HAWK Battery Stevns Fort
Danish Air Defence Group
Squadron 541
Some Hawk history
1952 Development of the HAWK missile system began.
United States Army began studies into a medium
range semi-active radar
homing
surface to air missile.
1954
Northrop was awarded the development contracts
for the launcher, radars and fire control systems, while
Raytheon was awarded
the
contract for the missile.
1956 The first test launch of the missile then designated the
XSAM-A-18 took place.
1957 Development was completed, by which time the designation had
changed to XM3 and XM3E1.
1959 The missile was deployed by the U.S. Army.
1960 Deployed by the
US Marine Corps.
To replace the old NIKE AJAX
and NIKE HERCULES, Denmark was offerered 4 HAWK missile batteries:
They were deployed around Copenhagen, to protect the capitol against air
raids.
In 1983 Squadron 541 was moved from the Middelgrunds Fort to the Stevns
Fort.
The Stevns Fort role was changing gradually from an artillery Fort to a SAM missile
base.
From 1989 to 2000 Squad. 541 was training Squadron for the entire Air
Defence Group. 2800
was trained
at Stevns in that perod.
In 2000 the Squadron was moved from Stevns.
The misiles and the equipment below, is part of the Cold War Museum on The
Stevns Fort.
The Radar Components
Hawk battery
Stevns Fort
HPIR
ROR
CWAR
PAR
BCC
BCC interior
6 launch areas (3 Alpha and 3 Bravo) where the missile were mounted i 3 on
the launcher.
In the area there were the
missiles, the launchers and a command center.
Besides that there were loaders and transporters for the missiles
Battery Control Central
BCC
Command room in BCC
PAR and HPIR Bravo
View of the launcher area
The Radars:
PAR:
Pulse Acquisition Radar.
Normal pulse radar.
ROR
Range only radar.
Passive radar. No active signals.
CWAR
Continious Wave Acquisition Radar.
Doppler radar against low targets.
HPIR
High Powered
Illuminator Radar
Combined Doppler
target and missile radar.
Later the Danish Airforce got some improved radars. They
were called IPAR, IROR, ICWAR and IHPIR. The "I"stands for for
improved.
BCC
The BCC (Battery Control Central). From here everything is
controlled. The crew is composed af an TCO (Tactical Control
Officer) who control the
launchers by orders from the ROC (missile Operation Central) and on the impression from the
Acuisitionscope and the
plotter board.
The TCO is assisted by the TCA (Tactical Control Assistent) who, among
other things, is responsible for the plotter board.
Furthermore there are a CWAR operator and two FCO (Fire Control
Operator).They are responsible for the fire console for
Fire Section Alpha and Fire Section Bravo.
The Missiles and the Launch Area
Hawk is an acronym for Homing
All the Way Killer. The guidence system is called Beam Rider.That means that the misile, by
a little radar in the nose, follows a radar beam from the ground to the target. This beam is sent out by the HPIR unit.
The misiles was mounted on a launcher. Three on every launcher.
To load the launchers the were a number of transporters and loaders
The Launch area was composed by Fire section Alpha and Fire Section
Bravo. Each section could be operated separately.
(Please see the map on the top
of the page)
Every launcher was separated
by ramparts to prevent explosions or
blasts to spread trom launcher to launcher
