Credit: MDA
Engineers from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, in cooperation with the U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA), the Japan Ministry of Defense, and U.S. Navy sailors aboard USS John Paul Jones (DDG-53), played a key role in the first live-fire intercept using the new Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block IIA guided missile during a Feb. 3 flight test off the west coast of Hawaii. The flight test, designated SM-3 Block IIA Cooperative Development (SCD) Project Flight Test, Standard Missile (SFTM)-01, was the third flight test of the SM-3 Block IIA guided missile and the first intercept test. This test also marks the first time an SM-3IIA was launched from an Aegis ship and the first intercept engagement using the Aegis Baseline 9.C2 (BMD 5.1) weapon system.