Virtual Impact Point based Midcourse Guidance for Exo-Atmospheric Interception

Abstract

This paper proposes Virtual Impact Point (VIP) based midcourse guidance for exo-atmospheric interception with a novel hit altitude adjustment algo-rithm. The VIP guidance generates an acceleration command to steer the VIP towards the PIP along the shortest path, and hit altitude adjustment algorithm is used to ensure the successful interception of solid interceptor. Numerical simulation is conducted to demonstrate the effectiveness and superiority of the proposed VIP guidance over other existing guidance methods.