly above the elevator, the others were reached by manually pushing the missiles off the elevator to the launcher along rails. When a missile is fired in a surface-to-air mission, an intercept cannot be made within a "dead zone" surrounding its launcher. Nike Hercules first entered service on June 30, 1958, at batteries located near New York. [27], It did, however, allow development of Hercules to continue, and the system was soon preparing to deploy. Site Point, near the Anchorage airport, was a double site with two complete batteries. Plato was cancelled in February 1959, replaced in the short term by further upgrades to Hercules, and in the longer term by the FABMDS program. Four Nike batteries were normally organized into a single battalion.[48]. The battery crew was housed on-site, either at the IFC, or sometimes, together with administrative offices and general services on a separate area. The TRR system combatted this by operating on two selectable very different set of frequencies. In his 26 November 1956 memorandum, he limited the Army to weapons with 200-mile (320 km) range, and those involved in ground-to-air defense to only 100 miles (160 km). However, as rumours of a ban on atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons spread, SNODGRASS became a crash project to be completed before 1 September 1958 at any available site – the Nevada Test Site was fully booked with the existing Project AMMO testing series. The site began as a Nike Ajax base and was later converted to Nike Hercules. As early as 1944 the US Army started exploring anti-aircraft missiles, examining a variety of concepts. It is relatively easy to jam range information on monopulse radars like the TTR by sending out false return signals. Nike Hercules was MIM-14A, MIM-14B and MIM-14C. Safety precautions require a special set of keys (19:42-20:25). The 'dead zone" has a ground radius of approximately 10,000 yards and an altitude of approximately 20,000 ft. [24] This forced the Army to turn its Jupiter IRBM systems to the Air Force, and to limit the range of their ABM developments. In January, only four missiles were operational at Suffolk, and during House appropriation hearings that month, the DoD proved rather subdued when Congress attacked the design, especially in light of several failed tests of the BOMARC B missile. It evolved into a much larger missile with two solid fuel stages that provided three times the range of the Ajax. Prior to launch, the Missile Tracking Radar (MTR) locked on to the transponder in the selected missile. A 23 October 1954 report stated that "Concurrent with the prosecution of the NIKE I and NIKE B programs, studies and research and development must be conducted to insure that the NIKE equipment is modernized to the maximum extent within the limits of current technology and economics of improvement as compared to investment in a new system ...". [36] Combining range from the TRR and direction from the TTR provided complete information on the target. It is relatively easy to jam a conventional radar by sending out additional pulses of radio signal on the same frequency. during a launcher area readiness drill. The NHK-1 was the first ballistic missile indigenously produced in South Korea. The AN/MPQ-43 Mobile HIPAR was made part of Hercules Standard A in August 1966m and began operational deployment in Europe on 12 April 1967.[43]. "[22] By the time early Hercules deployments were starting in 1958, BOMARC was still nowhere near operational. The components for a battery are transported to the Nike site in New Mexico and set up (20:26-21:49). The original Ajax detection radar retroactively became known as LOPAR, and remained in use as the main target selection radar in the missile control van. Die 3. Nike Hercules in Alaska, are available in Alaskan libraries. (1959). Free Returns 100% Satisfaction Guarantee Fast Shipping On 15 November 1956, the new missile was officially renamed as the Nike Hercules, as part of DA Circular 700-22, while the Nike I becoming Nike Ajax. Note that this has no effect on the determination of the direction to the target, which is the same for both the original and jammer pulses. The Hercules missile systems sold to Japan (Nike J) were subsequently fitted with upgraded internal guidance systems, the original vacuum tube systems being replaced with transistorized ones. Auf sieben bis neun Nike Hercules Raketen waren Nukleargefechtsköpfe der US Army montiert. Hercules batteries in the US were generally placed in older Ajax bases, using their underground storage and maintenance buildings. Approximately 25,000 Nike Hercules were manufactured. However, as it protected a much greater area, not as many sites were needed to provide coverage of potential targets. [9], Even as the Nike was undergoing testing, planners grew concerned about the missile's ability to attack formations of aircraft. During an alert, the site would go on "blue alert", at which time the LA crew would arm and erect the missiles and then retreat to safety. The Army eventually decided not to proceed with any Ajax modifications as Hercules would be arriving shortly anyway. Over its lifetime, significant effort was put into the development of solid state replacements for the vacuum tube-based electronics inherited from the early-1950s Ajax, and a variety of mobile options. has. IRBMs and ICBMs were also a consideration, but these were being addressed by the Nike Zeus concept, leaving only short-range weapons as an issue Hercules might need to address. The history of Phil Knight and the incredible