Building on the successful flight test of the Standard Missile SM-3 ballistic missile interceptor, the U.S. Navy and prime contractor Raytheon are now sifting through huge amounts of seeker and telemetry data to ensure there are no hidden hurdles toward achieving a first target intercept later this year. The Jan. 25 event marked an important turnaround in the fortunes of the development program designed to demonstrate the feasibility of the Navy Theater Wide ballistic missile defense system. The first test of the so-called Aegis light exo-atmospheric missile projectile intercept (ALI) series ended in failure due to a software problem, and the Navy was also struggling with other hardware problems.
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