Snark
An icbm before the advent of the icbm
Weapon Specifications
Note that the relationship between explosive power and destruction is not linear—a weapon’s destructive effects grow far more slowly than its explosive power.
Explosive Power
Up to 3.8 megatons.
Hiroshima Equivalent Factor
253x
Dimensions
67 ft, 2 inches x 42 ft., 3 inches (wingspan)
Weight
60,000 lbs.
Range
6300 miles, 650 mph
Year(s)
1960–1961
Purpose
Nuclear missile with tremendous range
NukeMap
Simulated destruction of a Snark missile at Macapá, Brazil. Click on the map to change parameters.
Videos
These curated videos provide additional context for this weapon — showing test footage, deployment scenes, technical explanations, interviews, or other historical material, allowing viewers to go deeper into the weapon’s design, use, and place in nuclear history.
Further Reading
- Wikipedia, Designation Systems, Military News
- The American Federation of Scientists has a short history of the development of the Snark, some of the technical and cultural difficulties it faced, and its eventual cancelation shortly after its introduction.
- A short article from Popular Mechanics in 1958 on the first launch of the Snark. It is in two parts: One and two. Note the map at the beginning of the first part showing the potential range of the Snark.
- The Space Force Museum at Cape Canveral has a page on the Snark, and the highlight here is the slideshow of the (rather dramatic) restoration of their Snark—one of only five on display in the world.
- In 1956, as J.P. Anderson writes in “The Day They Lost the Snark,” a test flight went wrong went the missile, with a range of thousands of miles, went off course after its launch from Florida and stopped responding to commands. It seems to have eventually crashed in Brazil.
- The Snark was built in Hawthorne, California. This article has a photograph of the missiles being assembled at the factory.
- The Snark doesn’t have many fans, as Thomas Newdick writes in “America’s First Strategic Cruise Missile Was Totally Useless.”
- President Kennedy harbored no love for the Snark, either. In his 1961 “Special Message to the Congress on the Defense Budget” orders, in a section entitled “Savings Made Possible by Progress,” the cancelation of the Snark, just months after it was activated. In his damning words: “Additional personnel will also be made available by the immediate phase-out of the subsonic Snark airbreathing long-range missile, which is now considered obsolete and of marginal military value in view of ICBM developments, the Snark’s low reliability and penetrability, the lack of positive control over its launchings, and the location of the entire wing at an unprotected site. (Fiscal 1962 savings: $7 million.)”
- J. Terry White, at White Eagle Aerospace (sounding a lot like a defense contractor), makes the general claim that although the Snark had “limited” operational service, it was still worth it.
- A 1961 magazine spread showing how our missiles could reach the USSR—and in the corner is a Snark.