Sea skimming is a technique many anti-ship missiles use to avoid radar and infrared detection during their approach.

Contents 1 Method 2 Advantages 3 Disadvantages 4 Use in major wars 5 References

[edit] Method

Sea skimming anti-ship missiles try to fly as low as is practically achievable, which is almost always below 50 meters (150 ft), and is often down towards 5 meters (15 ft).^[1]

[edit] Advantages

By flying low to the sea, the missile decreases the range at which the target ship detects the missile by some amount, often a large amount. Flying at a lower altitude means the missile is under the horizon for a longer time from the perspective of the target ship, and makes it harder to detect the missile because of Radar Clutter and similar effects. The real-life success of sea skimming depends on the exact implementation of the sea skimming, the sophistication of the detection equipment, as well as the infrared and radar signature of the missile. Sea skimming shaves seconds or even minutes off of the response time available to try to shoot down the missile. This means the response time of the ship's missile defenses might not be sufficient to shoot down the missile before it is too late, making a sea skimming missile significantly harder to defend against. Sea skimming can also increase the range of a missile, by relying on ground effects.

[edit] Disadvantages

Using sea skimming means there is the increased risk of the missile impacting with the water before reaching the target, due to weather conditions, rogue waves, software bugs and various other factors. Sea skimming also hinders target acquisition, as many of the principles that hinder the target's detection of the missile also hinder the missile's detection of the target. Furthermore, sea skimming involves a significant amount of computations, which means the missile must have corresponding processing power, which adds cost.

[edit] Use in major wars

French-made Exocet missiles were used by Argentina in the Falklands War (including the sinking of HMS Sheffield) and by Iraq (accidentally) against the USS Stark in the Persian Gulf during the Iran-Iraq War. The Argentinian pilots of the Super Étendard planes that attacked the HMS Sheffield were also skimming the sea at very low level. They increased their altitude only for a very short period to get final target information for the attack with their Agave radars.

British Sea Skua missiles were fired by Royal Navy Lynx helicopters during both the Falklands War and the Gulf War.

[edit] References

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