men and women he brought into his company to make NIKE … [30], In the aftermath of the Hercules/BOMARC debates, retired Army Brigadier General Thomas R. Phillips wrote an article for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that BOMARC and SAGE had been the "most costly waste of funds in the history of the Defense Department. It had a range of 180 km. The addition of the TRR solved a problem with early pulse radar units. In 1958 an article appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times in which various Air Force officials complained that the Hercules was ineffective. Redstone Arsenal then presented the T48E3 which was somewhat larger and longer to reach reasonable performance, but only at the cost of having to modify all of the Ajax launcher rails. As Hercules had evolved from the fixed-base Ajax system, early deployments offered no mobility. Otherwise the LOPAR was used. The result was fine for ranging but useless for position determination. The House eventually came to support the Defense Secretary's position as stated in the Master Air Defense Plan, retaining Hercules while reducing BOMARC and SAGE. The last active Nike Ajax batteries were relieved of their mission in December 1961, followed by the last Army National Guard unit in May 1964. The guidance commands were sent to the missile by modulating the MTR transmit signal. In order to simplify the upgrades at Ajax sites, HIPAR did not replace the earlier ACQ radar from Ajax, which was retained and now known as LOPAR. There were also several other models of Nike Hercules, e.g. [41][42] In spite of this success, the GOER-based Hercules would not be used operationally. In some instances, as was the case with N-75, the Army deactivated missile operations altogether. However, the lower specific impulse of these engines, combined with the requirement for longer range, demanded a much larger fuselage to store the required fuel. All CONUS Hercules batteries, with the exception of the ones in Florida and Alaska, were deactivated by April 1974. Browse 31 nike hercules missile stock photos and images available, or start a new search to explore more stock photos and images. Developed by Sandia Laboratories in Albuquerque and at Los Alamos, it was given 1A priority by the Joint Chiefs of Staff in March 1953.[11]. [29], Meanwhile, the Air Force scrambled to bring BOMARC to operational status, and on 1 September 1959 declared the 46th Air Defense Squadron at McGuire Air Force Base operational. And now, between mid-December and mid-April, you can tour the base. 1 comments: Starting in April 1960, considerable effort was put into a fully mobile "Cross-Country Hercules" launcher based on the M520 Goer vehicle, an articulated prime mover that saw considerable service during the Vietnam War. The dead zone is determined by the launch angle and the minimum turning radius of the missile. With sites deployed throughout the United States, it is one of the most recognizable military missiles in … The missile will be displayed at a decommissioned Cold-War era Nike Missile Base in Everglades National Park. LOPAR was relatively small, and the TTR/MTR were always trailer based, so these systems were also fairly mobile. Nike-Hercules Operators Manual. It was normally armed with the W31 nuclear warhead, but could also be fitted with a conventional warhead for export use. [40], The primary change to create the resulting "Improved EFS/ATBM Hercules" was a modified version of the HIPAR. It was developed for use as the first stage of the Nike Ajax and Nike Hercules missiles as part of Project Nike.. [24][26] The resulting flap led to calls for Nickerson to be court-martialed and was compared to the Billy Mitchell court-martial in the 1920s. Further deployments to allied units and US units in Alaska were carried out between November 1963 and the summer of 1965.[40]. The MTR was operated by one operator. The Army then began its own series of press releases under what they called "Project Truth". The Nike stage or Nike booster, a solid fuel rocket motor, was created by Hercules Aerospace for the Nike Ajax (M5) Nike Hercules (M5E1) (and M88 late in Hercules career). The fuselage had a bullet-like shape (Sears–Haack body), but this was difficult to make out due to the presence of the four large delta wings running almost the entire length of the fuselage. [48] The firing or launch command was given manually by the Battery Control Officer based on orders or Rules of Engagements. For these missions the computer used the MTR to guide the missile to a point above the target, then commanded it to dive vertically while measuring any changes in trajectory as it fell. (Perseus, who was also said to be one of Zeus’ sons, famously beheaded the snake-haired Gorgon Medusa.) NATO units from West Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium, Norway, Greece and Turkey continued to use the Hercules for high-altitude air defense until the late 1980s. The problem was the missile launcher itself, and especially the large HIPAR radar, which presented a formidable mobility problem. [44] Beginning around 1965, the number of Nike batteries was reduced. A reevaluation of the threat in the 1970s led to closing the Nike installations. In February, Air Force Chief of Staff Thomas D. White shocked everyone when he requested that BOMARC deployments be reduced to eight US and two Canadian sites, essentially killing the program. The back of the controls were even with the extreme rear of the missile. [13] This could be increased even further using stand-off missiles, like