Starstreak is a British short range surface-to-air missile, also known as Starstreak HVM where HVM stands for High Velocity Missile. Starstreak has been in service with the British Army since 1997, and is noted for splitting up into 3 submunition rounds prior to impacting with a target aircraft.
Starstreak is manufactured by Thales Air Defence Ltd, in Belfast.
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2 Notes 3 Inventory 4 Variants 5 Combat Performance 6 Characteristics 7 See also 8 External link |
The Stormer variant of Starstreak has been in service with the British army since 1997.
The LML and should-launched versions in use since 2000.
In July 2001, Thales received a contract for a Successor Identification Friend or Foe system for Starstreak.
Starstreak is visually guided to the target by an operator. The aiming unit illuminates the target with a radar beam, and sensors in the missile detect this beam and manoeuvre towards it.
The Starstreak missile breaks up into 3 submunitions, called darts, prior to hitting the target. Using submunitions is intended to increase the hit probability. When a dart hits the target, there is a delay before it explodes; it is intended that the dart will embed itself some way into the target, increasing the lethality of the explosion.
In use with the:
Starstreak can be:
As far as I know, Starstreak has not seen combat use.
If it was used in combat, it may have a number of advantages over some other missiles. Because it uses passive sensors (infra-red and human visual), it cannot be suppressed with anti-radar missiles. Its fast speed makes it more likely to be able to intercept an aircraft, and the use of 3 submunitions makes it is more likely that a munition will hit the target. Because it uses human visual tracking, anti-IR flares would be useless against it, though having said that anti-IR flares are less useful against modern imaging IR missiles.
Similar missiles include: Strela, Igla, Stinger, Blowpipe, Javelin, MistralHistory
Notes
Inventory
Variants
Combat Performance
Characteristics
See also
