Terrier Oriole is an unguided two-stage rocket system which is primarily used by the

Goddard Space Flight Center The Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is a major NASA space research laboratory located approximately northeast of Washington, D.C. in Greenbelt, Maryland, United States. Established on May 1, 1959 as NASA's first space flight center, GSFC empl ...

out of the

Wallops Flight Facility Wallops Flight Facility (WFF) is a rocket launch site on Wallops Island on the Eastern Shore of Virginia, United States, just east of the Delmarva Peninsula and approximately north-northeast of Norfolk. The facility is operated by the Godda ...

as a

sounding rocket A sounding rocket or rocketsonde, sometimes called a research rocket or a suborbital rocket, is an instrument-carrying rocket designed to take measurements and perform scientific experiments during its sub-orbital flight. The rockets are used to ...

. The system uses a

Terrier Terrier (from Latin ''terra'', 'earth') is a type of dog originally bred to hunt vermin. A terrier is a dog of any one of many breeds or landraces of the terrier type, which are typically small, wiry, game, and fearless. Terrier breeds vary ...

first-stage booster attached to an Oriole second-stage rocket. The system can carry payloads between up to an altitude of . It is also used to test ballistic missile defense systems, under the name ARAV-B.

Technical details

The

motor is in diameter and long, and it normally uses two "spin motors", both to reduce dispersion and to serve as drag plates. It uses four equally spaced fins which are and canted in such a way as to provide two revolutions per second at Terrier burnout. The weight of the Terrier booster system is . The Oriole motor is in diameter and long. There is a interstage adapter between the Terrier and Oriole systems, which allows for drag separation following Terrier burnout. The Oriole stage uses four fins in a cruciform configuration, which are canted in order to provide a spin rate of four revolutions per second upon Oriole burnout. Standard hardware includes a nose cone and capacitive discharge ignition system. Separation systems are available for use in order to separate the payload from the motor during ascent. An ogive nose cone is also available to users, when required. Terrier-Oriole is used to test ballistic missile defense systems, under the name Aegis Readiness Assessment Vehicle-B (ARAV-B). It is much cheaper than other ballistic missile targets.

T4-E

This T-T-O stack uses two Terrier Mk.70 (TX-664) plus the final Oriole GEM-22 as a medium range ballistic missile (MRBM) target.Terrier Terrier combinations
Gunter's space Page, updated to 03.03.2021, accessed 2022-11-23 In mid-November 2022, the T4-E stack was used for two live-fire events when

Japanese Navy , abbreviated , also simply known as the Japanese Navy, is the maritime warfare branch of the Japan Self-Defense Forces, tasked with the naval defense of Japan. The JMSDF was formed following the dissolution of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) ...

ships

JS Maya JS ''Maya'' (DDG-179) is the lead ship of her class of guided missile destroyer in the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF). She was named after Mount Maya and shares her name with a World War II heavy cruiser. Development The anno ...

and JS Haguro used RIM-161 SM-3 Block IIA missiles to engage T4-E targets in conjunction with the

US Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

at the

Pacific Missile Range Facility The Pacific Missile Range Facility, Barking Sands is a U.S. naval facility and airport located five nautical miles (9 km) northwest of the central business district of Kekaha, in Kauai County, Hawaii, United States. PMRF is the world's larg ...

, Kauai Island,

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only stat ...

. Japanese destroyers intercept ballistic missiles in tests with US Navy
Mike Yeo, DefenseNews.com, 2022-11-23

References

{{Reflist Sounding rockets of the United States

Technical details

T4-E

See also

References