Oops! My AIM-120C just went for the wrong target

[sirrah]

I just accidentally did a teamkill on one of the 4YA server  (luckily it's a training server, which is where I belong currently in the Viper)

My question in short:

Is it possible that when you launch an AMRAAM at an STT locked aircraft, that the missile can still "go" for another nearby target?

 

Situation:

I saw a player being chased by an enemy fighter, so I decided to help (turned out differently )

We headed straight towards each other at high speed. The player somewhat higher than me, the enemy aircraft chasing him a bit lower than me. So all three of us, exactly aligned, only different altitudes. No other aircraft around.

I triple checked the FRC returns on my mfd and locked up the enemy (the target furthest away from me) in STT mode. Once in range I fired one AIM-120C and apparently it went for the player instead of the enemy. All the time I kept the STT lock (I did not undesignate). Due to thick clouds, I wasn't able to visually see if my missile went for my locked aircraft. It was only when I saw the "teamkill" text popup when I knew I screwed up.. 

So, is it at all possible for an AMRAAM to "ignore" an STT lock, and go for a nearby other aircraft? Or must I somehow have messed up when locking the target (I really triple checked to avoid exactly this).

 

(Unfortunately I don't have a track file, as I disable that some time ago to avoid my disk space being chewed up)

[Aquorys]

I guess the best answer would be "it depends...", but generally speaking, an AMRAAM does not care about your aircraft's lock. AMRAAMs are guided via datalink and their own onboard active radar homing equipment in the terminal phase. The guidance equipment uses the most recent information about the target's position and movement to find the target, meaning that if a target's position and motion are plausible, based on the most recent information received on the datalink and the time elapsed since then, it will lock onto that target. How this works in detail, e.g. the exact distance/speed/direction tolerance based on a certain scenario, is classified information, therefore, there is virtually nothing you can do to figure out whether the behavior of the missile was realistic in DCS (outside of signing up for a job at Raytheon ).

[sirrah]

1 hour ago, Aquorys said:

I guess the best answer would be "it depends...", but generally speaking, an AMRAAM does not care about your aircraft's lock. AMRAAMs are guided via datalink and their own onboard active radar homing equipment in the terminal phase. The guidance equipment uses the most recent information about the target's position and movement to find the target, meaning that if a target's position and motion are plausible, based on the most recent information received on the datalink and the time elapsed since then, it will lock onto that target. How this works in detail, e.g. the exact distance/speed/direction tolerance based on a certain scenario, is classified information, therefore, there is virtually nothing you can do to figure out whether the behavior of the missile was realistic in DCS (outside of signing up for a job at Raytheon ).

Ok, so that means it is actually quite possible/plausible that I had indeed locked the correct aircraft and that (after launch) the AMRAAM's internal radar locked on to the nearby friendly?

 

I assume a NASAMS air defense would suffer from the same risk then. (The same 4YA server I was on, also had a NASAMS on one of our airfields, which was spamming AMRAAMS towards enemies, whilst there were many friendlies around. Didn't see any blue on blue accidents happen there though)

[Hobel]

vor 1 Stunde schrieb sirrah:

Ok, so that means it is actually quite possible/plausible that I had indeed locked the correct aircraft and that (after launch) the AMRAAM's internal radar locked on to the nearby friendly?

Yes.

In visual range, our rule of thumb is that if a friend is within the HUD frame, the risk is too high.

 

 

[skywalker22]

13 hours ago, sirrah said:

I just accidentally did a teamkill on one of the 4YA server  (luckily it's a training server, which is where I belong currently in the Viper)

My question in short:

Is it possible that when you launch an AMRAAM at an STT locked aircraft, that the missile can still "go" for another nearby target?

 

Situation:

I saw a player being chased by an enemy fighter, so I decided to help (turned out differently )

We headed straight towards each other at high speed. The player somewhat higher than me, the enemy aircraft chasing him a bit lower than me. So all three of us, exactly aligned, only different altitudes. No other aircraft around.

I triple checked the FRC returns on my mfd and locked up the enemy (the target furthest away from me) in STT mode. Once in range I fired one AIM-120C and apparently it went for the player instead of the enemy. All the time I kept the STT lock (I did not undesignate). Due to thick clouds, I wasn't able to visually see if my missile went for my locked aircraft. It was only when I saw the "teamkill" text popup when I knew I screwed up.. 

So, is it at all possible for an AMRAAM to "ignore" an STT lock, and go for a nearby other aircraft? Or must I somehow have messed up when locking the target (I really triple checked to avoid exactly this).

 

(Unfortunately I don't have a track file, as I disable that some time ago to avoid my disk space being chewed up)

Would be very helpful if you would provide us with a track. Or even batter with a Tacview file. There you/we can find lots of answers.

For now all I can say from my experiences, and I shot thousdands of AMRAAMs in DCS from multiple platforms, something like that has never happened to me. So it is a bit strange, and only the track, even batter tacview, would help explaining it.

 

[Hobel]

vor 3 Stunden schrieb skywalker22:

For now all I can say from my experiences, and I shot thousdands of AMRAAMs in DCS from multiple platforms, something like that has never happened to me. So it is a bit strange, and only the track, even batter tacview, would help explaining it.

interesting, go to a server with Fox3 and then try to get into a dogfight with someone, it won't take long and a friend will fire in there, the change is almost 50/50 that the missle will hit you

[sirrah]

3 hours ago, skywalker22 said:

Would be very helpful if you would provide us with a track. Or even batter with a Tacview file. There you/we can find lots of answers.

