On display in the dimly-lit National Air and Space Museum – Udvar-Havy facility is an example of the Light Exo-Atmospheric Projectile Kinetic Kill Vehicle (LEAP KKV). The LEAP is, in essence, a telescope hooked up to a computer and a solid rocket motor. The rocket did not exhaust out through a single nozzle in the tail, but instead through a multitude of nozzles around the midsection. Each nozzle was equipped with a valve, allowing the nozzle to be either On or Off. The purpose of this was that it would allow the LEAP to move sideways, rather than forward. Forward motion was assured by virtue of the vehicle being at the tip of a Navy Standard Missile (SM-3), which would use a three-stage rocket to chuck the LEAP to very high speeds and above the sensible atmosphere. The LEAP would use its ability to jink aroung the sky in order to put itself on an impact trajectory with an incoming enemy missile. No explosive warhead was carried; simply being smacked by a chunk of metal more than a foot long travelling at several kilometers per second is typically enough to trash even the toughest rocket or warhead.
5 Responses to “LEAP KKV”
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That’s what they used to whack that satellite with a while back.
>used to whack that satellite…
Remember, the anti-missile system is “unproven.”
Bah.
Don’t go there man.
And shortly after that became public, the engineers and techs pulled the telescope/guidance package off the front and stuck a housing for a ‘Gingus’ type walker/insterment package in its place and tested its ability to soft land on the Moon.
Scientests of the day where still freaking about the Military participating in Space Exploration at the time and pretty much acted like their heads were exploding when that came out.
Very cool. Thanks for posting this.