Fort Sill battalion test fires high-tech missile

By 1st Lt. Christopher Rossi, 214th Fires BrigadeJuly 3, 2014

ATACMS
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FORT SILL, Okla. (July 3, 2014) -- A firing element from A Battery, 1st Battalion, 14th Field Artillery test fired Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System munitions May 28 through June 14 at White Sands Missile Range, N.M.

After conducting many successful tests, from their M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, the group was presented with an invitation they could not refuse: a test firing of the M39 Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS).

The Block 1 ATACMS M39 is an all-weather, long range, guided surface-to-surface missile that can be fired from the M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System and the M142 HIMARS. The munitions are designed to engage targets 100 miles away, well beyond the range of standard artillery and rocket fires while destroying a target area of nearly a square kilometer by use of carrying a payload of hundreds of smaller M74 anti-personnel, anti-materiel bomblets.

This special test fire mission extended the group's stay until June 20, but the weeklong extension was one they were more than willing and honored to make.

An interesting coincidence with the launch was that the on-site project manager for the ATACMS testing was the same individual who managed the historic GMLRS live fire exercise that 1-14th FA conducted with allied forces in the United Arab Emirates last year. The 10-day, joint forces, live-fire exercise between the Steel Warriors and the Emirate 97th Heavy Artillery Regiment in September 2013 was the first time that U.S. forces fired HIMARS in the UAE, an event that solidified political and military ties between the two nations.

"It was a very, very rare opportunity that few people are ever afforded to do," Sgt. Sean Springs, said fire direction center chief. "Most of us had never shot an ATACMS missile, and this allowed us to learn how the systems work, how they are used in a wartime situation and how reliable and accurate they really are. Shooting a live missile for the first time even felt different to just processing a digital training mission."

In addition to the training provided to the Soldiers in A Battery, the missile launch also provided valuable information to the officials at White Sands Missile Range. The missiles used were manufactured in the 1990s and the ammunition lot required testing to verify continuing reliability and viability. In part for these reasons, as well as research and development, the launch was simultaneously recorded by high-speed cameras and data gathering sensors from the time of launch through detonation.

Fired from a 1-14th FA HIMARS launcher, the missile flew about 93 kilometers in around two minutes before decimating a target area of roughly 800-by-800 meters. This happens from the many M74 submunitions that are disseminated from the primary warhead in the air, a characteristic that earned the weapon the moniker "steel rain" during the Iraq War.

"In my personal training and experience I have done target [measurement] training, weaponeering and collateral damage analysis training," said 1st Lt. Brian Norman, A Battery executive officer. "Dealing with that and seeing how this missile actually fires and functions on target was like coming full-circle in my training and everything I have learned about these munitions."