Naval Sea Systems Command:

When surface warfare officers fire a missile to intercept a threat while defending their warship, what happens when the threat missile sustains specific types of damage at a specified range?

The Navy is collaborating with West Virginia University professors and students who are using a wind tunnel to help crack an aerodynamic code necessary to answer this question.

The answer – vital to warfighting safety and success – will provide the Navy with the key to answer subsequent questions. Will the damaged threat missile still hit the ship? Will it strike the ship and endanger crewmembers?

“Our Sailors should know if they hit a missile and if that threat is still going to hit them,” said Glenna Miller, Damaged State Modeling of a Post Intercept Threat Program manager at Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division (NSWCDD), regarding questions that have been unanswered since the development of missile systems. “They need to know immediately whether or not there are any pieces of that incoming missile that will hit them and the ship, causing damage to the ship and possibly, loss of life.”

In an initiative to answer the longstanding questions, the Office of Naval Research sponsored NSWCDD and West Virginia University in June 2019 to conduct research leading to the development of an air threat damaged states modeling and simulation capability…



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