The test involved ships from the United States, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
The United Kingdom hosted the event at its Hebrides Missile Test Range in Scotland. Commodore Frank Sijtsma of the Royal Netherlands Navy commanded the task group.
During the demonstration, the vessels defended against simultaneous anti-ship and ballistic missile threats originating from multiple locations. The countries had to pass information over a total of 5.7 million square miles using a variety of platforms from different countries to identify, track and engage the threats.
The fleet fired more than 26 missiles, including the Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile and the SM-3 in the US inventory and the Aster-30 missile used by France, Italy and the United Kingdom.
Commander of US Naval Forces Europe-Africa Admiral Mark Ferguson said:
“Today, nine member nations of the Maritime Theater Missile Defence Forum, under the auspices of the US Missile Defence Agency, successfully conducted the simultaneous engagement of a ballistic missile in space and an anti-ship cruise missile target, the first demonstration of this capability in the European theatre, the execution of the live-fire exercise is a clear demonstration of the forum’s ability to safely conduct effective coalition sea-based defence against simultaneous anti-ship and ballistic missile threats within an operational scenario.
To remain proficient, we must practice unified, decisive, and timely command and control. Continuous training also hones our operational tactics, techniques, and procedures, which helps us achieve the level of readiness required to execute such a demanding fast-paced mission as ballistic missile defence.”
The test was performed to underline the Nato commitment to missile defence of member states.
For those who are interested, there is a fairly good video of the exercise and demonstration on YouTube under the title At Sea Demonstration 2015 – ASD15.
No passenger jets were harmed during this event.
According to this link. the Skylark sounding rocket has been launched from Wales.
http://www.le.ac.uk/ebulletin-archive/ebulletin/news/press-releases/2000-2009/2005/04/nparticle-vcz-vgw-y8c.html
We do seem to be forgetting the UKs most important space mission here!
by far!
Much better!
How we gonna use it again???
We need more funding and research into reliant robin spacecraft
I was hoping this would be good for humanity. Not war!
You could argue that something which deters aggression is good for humanity
It was not launched from UK Soil. It was launched from a WAR SHIP, not British, it was in British waters, on A British test range , and that’s as close as it gets.
It’s all sovereign territory!
Wrong, the rocket was launched from land. It was intercepted by a missile launched from a ship
It says from ” UK SOIL” and it was not, it was from a Non British Warship, and any war ship maintains the Sovereignty of the Nation that it belongs to, so not British Sovereign Territory eather ?
David ….you are correct, I got a wee bit confused, the fact was I know the ships involved had just finished, ex joint warrior 215, so where all around the area, and just asume that one of them fired it.
A warship complete with buildings, floodlights and a tree.
Not familiar with the warship type. Could you advise?
The Germans launched unguided rockets that entered space 80 years ago called the V2, just saying.
30 missiles launched against 2 targets seems like a lot of fun.
There were many other targets launched during the exercise, so not all 30 were aimed at the ballistic targets.
Beauti
We are a backwards 3rd world country lol