Mark 36 Super Rapid Bloom Offboard Chaff (SRBOC)

During the USS New Jersey's modernization in the 1980s, she and all Iowa-class battleships were outfitted with the Mark 36 Super Rapid Bloom Offboard Chaff, or SRBOC, a deck-mounted mortar-tube countermeasure system that worked with the AN/SLQ-32 Electronic Warfare system and the Phalanx Close-In Weapons System. Dependent on the ship's detection and threat analysis equipment, SRBOC would be activated after the AN/SLQ-32 failed to deter the enemy, and the Phalanx system would then be available to begin firing as it detected objects coming toward the ship. Both systems could be controlled from either the Combat Engagement Center or the Navigation Bridge, but before entering a combat zone the crew manually removed watertight caps protecting the equipment so SRBOC could operate. Each system had six 130-mm tubes arranged in parallel rows at 45 and 60 degree angles, allowing canisters or decoys to be launched at different heights and ranges, with nearby deck lockers holding additional canisters for quick reloading. An electromagnetic charge generated the firing circuits and initiated the propelling charges in the cartridges, sending a canister with hundreds to thousands of small metallic strips and debris called chaff about 700 feet into the air before it exploded into a cloud that created a false target to confuse or distract incoming enemy missiles.

Camden, New Jersey · United States