those currently under development by all of the nuclear-armed forces for just this reason. [18] Nevertheless, when the Army first released information about Ajax to the press in 1953, the Air Force quickly responded by leaking information about BOMARC to Aviation Week,[19] and continued to denigrate Nike in the press over the next few years. The changes were designed to be upgradable without major changes to the deployed system – the TTR/MTR could be replaced at any time, the HIPAR used its own displays and therefore required no changes in the missile launch equipment, the TRR was slaved to the TTR and simply updated range readings, and the new seeker could be retrofitted at any time. Once a target was found on the LOPAR it could be identified with aid of an Identification friend or foe system. Box art is a clearly exciting launch sequence! Hercules had a complicated family tree. The Alaskan sites were deactivated in 1978 and Florida sites stood down during the following year. [38] HIPAR was a large system and generally deployed under a dome on top of a concrete platform that raised it above any local obstructions. Martin produced the T48E1 and E2 designs for Ajax used a fibreglass casing that was destroyed by small explosives, but this proved overweight and did not boost the Ajax to the required speed. Based on the 'time to fly' of the missile this limited overall battery rates to about one launch every couple of minutes.[48]. [33] The first deployments in Europe began in 1959. This three minute video is a (successful :-) test of an early Nike Ajax destroying a radio controlled WW-II B-17. Hercules was designed from the start to operate from Ajax bases. Interceptions with the Hercules system would typically start with targets being detected and identified on the HIPAR system, if this was in use. Site Summit (B Battery) still sits above Eagle River, its IFC buildings and clamshell towers easily visible when driving towards Anchorage. Inside are sprues for essentially two models- the missile and the launcher- plus decals and the … To provide the same range of view, the tracking radars were also often placed on concrete platforms of their own, although these were much smaller. The LA also had a control van to control and monitor the LA activities and maintenance facilities. Like almost any thorny military problem of the 1950s, the solution was the application of nuclear bombs. Nike was initially deployed at military bases starting in 1953, especially Strategic Air Command bomber airfields, and general deployment then followed at US cities, important industrial sites, and then overseas bases. Aug 12, 2019 - Explore Stephen T. Broas's board "Nike Hercules" on Pinterest. Bell also proposed a much more modified design known as "Nike Hercules" with an enlarged upper fuselage able to carry the XW-7 warhead of up to 40 kt. TTR and TRR operator console. Instead of de-emphasizing BOMARC in favor of Hercules, inter-service rivalry became rampant, and the Air Force began a policy of denigrating Hercules and the Army using policy by press release. Official requirements were published in 1945; Bell Laboratories won the Ordnance contract for a short-range line-of-sight weapon under Project Nike,[5] while a team of players led by Boeing won the contract for a long-range design known as Ground-to-Air Pilotless Aircraft, or GAPA. The IFC contained the search and tracking radars and control center (operators, computer, etc. In part because of less parts supportability, Western European (Fourth Allied Tactical Air Force (4 ATAF) and Second Allied Tactical Air Force (2 ATAF) sites essentially became fixed sites and were no longer considered capable of a mobile role. The Nike Hercules was a command-guided, long-range, high-altitude anti-aircraft missile. Even as Nike Ajax was being tested, work started on Nike-B, later renamed Nike Hercules (MIM-14). Each Nike battery consisted of two or three areas; IFC, LA and general. ), and various related offices and communications centres for general operations. Thule's air defense was reduced during 1965, and SAC air base defense during 1966, reducing the number of batteries to 112. It was reverse-engineered from the U.S. MIM-14 Nike Hercules, from which it derives its name. The government commissioned the building of 240 Nike Missile bases around the country. Although Hercules had demonstrated its ability to successfully engage short-range missiles, the capability was not considered very important. [36] Engineering was complete in 1958 and entered low-rate production in May 1959. —Don Bender (U.S. Army Photos) The Life of a Missileman Our battery was one of 19 comprising the New York-Philadelphia Defense. Deployment of the INH upgrade kits began on 10 June 1961 at the BA-30 site in the Washington–Baltimore defense area, and continued into September 1967. Nike Hercules batteries at SAC bases and in Hawaii were installed in an outdoor configuration. When the battery was given orders to attack a target, the alert status lamp changed from blue to red. The NHK-1 (Nike Hercules Korea 1) was a short-range, solid-fueled ballistic missile. Smaller deltas in front of the main wings, and blended into them, provided roll control with very small flaps mounted to pivot along a line roughly 45 degrees from the line of the fuselage. One of the first photos released by the U.S. Army of Nike. Information from the MTR and TTR continued to be fed to the computer for updating the intercept point based on any actual changes in either the missile or the target location, speed or direction.