Ground Based Interceptor Arrow
Arrow 2 has successfully completed 14 intercept tests and there have been ten tests of the complete Arrow system. The seventh test, in July 2004, was the first test against a real rather than simulated ballistic missile, a Scud-B short-range ballistic missile.
A full Arrow battery was transported to the Point Mugu naval range in California for the test. The Scud-B was successfully intercepted and destroyed at an altitude of 40,000m. This test was part of the ongoing Arrow System Improvement Program (ASIP) being conducted jointly by Israel and the US.
In the second test at Point Mugu, in August 2004, against a target simulating a separating ballistic missile, the radar successfully acquired the target but the intercept failed in the final stage, leading to a suspension of testing.
Testing was resumed in December 2005, when an Arrow 2 block 3 missile successfully intercepted a target at an unspecified but reported record low altitude. In February 2007, the system successfully intercepted and destroyed a Rafael Black Sparrow target missile, simulating a ballistic missile, at high altitude. Both Arrow batteries took part in the test. An Arrow 2 Block 4 missile is under development.
Arrow 2 Missile Launch Platoon
The missile launch platoon consists of the Hazelnut Tree truck-mounted Launch Control Centre (LCC), developed by IAI MLM, with four or eight missile launch trailers. The entire launch platoon is mobile and able to relocate to a new site. After firing the launchers can be reloaded in an hour.
There are microwave and radio data and voice communications links between the launch centre and the radar command and control centre. The launch system can be located up to 300km from the site selected for the radar command and control centre.
Arrow 2 ATBM
The two-stage missile is equipped with solid propellant booster and sustainer rocket motors. The missile uses an initial burn to carry out a vertical hot launch from the container and a secondary burn to sustain the missile's trajectory towards the target at a maximum speed of Mach 9, or 2.5km/s.
Thrust vector control is used in the boost and sustainer phases of flight. At the ignition of the second stage sustainer motor, the first stage assembly separates. The first stage booster is manufactured by Israel Military Industries. Rafael manufactures the sustainer motor.
The Arrow missile is launched before the threat missile's trajectory and intercept point are accurately known. As more trajectory data becomes available, the optimum intercept point is more precisely defined and the missile is guided towards the optimum intercept point.
The kill vehicle section of the missile, containing the warhead, fusing and the terminal seeker, is equipped with four aerodynamically controlled moving fins to give low altitude interception capability. The warhead is a high explosive directed blast fragmentation warhead developed by Rafael, which is capable of destroying a target within a 50m radius.
The dual mode missile seeker has a passive infrared seeker for the acquisition and tracking of tactical ballistic missiles and an active radar seeker used to home on air breathing targets at low altitudes. The infrared seeker is an indium antimonide focal plane array developed by Raytheon (formerly Amber Engineering).
The intercept altitudes are from a minimum of 10km up to a maximum of 50km. The maximum intercept range is approximately 90km.