U.S. ROCKET TEST

Press, Volume C, Issue 29634, 3 October 1961, Page 7

U.S. ROCKET TEST

Titan Lands On Target

(NXJ>.A.-Reiaer—ComrtoM) CAPE CANAVERAL, October 2. A United State* Air Force Titan rocket which carried a dummy warhead 5300 miles across the Atlantic Ocean soon would enter the American arsenal of nuclear weapons, United Press International said The 98-foot, bullet-shaped rocket carried hundreds of pounds of test equipment and radios in its slender nose cone. The missile sent its nose—the section that would carry a nuclear warhead in time of war—squarely into its planned target area, U.P.I. said.

The Titan, capable of hurling a five-megaton nuclear warhead one-third of the way around the world, is scheduled to be classified as a “war-ready” weapon within a few weeks, according to U.P.I. It passed another key test last Saturday in a launching at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.

In California, at Edwards Air Force Base, an X-15 1 rocket aeroplane flew at 3545 miles an hour last week in a test of its ability to manoeuvre at high acceleration and to withstand temperatures of lOOOdeg. It was not a record speed. The fastest an X-15 her frown was 3645 miles an hour on September 12. The aeroplane is designed to withstand temperatures of up to 1200 deg when it performs its planned mission of reaching a speed of 4000 miles an hour at the fringe of the earth's atmosphere.