White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) is a military testing area operated by the United States Army. The range was originally established as the White Sands Proving Ground on 9 July 1945. White Sands National Park is located within the range.
Kirtland Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base located in the southeast quadrant of the Albuquerque, New Mexico urban area, adjacent to the Albuquerque International Sunport. The base was named for the early Army aviator Col. Roy C. Kirtland. The military and the international airport share the same runways, making ABQ a joint civil-military airport.
Wallops Flight Facility (WFF) is a rocket launch site on Wallops Island on the Eastern Shore of Virginia, United States, just east of the Delmarva Peninsula and approximately 100 miles (160 km) north-northeast of Norfolk. The facility is operated by the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and primarily serves to support science and exploration missions for NASA and other Federal agencies. WFF includes an extensively instrumented range to support launches of more than a dozen types of sounding rockets; small expendable suborbital and orbital rockets; high-altitude balloon flights carrying scientific instruments for atmospheric and astronomical research; and, using its Research Airport, flight tests of aeronautical research aircraft, including unmanned aerial vehicles.
Pacific Missile Test Center (PMTC) is the former name of the current Naval Air Warfare Center, Weapons Division. The name of the center was the Naval Air Missile Test Center prior to PMTC. It is located at Naval Base Ventura County/Naval Air Station Point Mugu in Ventura County, California. The nearest city to the installation is Oxnard.
The United States Army Space and Missile Defense Command (USASMDC) is an Army Service Component Command (ASCC) of the United States Army. The command was established in 1997. The current USASMDC commander is Lieutenant General Daniel L. Karbler with Senior Enlisted Advisor Command Sergeant Major Finis A. Dodson.
The Air Force Missile Development Center and its predecessors were Cold War units that conducted and supported numerous missile tests using facilities at Holloman Air Force Base, where the center was the host unit
The HLONS , commonly known as ZEUS, is a solid-state laser weapon which is used by the U.S. military in order to neutralize surface land mines and unexploded ordnance. The ZEUS-HLONS system was a co-operative effort between Sparta Inc and NAVEODTECHDIV to demonstrate that a moderate-power commercial solid state laser (SSL) and beam control system could be integrated onto a Humvee (HMMWV) and used to clear surface mines, improvised explosive devices (IEDs), or unexploded ordnance from supply routes and minefields.
A laser weapon is a directed-energy weapon based on lasers. After decades of R&D, as of January 2020 directed-energy weapons including lasers are still at the experimental stage and it remains to be seen if or when they will be deployed as practical, high-performance military weapons. Atmospheric thermal blooming has been a major problem, still mostly unsolved, and worsened if fog, smoke, dust, rain, snow, smog, foam, or purposely dispersed obscurant chemicals are present. Essentially, a laser generates a beam of light which needs clear air, or a vacuum, to work without thermal blooming.
Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division is the principal tenant command located at Naval Support Activity Crane. NSA Crane is a United States Navy installation located approximately 35 miles southwest of Bloomington, Indiana, and predominantly located in Martin County, but small parts also extend into Greene and Lawrence counties. It was originally established in 1941 under the Bureau of Ordnance as the Naval Ammunition Depot for production, testing, and storage of ordnance under the first supplemental Defense Appropriation Act. The base is named after William M. Crane. The base is the third largest naval installation in the world by geographic area and employs approximately 3,300 people. The closest community is the small town of Crane, which lies adjacent to the northwest corner of the facility.
U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command, or ATEC, is a direct reporting unit of the United States Army responsible for developmental testing, independent operational testing, independent evaluations, assessments, and experiments of Army equipment.
North Oscura Peak, is a summit in the Oscura Mountains in Socorro County, New Mexico is the location of an Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) site in the northern portion of the White Sands Missile Range. It rises to an elevation of 7,976 feet / 2,431 meters.
USS Desert Ship (LLS-1) is a concrete blockhouse providing assembly and launch facilities simulating shipboard conditions for Navy surface-to-air weapons testing at the Naval Air Warfare Center (NAWC) Weapons Division – White Sands.
Misty Picture was a test conducted on May 14, 1987 by the United States Defense Nuclear Agency involving the detonation of several thousand tons of conventional explosives to simulate the explosion of a small nuclear bomb.
The 46th Test Group was a United States Air Force group active from 1992 to 2012. It was last active with 46th Test Wing, at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida. The 46th Test Group was stationed as a tenant unit at Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico, throughout its existence. It was inactivated on 18 July 2012, being replaced by the 96th Test Group in an administrative reorganization.
The 96th Test Group was a United States Air Force unit, based at Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico. It was a Geographically Separate Unit (GSU), assigned to the 96th Test Wing, Eglin Air Force Base, Florida.
German V-2 rockets captured by the United States Army at the end of World War II were used as sounding rockets to carry scientific instruments into the earth's upper atmosphere at White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) for a program of atmospheric and solar investigation through the late 1940s. Rocket trajectory was intended to carry the rocket about 100 miles (160 km) high and 30 miles (48 km) horizontally from WSMR Launch Complex 33. Impact velocity of returning rockets was reduced by inducing structural failure of the rocket airframe upon atmospheric re-entry. More durable recordings and instruments might be recovered from the rockets after ground impact, but telemetry was developed to transmit and record instrument readings during flight.
The Utah Launch Complex was a Cold War military subinstallation of White Sands Missile Range for USAF and US Army rocket launches. In addition to firing Pershing missiles, the complex launched Athena RTV missiles with subscale (test) warheads of the Advanced Ballistic Re-entry System to reentry speeds and impact at the New Mexico range. From 1964 to 1975 there were 244 Green River launches, including 141 Athena launches and a Pershing to 281 kilometers altitude. "Utah State Route 19 runs through the Green River Launch Complex, which is south of the town and eponym of Green River."
From 1960 to 1988 there were Pershing missile launches for testing from various sites in the US. The systems included the Pershing 1 Field Artillery Missile System, the Pershing 1a Field Artillery Missile System and the Pershing II Weapon System. Initial launches were from what is now the Eastern Range at Cape Canaveral, Florida using Launch Complex 30A using the dismounted erector launcher. Later launches were from the full transporter erector launcher (TEL). Further launches were conducted at White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) using tactical equipment. The Pershing 1 and 1a had a range of 740 kilometres (460 mi), thus launches were from various subinstallations into WSMR. The two-stage Pershing II had a range of 1,770 kilometres (1,100 mi), thus launches at WSMR used a single-stage missile with two-stage launches at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Complex 38 was the White Sands Missile Range facility for testing the Nike Zeus anti-ballistic missile. The site is located east of the WSMR Post Area.
The Holloman High Speed Test Track (HHSTT) is a United States Department of Defense/Air Force aerospace ground test facility located at Holloman Air Force Base in south-central New Mexico. It is adjacent to the White Sands Missile Range and is operated by the 846th Test Squadron of the 704th Test Group of the Arnold Engineering Development Complex at Arnold Air Force Base.
