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The U.S. Missile Defense Agency, working in concert with Lockheed Martin, successfully conducted a test of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) Weapon System in Hawaii last night. The intercept was the fifth successful test for THAAD system in five attempts.

KGMB9 News noted that this was first time the military needed to identify a mock warhead that separated from booster rockets. “Six minutes later,” the station reported, “an interceptor was launched from the Pacific Missile Range. It hit the mock warhead destroying it.” See the video at right.

The Honolulu Advertiser and Honolulu Star-Bulletin have more details on the successful test, which marked the 29th of 30 successful tests conducted since September 2005.

The U.S. Missile Defense Agency and Lockheed Martin both praised the operation.

“Preliminary indications are that planned flight test objectives were achieved,” the agency reported in a release from Lt. Gen. Henry “Trey” Obering. “This test involved the intercept of a separating target (mock warhead separated from the booster rockets) in the ‘midendoatmosphere’ (inside the earth’s atmosphere). The target, representing a threat ballistic missile, was launched from a U.S. Air Force C-17 aircraft flying over the Pacific Ocean at 4:16 p.m. Hawaiian Standard Time (10:16 p.m. EDT). Approximately six minutes later the interceptor missile was launched from a mobile THAAD launcher on the range facility.”

One additional THAAD test is scheduled at the Pacific Missile Range Facility on Kauai, Hawaii, by the end of the year.

“This successful mission once again proves THAAD’s outstanding performance, this time against a new target type. The THAAD Team has again met the challenge and delivered mission success,” said Tom McGrath, program manager and vice president for THAAD at Lockheed Martin. “As we meet our increasing flight test objectives, the protection THAAD will provide to our Warfighters, friends and allies around the world becomes more significant.”

Photos and video of the test are available on the Missile Defense Agency website.

In its 14th successful test since 2002, the U.S. Navy shot down a ballistic missile in the Pacific Ocean about 250 miles northwest of Kauai late Thursday.

The USS Lake Erie successfully intercepted a SCUD-type missile (like those used by Iraq against Israel in the 1991 Gulf War) that was fired from a decommissioned warship. It was Lake Erie’s 10th successful missile defense test out of 12 opportunities.

Read more about the growing success of our missile defense system, as well as why the system is so vital to our national security, on Heritage’s missile defense research page.

Update: Read more about this success at NationalSecurity.org.

Cross-posted on The Foundry.