US successfully conducts this year's first missile defense test

Published: Feb 24, 2006
Source: aimpoints.hq.af.mil



ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - A missile rose more than 160 kilometres into the atmosphere from Alaska's Kodiak Island on Thursday in the first of several tests planned this year for the U.S. missile-defence system.

The 11-metre-long missile travelled about 4,000 kilometres over the Pacific Ocean toward the California-Mexico border before splashing down, said Missile Defence Agency spokesman Rich Lehner. The purpose was to test upgrades to early-warning radar installed in 1980 at Beale Air Force Base in northern California.

"Everything went very well," Lehner said.

"There were 26 test objectives and every one of them was met."continue..