Re: Air Force Seeks Bush's Approval for Space Weapons Programs


Pat Flannery (flanner@xxxxxxxxxx) writes:
> Andre Lieven wrote:
>
>>No, HMS Gloucester destroyed the Silkworm
>>
> Now that makes more sense.

Indeed.

>> with two Sea Dart SAMs.
>>She and a consort, HMS London also chose not to launch chaff, so as
>>not to decoy the SSM away from them, and only the battleship.
>>
>>>And anyone care to guess how many gallons of paint it
>>>would've taken to cover up the stain if the damned thing had hit Mighty
>>>Mo on her main belt armor anyway? ;-)
>>
>>Not many. But, had the SSM hit the Mo not on the belt, but among the
>>electronics spaces on the superstructure, well, that could have been
>>inconvenient.
>
> At least one version of Silkworm does terminal homing via infrared- this
> may be a back-up in case its active radar gets jammed. If that were the
> case, it would have hit the ship in one of its funnels.

Which is one reason modern ship designs are taking care to not only
eliminate 90 degree angles on ships, but to mask the exhaust plumes,
such as not to be such a target.

> The warhead is around 1,100 pounds; I don't know what exact effect that
> would have, but at he very least I think you convert the ship into a
> single-funnel layout. :-)

That depends. Many such battleship type vessels have survived such
single hits. Some didn't.

Given the relative lack of tanker sinkings by Iraqi and Iranian
SSMs/ASMs in the 80s, its not such a lock.

Andre


--
" I'm a man... But, I can change... If I have to... I guess. "
The Man Prayer, Red Green.
.

Relevant Pages
Quantcast