For now all I can say from my experiences, and I shot thousdands of AMRAAMs in DCS from multiple platforms, something like that has never happened to me. So it is a bit strange, and only the track, even batter tacview, would help explaining it.

 

As I explained in my OP; I have MP automatic track saving disabled. Also, I don't have Tacview.

I know, not ideal, but the main question I asked, does not need a track file: "can an aim-120 ignore the target locked in the cockpit and after launch on its own establish a lock on a different target"

 

As I read the replies from other people here, the answer seems to be: "yes, it is possible"

Edited June 21, 2024 by sirrah

[Nealius]

This is why slinging a Fox 3 into a furball with friendlies is advised against as standard SOP. Once the AMRAAM's seeker goes active, it locks onto the first thing it sees within the area your FCR datalink told it to go to. 

[skywalker22]

  

30 minutes ago, Hobel said:

interesting, go to a server with Fox3 and then try to get into a dogfight with someone, it won't take long and a friend will fire in there, the change is almost 50/50 that the missle will hit you

Not true. I guess you are not much on very crouded Growling Sidewinder server. I have spent lots of time there in last 3 years, I can say Im there at least 3 days/week, for at least 1h each time, but so far I cannot accuse anyone for a friendly fire. And the same goes for me.

So your statement is far from being true.

But this is not the OP's point, he is says that he locked and fired amraam on bandit, but the missile then changed its course to someother target, which by his words, was a friendly.

@sirrah it's a shame you don't save replays, don't hurt you know, specially in cases lik that. I have them turned on, and delete them manually ones in a while anyway. Without that we are helpless.

[skywalker22]

1 hour ago, sirrah said:

but the main question I asked, does not need a track file: "can an aim-120 ignore the target locked in the cockpit and after launch on its own establish a lock on a different target"

 

I would say no, as said, I've shot hundreds of them, and never noticed that it would switch the target.

Edited June 21, 2024 by skywalker22

[QuiGon]

46 minutes ago, sirrah said:

As I read the replies from other people here, the answer seems to be: "yes, it is possible"

It is indeed possible as the missile will just use it's own seeker to track the target once the missile goes active and it has no way to discriminate between friend and foe.

 

48 minutes ago, Hobel said:

interesting, go to a server with Fox3 and then try to get into a dogfight with someone, it won't take long and a friend will fire in there, the change is almost 50/50 that the missle will hit you

Yeah, I've seen that happening way too often and it even happened to me as well, so if you see a friendly close to your target you better be careful when launching a Fox3...

[Hobel]

vor 1 Stunde schrieb skywalker22:

I would say no, as said, I've shot hundreds of them, and never noticed that it would switch the target.

same here it happens and is also in the nature of the thing.
Over time, the DCS Aim120 has been improved so that it is more likely to search for the actual target parameters, but as I said, this is not always a guarantee.

 

this is an old video, Aim120 loses the actual target in the notch and switches to the next one that is "visible"

Edited June 21, 2024 by Hobel

[skywalker22]

  

3 hours ago, QuiGon said:

It is indeed possible as the missile will just use it's own seeker to track the target once the missile goes active and it has no way to discriminate between friend and foe.

 

Yeah, I've seen that happening way too often and it even happened to me as well, so if you see a friendly close to your target you better be careful when launching a Fox3...

As far as I know, and as far as we have discussed here on this forum, the AIM-120C-5 made by ED can only follow one target. If it looses lock, it goes stupid. In contrast to it's real counterpart, which after loosing lock, tries to find any possible target, friend or foe, it doesn't matter, since missile has no clue what type of aircraft has reacquired.

One more worth mentioning, if there are two or more contacts close to each other, in the heat of the moment,  it's very easy to pick the wrong one, and if you are not double or even tripple checking which one you locked, you will not even notice you chose the wrong one - I know I cought my self at it lots of time. 

Anyway, using Tacview always helps in situations like this.  @Hobel that video is a bit unclear, would be good to have a full tacvirew file, so see from all the angles what was really going on there, but it indeed kind of show that the missile lost lock to one aircraft, and picked another one. But hard to confirm from only this angle.

[QuiGon]

7 minutes ago, skywalker22 said:

As far as I know, and as far as we have discussed here on this forum, the AIM-120C-5 made by ED can only follow one target. If it looses lock, it goes stupid. In contrast to it's real counterpart, which after loosing lock, tries to find any possible target, friend or foe, it doesn't matter, since missile has no clue what type of aircraft has reacquired.

That is true if the missile has lost it's target, but picking the wrong target happens at the moment when the missile goes pitbull iirc. Two different situations.

  

7 minutes ago, skywalker22 said:

One more worth mentioning, if there are two or more contacts close to each other, in the heat of the moment,  it's very easy to pick the wrong one, and if you are not double or even tripple checking which one you locked, you will not even notice you chose the wrong one - I know I cought my self at it lots of time.

That is also true, but I have seen this happening in situations where the locked-on target was definitely the correct one.

[Hyperlynx]

On 6/21/2024 at 8:36 AM, sirrah said:

As I explained in my OP; I have MP automatic track saving disabled. Also, I don't have Tacview.

It's worth getting, especially since there's a free version. The recordings it makes are waaaaaaay smaller than track files