RIM-8 Talos Mark 7 Twin Rail Launcher System (Buffalo, New York)

 military, place with historical importance, missile, weapons, United States Navy

Displayed aboard the USS Little Rock (CLG-4) is the last remaining example of a RIM-8 Talos Mark 7 Twin Rail Launcher System in the world. Taking the place of the Little Rock’s aft 6-Inch/47-Caliber Mark 16 Triple Gun Turrets, the Mark 7 Twin Rail Launcher System was installed during the Little Rock’s 1957-1959 conversion from a traditional Gun Cruiser to a Galveston Class Guided Missile Cruiser.

The Mark 7 Twin Rail Launcher was designed to fire the RIM-8 Talos Missile, a large long-range surface-to-air missile. Designed in the late 1940’s to offer protection against airborne aircraft and guided missile threats, the Talos was a 7,800lb, 38ft long ramjet-powered missile which utilized ship-based radar beam riding guidance to the vicinity of its target and then engaged its own onboard SemiActive Radar Homing (SARH) system for terminal guidance. Able to carry a either a 300lb conventional High Explosive or W30 Nuclear warhead up to 50 nautical miles at speeds up to Mach 2.5 and ceilings of 80,000ft, the Talos was often propelled from the deck of its launch vessel by a MK 11 solid-fueled rocket booster which added a further 4,000lbs and added a further 11ft to the total length of the weapon.

As with all Galveston Class Guided Missile Cruisers, the Little Rock and her two sisterships USS Galveston (CLG-3) & USS Oklahoma City (CLG-5) had their Mark 7 Twin Rail Launchers fed by a complex three-section missile house which consisted of a Missile Storage Magazine, Ready Service Magazine and a Wing and Fin Assembly Area. Unmated Talos Missiles and MK 11 Boosters were kept in the foremost Missile Storage Magazine, stored in Port and Starboard Racks which allowed storage for 15 missiles and 15 boosters on each side. Aft of this section through pneumatic blast doors was the Ready Service Magazine where the missile, warhead and booster would be mated together and placed into a rotating tray system. With capacity for 16 assembled missiles, the rotating tray system would feed one missile at a time onto an overhead rail system which would move the missile into the Wing and Fin Assembly Area through another set of pneumatic blast doors. Here, crewmen would attach each of the 12 fins required for each Talos and Booster, arm it’s fuse and activate its guidance systems before signaling the ship’s Weapons Control Officer that the missile was ready to be loaded.

Outside of the missile house, the Mark 7 Twin Rail Launcher would slew itself into position and level its arms with the deck in position to receive the completed missile. Once the launcher was in place a two-leaf armored blast door would open; the top leaf connecting the missile house rail with the rail on the launcher arm and allowing the 11,800lb, 49ft missile to slide into place at the impressive pace of 12ft per second. Once the blast doors on the missile house were sealed, the Mark 7 Launcher would slew into firing position and utilizing guidance information provided by the ships AN/SPW-2 guidance and AN/SPG-49 illumination and tracking radar systems, the missile would roar off the deck towards its target. Well trained Talos crews could fire a two-missile salvo every 46 seconds, which meant that in a theoretical saturation attack the ship would deplete its missile load in less than 20 minutes.

In addition to being carried aboard the ships of the Galveston Class, the RIM-8 Talos Missile System was also carried aboard the Albany Class of Guided Missile Cruisers and the USS Long Beach (CGN-9), although these ships utilized different missile assembly systems and carried up to three launcher systems. Though Little Rock herself never fired one of her Talos Missiles in anger, Talos fired by USS Long Beach and USS Chicago (CG-11) are credited with downing three MiGs during the Vietnam War, and a single anti-radar Talos fired by the USS Oklahoma City holds its place in history as the first successful combat surface-to-surface missile shot in US Navy history when it destroyed a North Vietnamese radar van in 1971.

By the end of the 1970’s the Talos Missile was rapidly growing technologically obsolete and increasingly manpower intensive when compared to smaller and more modern missile systems which could be mounted on smaller ships with smaller crews. Formally withdrawn from active US Navy service with the decommissioning of the USS Oklahoma City in December 1979, the Talos system nevertheless remained in use through 2005 as the MQM-8G Vandal, a supersonic drone missile used in pilot training and anti-missile exercises.

Detailed description of the Talos MK7 System:
www.okieboat.com/Talos%20launching%20system.html

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgFIhomusc8