Brits "misfire" a Trident?

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DAllen

DAllen

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So anyone hear about this?

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-38711418

I mean, holy crap. Can't believe (well, actually I can) that the press is so daggumed focused on who had the bigger inauguration crowd rather than this. I realize that the missile was unarmed but can you imagine the damage from just the kinetic energy of a empty warhead coming down at hypersonic velocity? I bet it would level an entire city block.
 
The kinetic energy from 1 kilogram of nuclear warhead re-entering at 7km/ second (a typical speed for modern warheads) is equivalent to ~6 kilograms of TNT.
 
So what? Crickets? Really? I mean, no one is worried about this rather irresponsible act that put our country in danger? Tridents have been around for over half a century and thoroughly tested so I suspect a misfire is highly unlikely. Someone screwed up. Where is our president in on all of this? What, if anything did our former president do?

Oh wait, I know...We're all too worried about who had the bigger crowd at their inauguration.
 
DAllen said:
Oh wait, I know...We're all too worried about who had the bigger crowd at their inauguration.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I guess it wasn't part of the reality show script so it didn't make the headlines. Remember, we only want intelligence briefings when something changes. The missile didn't hit land; "no harm, no foul."
 
the question we should be asking is; was it really a 'misfire'...
Rex
 
On the good side it did not hit anything.

That said, you are right- the firing of a ballistic missile is a big deal. It is a much bigger deal if it was not supposed to happen. Also a huge deal if it does not go where it is supposed to.

I suspect that our folks are in rather serious discussions with their British counterparts.

Let's just hope the missile was actually unarmed. Seems a rather convenient story.
 
I find it plausible that human error played a part, as anyone who's had to support a major tech refresh could guess.
 
Why are the Brits firing a missile off the coast of Florida? There is more to this story, like the US military was involved in this also.....
 
jderimig said:
Why are the Brits firing a missile off the coast of Florida? There is more to this story, like the US military was involved in this also.....
Click to expand...

The story is misleading. A later story said they were 5600 miles away from the coast of Florida when they launched.
It happened in June. The missile was one of several test flights. It initially turned towards the USA.



Steve Shannon
 
Ironic that they just decided to invest in their Trident missile. A one-off malfunction: Plausible? Yes. I know next to nothing about ballistic missile technology but it seems reasonable that if malfunctions happen in the space program globally, then they might happen with other systems as well.

They better get the bugs worked out before they load it up with real nuclear MIRVs. World War 3 would be the worst time to have a friendly fire incident.
 
Steve Shannon said:
The story is misleading. A later story said they were 5600 miles away from the coast of Florida when they launched.
It happened in June. The missile was one of several test flights. It initially turned towards the USA.



Steve Shannon
Click to expand...

Really, I think it's just the headline and thread title that are misleading. Reading to the bottom of the article, it's clear there was a planned test and the Trident went off course. That's definitely not good (did the RSO push the big red button to destroy the missile?), but it's far better than an accidental firing.
 
jderimig said:
LOL. That puts the submarine somewhere on land in Europe or Africa.
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My mistake:
Here was the quote:
According to the Sunday Times, the unarmed Trident II D5 missile was intended to be fired 5,600 miles (9,012 km) from the coast of Florida to a sea target off the west coast of Africa - but veered towards the US.
 
Steve Shannon said:
My mistake:
Here was the quote:
According to the Sunday Times, the unarmed Trident II D5 missile was intended to be fired 5,600 miles (9,012 km) from the coast of Florida to a sea target off the west coast of Africa - but veered towards the US.
Click to expand...

That's still wrong. The quote does not mention the coast of Florida at all. Here is the quote:

"It says the Trident II D5 missile was intended to be fired 5,600 miles (9,012 km) to a sea target off the west coast of Africa but veered towards the US."

Keep Florida out of it! Florida already has enough problems as it is!
 
ThirstyBarbarian said:
That's still wrong. The quote does not mention the coast of Florida at all. Here is the quote:

"It says the Trident II D5 missile was intended to be fired 5,600 miles (9,012 km) to a sea target off the west coast of Africa but veered towards the US."

Keep Florida out of it! Florida already has enough problems as it is!
Click to expand...

Mine was not misquoted; it was just a different article than you copied. It was copied and pasted directly from a BBC news article entitled Trident: Defence Secretary refuses to give test missile details.

CNN also identified it as a location off the coast of Florida where both the USA and Britain test missiles.
 
I'm thinking the official response will be along the lines of, "Well, **** happens." :facepalm:
 
I too read that the launch site was just off the coast of Florida.
I would hazard to guess that there are some good rocket-launch tracking assets in that area......
 
Steve Shannon said:
Mine was not misquoted; it was just a different article than you copied. It was copied and pasted directly from a BBC news article entitled Trident: Defence Secretary refuses to give test missile details.

CNN also identified it as a location off the coast of Florida where both the USA and Britain test missiles.
Click to expand...

I copied it from the BBC article in the original post, which sounds like it is a different source that what you used. The grammar in the sentence you copied is a little bit strange, and it make it a bit ambiguous. It needs a comma in there somewhere. Maybe that's why they dropped "from the coast of Florida" in the article linked above --- couldn't decide which meaning was right and didn't know where to put the comma.
 
ThirstyBarbarian said:
I copied it from the BBC article in the original post, which sounds like it is a different source that what you used. The grammar in the sentence you copied is a little bit strange, and it make it a bit ambiguous. It needs a comma in there somewhere. Maybe that's why they dropped "from the coast of Florida" in the article linked above --- couldn't decide which meaning was right and didn't know where to put the comma.
Click to expand...

After I read the original article I went to the bottom of the article and clicked on the newest links. There's one there now that's 40 minutes old with similar words.
 

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