This Photo Proves How The Hellfire Missile That Uses Blades Instead Of Explosives Works

Published Dec 3, 2019 9:55 PM EST

After the most recent known use of the AGM-114R9X Hellfire missile, a weapon that uses blades instead of explosives to kill its target with minimal collateral damage, literally smashing and slicing through them, evidence of exactly how the bizarre weapon works has come to light. Imagery from the scene of the attack, located less than 10 miles from where Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed in Syria, shows what appears to be the core of the weapon and its deadly appendages. It appears to be a gruesome, but stunningly effective device.

The image, seen at the top of this story, shows a thick central hub structure that would act as a penetrator with six swing-out skeletonized blades. Basically, anything in the radius of the blades would die.

The standard AGM-114 flies at roughly 1,000 miles per hour. It isn’t clear if this version of the weapon hits those speeds, but there is no indication otherwise. It’s unclear when exactly the blades deploy during use, but it is likely that they extend out from the missile via fairings that pop-off shortly before its flight ends or swing-out through slots in the missile’s body. A fuze system or direct inertia system could deploy them once the missile makes contact with a surface, as well.

The Hellfire is just over five feet long, with its warhead section taking up the central area of the missile’s tube-like body. You can see how this payload would slot into where the explosive warhead would otherwise go in the image below:

AGM-114 internal configuration. , Stahlkocher/Wikicommons

The payload area is roughly a foot and a half long and let’s say the swords are roughly the same length, this would provide about a three and a half foot diameter kill zone, which is similar to what we see in the images of the vehicles that have been struck. It is the ultimate precision air-to-ground weapon—surgical both in metaphor and application.

It would be highly interesting to see how this almost comic-book-like adaptation of the AGM-114 came to be. We definitely know there are places where these types of payloads are tested and the need for such a weapon obvious, but how such melding of old and new weaponry came to be would be fascinating to understand. In fact, I am just as interested in all the pitches that didn’t get selected considering how wild the one that did is.

The image at least verifies how many of us thought this system would work and fits with the few non-attributed descriptions of its general concept of operations.

Special thanks to Bellingcat’s Nick Waters who alerted us to this image after Twitter user @obretix came across it.

Contact the author: Tyler@thedrive.com

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发布于2019年12月3日晚上9:55（美国东部时间）。

在最近一次已知的AGM-114R9X“地狱火”导弹使用后，这种武器的运作原理也浮出水面。该武器使用刀片而非炸药来杀伤目标，以最大限度减少附带损伤，其运作方式如同利刃般撕裂和切割目标。袭击现场的图像显示，在距离叙利亚阿布·贝克尔·巴格达迪被击毙地点不到10英里的地方，似乎可以看到该武器的核心部件及其致命的附属部件。这看起来是一种极其残忍但又极其有效的装置。

本文顶部的图片展示了一个粗壮的中央枢纽结构，它像一个穿甲弹一样，带有六个可摆动的骨架状刀片。基本上，任何位于刀片作用范围内的物体都会被摧毁。

标准型AGM-114导弹的飞行速度约为每小时1000英里。目前尚不清楚这种改进型导弹是否能达到如此高的速度，但也没有迹象表明它达不到。目前还不清楚导弹在飞行过程中何时展开旋翼，但旋翼很可能是通过整流罩从导弹伸出，整流罩会在导弹飞行即将结束时弹出，或者旋翼会从导弹弹体上的缝隙中摆动出来。此外，导弹与目标表面接触后，引信系统或惯性系统也可以启动旋翼展开。

“地狱火”导弹长度略超过五英尺，其弹头部分占据了导弹管状弹体的中央区域。您可以在下图看到该有效载荷如何装入原本放置爆炸性弹头的位置：

AGM-114内部配置。 ，斯塔尔科赫/维基共享资源

有效载荷区域大约一英尺半长，假设剑刃长度也大致相同，那么这将形成一个直径约三英尺半的杀伤区，这与我们在被击中车辆的图像中看到的类似。它是终极的精确空对地武器——无论从比喻意义还是实际应用来看，都堪称外科手术般精准。

我很想知道这种近乎漫画风格的AGM-114导弹是如何诞生的。我们当然知道有些地方会测试这类有效载荷，对这种武器的需求也显而易见，但这种新旧武器融合的产物究竟是如何形成的，着实令人着迷。事实上，考虑到最终入选的方案如此天马行空，我对所有落选的方案也同样感兴趣。

这张图至少证实了我们当中有多少人认为这个系统会奏效，并且与少数未注明出处的关于其一般运行概念的描述相吻合。

特别感谢 Bellingcat 的 Nick Waters，他在 Twitter 用户 @obretix 发现这张图片后提醒了我们。

联系作者：Tyler@thedrive.com

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