Sunday, November 23, 2008

Starstreak

IOC: 1997

Starstreak II

IOC: 2008

Origin
United Kingdom

Contractor/s
Thales

Family Members
Starstreak

Description: The Starstreak is a short-range, two-stage, hypervelocity surface-to-air and air-to-air missile designed to defeat the most advanced airborne threats. In service with the Armed Forces of the United Kingdom (UK) from 1997, it is launched from shoulder, tracked vehicles (Stormer), wheeled vehicles, and helicopters such as the British Army's WAH-64 Apache. According to the UK Ministry of Defense (MoD) estimates, the Starstreak missile will remain in service with the British Armed Forces until 2020.

The Starstreak missile features a two-stage rocket motor and high precision laser beam-riding guidance immune to all known countermeasures. The first stage motor ejects the missile out of its canister. At a safe distance from the launcher, the second motor ignites and accelerates the missile to more than 3 times the speed of sound. It has three individually guided darts which separate from the missile when the second motor ends. The darts are guided by laser beam-riding and are effective in clutter and battlefield obscurants. It does not require maintenance neither in service support.

Starstreak II is an enhanced version of Starstreak missile featuring a maximum range in excess of 7,000 meters and an improved guidance system with optimized performance against small signature targets such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), helicopters and light armored vehicles. The range increase affects both altitude and parabolic coverage. Thales claims that enhanced Starstreak can be launched either from air, sea and ground-based platforms. The Starstreak II development was leveraged by the British military commanders experience gained in recent conflicts. Thales UK announced the enhanced weapon developement in 2007.

Specifications
Performance: Max Range 7,000 m (22,966 ft)

Operators

United Kingdom

Notes
(*) lead contractor
IOC: Initial Operating Capability
FOC: Full Operating Capability
CEP: Circular Error Probable
Comm: Commissioning Date
Meters (m) Kilometers (km) Nautic Miles (nm) Inch (in) Yard (yd) Foot (ft) Millimeter (mm)
Pound (lb) Kilogram (kg) kN (KiloNewton) Ton (t)
Meters per Second (mps) Kilometers per Hour (kph) Knot (kt) Miles per Hour (mph)
Liter (l) Galon (gl)
Year (yr) Minutes (min) Second (sec)
Shaft-Horse-Power (shp)

Last Updated: Saturday, November 22, 2008

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