THAAD System Shoots Down Target Over Alaska In First-of-its Kind Test

The U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA), the Ballistic Missile Defense System Operational Test Agency, and U.S. Army soldiers of the 11th Air Defense Artillery Brigade from Fort Bliss, Texas, conducted an intercept test on July 11, 2017, of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) element of the nation’s ballistic missile defense system. A ballistic missile target was air-launched by a U.S. Air Force C-17 over the Pacific Ocean north of Hawaii. A THAAD weapon system located at PSCA in Kodiak, Alaska,