‘Star Wars’ Laser Progress Delayed by Fire at Test Site

A flash fire at a TRW Inc. test site in southern Orange County will indefinitely delay the final testing of the missile-killing Alpha laser, a key component of President Reagan’s “Star Wars” defense initiative, the Pentagon disclosed Thursday.

The fire broke out Jan. 7 at the sprawling, 2,700-acre TRW plant between San Juan Capistrano and San Clemente when a worker opened a valve at the wrong time, officials said.

The error caused a brief but intense fire in piping at the test facility, contaminating the main vacuum chamber that is used to simulate conditions in space where the laser would be fired. No one was injured in the fire, and the extent of damage is not yet known.

But with the vacuum chamber contaminated by smoke and debris, officials said it was impossible to go on to the final experiment in which the laser beam itself would be produced and tested in spacelike conditions.

That phase of the Alpha laser project had been scheduled for sometime during the first half of this year, but has now been indefinitely postponed.

‘This Is a Complex System’

“It’s now been three weeks, and we still don’t really know the extent of the damage,” said Maj. Michael Fick, a spokesman for the Air Force Weapons Laboratory at Kirtland Air Force Base near Albuquerque, N.M. “This is a complex system and we just don’t know how long things will be delayed. It takes time to assess what happened.”

Fick said Air Force officials assigned to the Alpha project were at TRW’s Capistrano test site Thursday inspecting the damage.

TRW Inc., a Redondo Beach-based aerospace research firm, is under contract from the Air Force to develop a powerful, yet compact, chemical laser that could destroy enemy missiles and satellites.

The $200-million Alpha laser, as it is known, is one of the primary projects of the Pentagon’s Strategic Defense Initiative, which envisions using a space-based laser system to defend against nuclear missile attack.

The Alpha laser is designed to be mounted on a platform in space, from where it would fire a high-energy laser beam toward a mirror that would direct it at incoming Soviet missiles.

If the technology proves feasible--and if Star Wars development is not derailed by political opposition--the laser will be launched into space in the early 1990s, Air Force experts said.

But the test faces many scientific and technical hurdles, including mastering the ability to direct a beam the diameter of a baseball onto a moving target miles away and holding it there for the time it takes to destroy the target.

It was during preparations for one of the Alpha laser tests that the accident occurred, Fick said.

“They were preparing for a test when the wrong valve was opened, causing flourine to be released into a line that resulted in damage,” he said. “What resulted was a brief, self-contained fire which damaged several valves, associated piping and control cables. There was no damage to the Alpha laser itself.”

The laser device is being constructed in the same building where the fire broke out, but the blaze was contained quickly enough so that the laser was never threatened, officials said.

At the time of the accident, Fick said, TRW was on the verge of conducting experiments to determine if the system would form a free flouride atom necessary to create a lasing medium.

“The medium is the area where the actual lasing takes place,” Fick explained.

Edie Cartwright, a TRW spokeswoman, said the fire was put out by a specially trained team of company firefighters permanently based at the facility.

“The crew is there as much to protect the facility from grass fires as from anything else,” Cartwright said. “This little accident was totally self-contained and was really no problem. There never were any personnel in danger.”

Cartwright said the Orange County Fire Department would be called in case a fire broke out “that we were not able to control.” She said the Fire Department had a complete list of flammable chemicals stored at the Capistrano test site, which is situated in an unincorporated county area just east of the northern end of San Clemente, near the San Diego County line and Camp Pendleton.

Last October, the Pentagon awarded a $10.8-million contract to Martin Marietta Corp. for a study on the feasibility of testing the Alpha laser in space and for suggestions on ways to conduct such experiments without violating the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

A month later, the Administration unveiled plans for Zenith Star, a 50-ton carrier for the Alpha laser.

While the study was under way, TRW began a four-phase testing schedule of the Alpha laser at its Capistrano facility, which employs about 200 people. The first “hot” test was conducted Dec. 23, during which hydrogen and fluorine gases were mixed at the test facility to gauge their energy production. The test was described by Strategic Defense Initiative officials as a success.

The Jan. 7 test was a second phase of the testing process, leading up to full-scale ground testing of the laser itself this spring.

In the final test, fluorine and hydrogen gases were to be mixed in a combustion chamber to determine if the gases burned properly. In the same test, the Alpha laser beam itself was to be produced.

The laser’s energy, estimated at two million watts, is created by the combustion of hydrogen and fluorine. The laser system was described by military officials as the “most mature” of Strategic Defense Initiative technologies and likely to be the first tested and deployed in space.

The orbiting laser is designed to be small and lightweight, made primarily of aluminum. If the current series of ground-based experiments is successful, the Pentagon hopes to conduct initial space tests next year.

The Alpha project, like the entire Star Wars program, has come under attack by critics who claim that it violates the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

TRW CAPISTRANO TEST SITE AT A GLANCE

TRW Capistrano Test Site, where the Alpha laser under President Reagan’s “Star Wars” defense initiative is being developed and tested.

Location: On 2,700 acres in unincorporated Orange County near the cities of San Juan Capistrano and San Clemente. Bordered on the south by Camp Pendleton and the north by Rancho Mission Viejo, it is barely visible from the road.

Employees: Approximately 200 are employed at the Capistrano Test Site, including an undisclosed number working on the Alpha laser project.

Other Projects: Redondo Beach-based TRW is also involved in other aerospace and electronics projects at the Capistrano site, including developing and testing new antennas. Classified projects other than Alpha are under way there.

The Capistrano facility opened in 1963. Company officials would not say exactly how long they have been working on Alpha or other Strategic Defense Initiative projects. Access to the facility is restricted.

Source: TRW