Mystery Cruise Missile Video
O.K.guys give it your best shot, as to what you think is happening here and what they might be. and no i do not think it is a flock of geese. poster note
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Mystery Cruise Missile Video
By David Hambling
June 14, 2008 | 9:27:00 AM
URL:
Here's a video mystery that's been puzzling me for some time: footage which seems to show a group of Tomahawk cruise missiles flying in very close formation. But, so far as I know, Tomahawks don't really have the technology to pull of such a move. So is it for real?
The video appears in several places on the Internet. The title screen says "Operation: Iraqi Freedom Date: 22 Mar 03" and gives the unit and call sign of the aircraft involved, as well as a "Target Name" of "Cruise Missile Formation." It certainly seems to show several light-colored objects moving together at high speed. They do not stick to one formation but move relative to each other, while keeping quite close spacing.
Are they really cruise missiles, though? There are obvious advantages to sticking together -- they'd likely appear on radar as a single object -- but it would be difficult to achieve. Tomahawk Cruise missiles do not have air-to-air radar and can't 'see' each other. There have been models with radar which looks downwards and uses digital scene matching for navigation; that system was superseded by GPS, however.
Cruise missiles are guided via a series of pre-programmed waypoints - hence the occasion when BBC reporter John Simpson watched a cruise missile in Baghdad fly "down the street and turn left at the traffic lights." The waypoints can be specified in time and space, so a several missiles launches seconds apart could be programmed to bunch up with very small separation. But it's hard to see the advantage of doing this, compared to the very real risk of a collision that could cost you at least two missiles, if not the entire formation.
There are a few online discussions of the video which don’t shed much light, but perhaps the oddest supposedly authoritative comment is this one:
When I put this question to the Tomahawk program manager at the Pentagon, he said that video had been analyzed and that there was no way seven Tomahawk's could fly "formation" in that small a space. Based on where it was taken and how it was taken (C-130 optical tracking system) took it, it was determined to be large birds, most likely geese, and the relative speed of the Hercules make it look like they were traveling fast.
As with the best Unidentified Flying Object sightings, this 'explanation' seems even less likely than the original story. Geese or cruise missiles? Roswell Rods? Or just Swamp Gas? All informed opionons are welcome, as usual…
O.K.guys give it your best shot, as to what you think is happening here and what they might be. and no i do not think it is a flock of geese. poster note
--------------------------------------------------------
Mystery Cruise Missile Video
By David Hambling
June 14, 2008 | 9:27:00 AM
URL:
Here's a video mystery that's been puzzling me for some time: footage which seems to show a group of Tomahawk cruise missiles flying in very close formation. But, so far as I know, Tomahawks don't really have the technology to pull of such a move. So is it for real?
The video appears in several places on the Internet. The title screen says "Operation: Iraqi Freedom Date: 22 Mar 03" and gives the unit and call sign of the aircraft involved, as well as a "Target Name" of "Cruise Missile Formation." It certainly seems to show several light-colored objects moving together at high speed. They do not stick to one formation but move relative to each other, while keeping quite close spacing.
Are they really cruise missiles, though? There are obvious advantages to sticking together -- they'd likely appear on radar as a single object -- but it would be difficult to achieve. Tomahawk Cruise missiles do not have air-to-air radar and can't 'see' each other. There have been models with radar which looks downwards and uses digital scene matching for navigation; that system was superseded by GPS, however.
Cruise missiles are guided via a series of pre-programmed waypoints - hence the occasion when BBC reporter John Simpson watched a cruise missile in Baghdad fly "down the street and turn left at the traffic lights." The waypoints can be specified in time and space, so a several missiles launches seconds apart could be programmed to bunch up with very small separation. But it's hard to see the advantage of doing this, compared to the very real risk of a collision that could cost you at least two missiles, if not the entire formation.
There are a few online discussions of the video which don’t shed much light, but perhaps the oddest supposedly authoritative comment is this one:
When I put this question to the Tomahawk program manager at the Pentagon, he said that video had been analyzed and that there was no way seven Tomahawk's could fly "formation" in that small a space. Based on where it was taken and how it was taken (C-130 optical tracking system) took it, it was determined to be large birds, most likely geese, and the relative speed of the Hercules make it look like they were traveling fast.
As with the best Unidentified Flying Object sightings, this 'explanation' seems even less likely than the original story. Geese or cruise missiles? Roswell Rods? Or just Swamp Gas? All informed opionons are welcome, as usual…
