Nike-Hercules missile

MIM-14 Nike-Hercules
Nike-Hercules missile
Type	Surface-to-air missile
Production history
Manufacturer	Western Electric, Bell Laboratories, Douglas Aircraft Company
Specifications
Weight	10,710 pounds (4,860 kg)
Length	41 feet (12 m) overall 26 feet 10 inches (8.18 m) second stage
Diameter	booster 31.5 inches (800 mm) second stage 21 inches (530 mm)
Warhead	initially W7 (2.5 or 28 kt) later W31 nuclear 2 kt (M-97) or 20 kt (M-22) or T-45 HE warhead weighing 1,106 pounds (502 kg) and containing 600 pounds (270 kg) of HBX-6 M17 blast-fragmentation
Engine	Booster: Hercules M42 solid-fueled rocket cluster (4x M5E1 Nike boosters) 978 kN (220000 lb) Sustainer: Thiokol M30 solid-fueled rocket 44.4 kN (10000 lb)
Wingspan	11 feet 6 inches (3.51 m) booster 6 feet 2 inches (1.88 m) second stage
Operational range	90 miles (140 km)
Flight ceiling	150,000 feet (46,000 m)
Speed	>Mach 3.65 (ca. 2750 mph or 4,470 km/h)
Guidance system	command guidance

The Nike Hercules (initially designated SAM-A-25, and later MIM-14) was a surface-to-air missile (SAM) used by U.S. and NATO armed forces for medium- and high-altitude long-range air defense. It was normally armed with the W31 nuclear warhead, but could also be fitted with a conventional warhead for export use. Its warhead also allowed it to be used in a secondary surface-to-surface role, and the system also demonstrated its ability to hit other short-range missiles in flight.

Hercules was developed as the successor to the earlier MIM-3 Nike Ajax, adding the ability to attack high-flying supersonic targets and carrying a small nuclear warhead in order to attack entire formations of aircraft with a single missile. It evolved into a much larger missile with two solid fuel stages that provided three times the range of the Ajax. Deployment began in 1958, initially at new bases, but it eventually took over many Ajax bases as well. At its peak it was deployed at over 130 bases in the US alone.

Hercules' was officially referred to as "transportable", but moving a battery was a significant operation and required considerable construction at the firing sites. Over its lifetime, significant effort was put into development of solid state replacements for the vacuum tube-based electronics inherited from the early-1950s Ajax, and a variety of mobile options. None of these were adopted, in favour of much more mobile systems like the MIM-23 Hawk. Another potential development was an upgraded version of the Hercules for the anti-ballistic missile role, but this later emerged as the rather different LIM-49 Nike Zeus design. Hercules would prove to be the last operational missile from Bell's Nike team; Zeus was never deployed, and Hercules follow-on were developed by different teams.

Hercules remained the US' primary heavy SAM until it began to be replaced by the higher performance and considerably more mobile MIM-104 Patriot in the 1980s. Patriot's much higher accuracy allowed it to dispense with the nuclear warhead, and Hercules was the last US SAM to use this option. The last Hercules missiles were deactivated in Europe in 1988, without ever being fired in anger.