The Mark 84 or BLU-117 is an American
general-purpose bomb
A general-purpose bomb is an air-dropped bomb intended as a compromise between blast damage, penetration, and fragmentation in explosive effect. They are designed to be effective against enemy troops, vehicles, and buildings.
Characteristics ...
. It is the largest of the
Mark 80 series of weapons. Entering service during the
Vietnam War, it became a commonly used US heavy
unguided bomb (due to the amount of high-explosive content packed inside) to be dropped. At the time, it was the third largest bomb by weight in the US inventory behind the
BLU-82
The BLU-82B/C-130 weapon system, known under program "Commando Vault" and nicknamed " Daisy Cutter" in Vietnam for its ability to flatten a section of forest into a helicopter landing zone, is an American conventional bomb, delivered from eith ...
"Daisy Cutter" and the
M118 "demolition" bomb. It is currently sixth in size due to the addition of the
GBU-28
The GBU-28 is a 5,000-pound (2,268 kg) class laser-guided "bunker busting" bomb produced originally by the Watervliet Arsenal, Watervliet, New York. It was designed, manufactured, and deployed in less than three weeks due to an urgent need ...
in 1991, the
GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast bomb (MOAB) in 2003, and the
Massive Ordnance Penetrator.
Development
The Mark 84 has a nominal weight of , but its actual weight varies depending on its fin,
fuze
In military munitions, a fuze (sometimes fuse) is the part of the device that initiates function. In some applications, such as torpedoes, a fuze may be identified by function as the exploder. The relative complexity of even the earliest fuze d ...
options, and retardation configuration, from . It is a streamlined steel casing filled with of
Tritonal high explosive.
The Mark 84 is capable of forming a crater wide and deep. It can penetrate up to of metal or of concrete, depending on the height from which it is dropped, and causes lethal fragmentation to a radius of .
Many Mark 84s have been retrofitted with stabilizing and retarding devices to provide precision guidance capabilities. They serve as the warhead of a variety of precision-guided munitions, including the
GBU-10/
GBU-24/
GBU-27
The GBU-27 Paveway III (Guided Bomb Unit) is a laser-guided bomb with bunker busting, bunker buster capabilities, it is a GBU-24 Paveway III (fitted on the warhead of the BLU-109 bomb body) that has been redesigned to be used by the Lockheed F-117 ...
Paveway laser-guided bombs,
GBU-15 electro-optical bomb,
GBU-31 JDAM and Quickstrike
sea mines.
The
HGK is a Turkish guidance kit used to convert 2000-lb Mark 84 bombs into GPS/INS guided smart bombs.
According to a test report conducted by the United States Navy's
Weapon System Explosives Safety Review Board (WSESRB) established in the wake of the
1967 USS Forrestal fire
On 29 July 1967, a fire broke out on board the aircraft carrier after an electrical anomaly caused a Zuni rocket on an F-4B Phantom to fire, striking an external fuel tank of an A-4 Skyhawk. The flammable jet fuel spilled across the flight dec ...
, the
cooking off time for a Mk 84 is approximately 8 minutes 40 seconds.
See also
*
BLU-109 bomb
*
BLU-116
*
Mark 81 bomb
*
Mark 82 bomb
*
Mark 83 bomb
References
External links
Mk65 Quick Strike Mine
{{Use dmy dates, date=June 2017
Cold War aerial bombs of the United States
Aerial bombs of the United States
Military equipment introduced in the 1970s