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Aviation History
1960
1960 - 1169.PDF
FLIGHT, 29 July 1960 145 As noted in a para- graph on this page, USS "George Washing- ton" fired two Polaris missiles from a depth of 90ft on July 20. The first missile (left) left the water some 15° away from the ver- tical and was cor- rected following first - stage ignition The second Polaris (right) was fired some three hours later. Both achieved completely successful missions Missiles and Spaceflight COMPLETE POLARIS MISSION In last week's issue, and on pages 147-150, we have presented acomprehensive account of the development of the Polaris sub- marine-launched ballistic missile of the US Navy. This greatweapon surmounted its culminating hurdle on July 20, when two were fired on full-range missions from the first Polaris submarine,SSB(N) 598 George Washington. For several months George Washington has been based at PortCanaveral, Florida, at the head of the Atlantic Missile Range. After firing at least 30 test "slugs" to check out her 16 missiletubes, she took aboard two real Polaris on the night of July 19, and slipped her moorings early next day, with 307 crew and tech-nicians aboard. After making a rendezvous with the surface ship Observation Island about 30 miles off-shore, she submerged andbegan her firing run 90ft down at 2kt. This is apparently rather deeper than the normal operational depth. After a green smoke-float had popped to the surface the finalseconds of the countdown ticked away until, a second or two after "zero," the orange re-entry vehicle thrust its nose obliquelyout of the blue ocean. Owing to the considerable firing depth the missile almost stopped just above the water, but the first stagefired promptly, correcting the non-vertical attitude in about 2sec (see picture). Observers on shore saw the thin smoke trail, andthe inter-stage separation 55sec from the launch. Impact took place in the prescribed area north of Puerto Rico, 1,100 milesdown-range. Missile No 2 followed 3hr later, and, leaving the water much nearer to the vertical, also flew a perfect 1,100 milemission. A BRITISH SKY BOLT? In the Defence Debate in the Commons on July 20, HaroldWatkinson, Minister of Defence, made it quite clear that a great deal of thought is being given to the possibility of Britain develop-ing an indigenous ALBM for Bomber Command. This suggestion —which was first implied by him earlier this year—should furtherincrease the effectiveness of the Vulcan B.2 and Victor B.2. His words were: "Sky Bolt will cost a great deal less than BlueStreak because the R and D cost is being covered by America. Supposing that out of our spare resources we decided to diversifythe deterrent and produced a missile as a partner to Sky Bolt which was entirely made by us, would the right hon. Gentlemanthen change his policy again?" After George Brown, "Shadow" Defence Minister, had asked whether this was to happen, MrWatkinson replied, "That is for the Government to decide." CORVUS CANCELLED Under development since 1955 by Northrop's Radioplane Divi-sion, the Corvus air-to-surface guided missile was cancelled by the US Navy on July 19. In their view it was "more limitedin its application than other systems now under development." Total funding at the time of cancellation had been approxi-mately $80m. Corvus, or ASM-N-8, was a beautifully streamlined aero-dynamic-cruise device with a range of the order of 100 miles. It was intended to be carried by such carrier-based aircraft as theA4D, A3J or F4H, and in its major role would have been used to home on to enemy electronic installations and destroy them.The first flight-test prototype was successfully fired from an A4D at Point Mugu exactly one year ago Flight, August 21, 1959). SPACEFLIGHT APUs Two American companies have announced their work on new systems to provide power for advanced satellites and space probes. Martin's Nuclear Division have started testing SNAP 1-A, a compact generator fed from a nuclear reactor, which is under contract to the Atomic Energy Commission. Promising more On June 28 the US Air Force gave a D-Model Atlas ICBM to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. Unlike previous display Atlas missiles, this specimen is clearly genuine (comments appear on p. 153)
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