"Faked" SDI test from the 1980s

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Maury Markowitz

From the Great White North!
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I'm trying to track down references to an SDI test that I'm pretty sure used the MIRCL laser and SeaLite beam director. The test is mentioned here:

- CSMonitor.com

The Christian Science Monitor - an independent daily newspaper providing context and clarity on national and international news, peoples and cultures, and social trends.
www.csmonitor.com www.csmonitor.com

I recall this being on the nightly newscasts. After much hype about SDI, little had occurred and then this test was played on every channel. In it, the laser fires and the missile fuselage, from a Titan IIRC, basically just disappeared. In an instant, a hole slightly larger than the fuselage simply appeared and the upper remaining part hung in the air for a split second like Wile E before he looks down.

I later heard the test was faked by placing small explosives on the fuselage. Watching YouTube videos of other tests using the same laser that take many seconds to destroy a drone and then only do so by making it lose control, and simply considering its rather limited power, it seems highly likely something extremely fishy was going on here.

Does anyone have any useful references to this?
 
Maury Markowitz said:
I'm trying to track down references to an SDI test that I'm pretty sure used the MIRCL laser and SeaLite beam director. The test is mentioned here:

- CSMonitor.com

The Christian Science Monitor - an independent daily newspaper providing context and clarity on national and international news, peoples and cultures, and social trends.
www.csmonitor.com www.csmonitor.com

I recall this being on the nightly newscasts. After much hype about SDI, little had occurred and then this test was played on every channel. In it, the laser fires and the missile fuselage, from a Titan IIRC, basically just disappeared. In an instant, a hole slightly larger than the fuselage simply appeared and the upper remaining part hung in the air for a split second like Wile E before he looks down.

I later heard the test was faked by placing small explosives on the fuselage. Watching YouTube videos of other tests using the same laser that take many seconds to destroy a drone and then only do so by making it lose control, and simply considering its rather limited power, it seems highly likely something extremely fishy was going on here.

Does anyone have any useful references to this?
Click to expand...
I remember seeing the setup in a book on SDI I found in my school library. The Titan section was placed in a fixture to put it under simulated flight loads. Took about 5 seconds to put enough heat into the skin to weaken it, and then it went like a beer can.

Same laser and beam director also shot down a TOW missile. Oddly enough, it took about 5sec for that to work as well.
 
Scott Kenny said:
I remember seeing the setup in a book on SDI I found in my school library. The Titan section was placed in a fixture to put it under simulated flight loads. Took about 5 seconds to put enough heat into the skin to weaken it, and then it went like a beer can.

Same laser and beam director also shot down a TOW missile. Oddly enough, it took about 5sec for that to work as well.
Click to expand...
No. The one that took down TOW missiles was this:


mtu_01_zpsc99fe03f.jpg

mtu_02_zps05b606df.jpg
 

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