GAR-1 Falcon

Falcon was the first air-to-air guided missile in the Air Force and the first in the world to enter operational service. In 1947 the newly created US Air Force held a competition for a combination fire control system and guided missile for installation on future interceptors, and Hughes Aircraft won the competition for both the fire control system and the guided missile, to be launched from bombers for self-defense. This guided missile eventually became known as the Guided Aircraft Rocket, or GAR-1 Falcon. The GAR-1 was a semi-active radar homing short-range intercept missile with a range of 5 miles. Launched miles from its target, Falcon was guided automatically by radar located in the nose, with receiver aerials like small fins flanking the nose. It had a Thiokol solid-fuel rocket motor and a high-explosive warhead, but no proximity fuze, so it had to hit its target to explode. Later versions of GAR-1 added an elevon, or additional fin, at the base of each fin for maneuverability. GAR-1 became operational with F-89H/J and F-102A interceptors in 1956, and about 4000 were produced. Falcon was retired from U.S. Air Force service in the late 1980s. At White Sands Proving Ground, the first Falcon was tested in 1952 (?) 1954. Firing records show that 795 were launched between 1955 and 1961, followed by tests of later versions of Falcon. Its range was about 5 miles, its speed about Mach 2, its length 6 feet, its diameter 6 inches, its weight 126 pounds, its propellant solid, and its first firing was in 1952.

White Sands, New Mexico · United States