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Lark CTV-N-9 / KAQ-1 / XSAM-2
Lark CTV-N-10 / KAY-1 / XSAM-4

The Lark was an early U.S. Navy surface-to-air, liquid-propellant, rocket-propelled missile built by the Consolidated-Vultee Aircraft Corporation, and was usually launched from the decks of ships with the help of solid propellant boosters. It carried a 100-pound warhead and had a range of about 38 miles. The Lark missile was not ready before hostilities ended, but was tested after the war.

The image of desperate Japanese pilots purposely flying their planes into American warships in the closing months of World War II figures prominently in American popular culture. When most people hear the term kamikaze, they think of swarms of planes flying through a torrent of antiaircraft fire and plowing into the decks of aircraft carriers, battleships, cruisers, and destroyers, taking the lives of sailors and damaging or sinking the ships in this desperate act.

The Lark had been designed for use by the Navy against Japanese aircraft during World War II. Japan’s special air attack units (Kamikaze) were initially organized under very particular circumstances and with limited operational objectives in the Philippines late in 1944. The first organized kamikaze attack took place on October 25, 1944, when Lt. Yukio Seki of the 201st Air Group commanded the first group of five tokko, or Special Attack Corps units, against the American fleet at Leyte Gulf.

As the campaign continued, the Americans adapted their defenses, shooting down more kamikazes than could strike their targets. The Americans had increased their fighter protection, developed new antiaircraft ordnance with proximity fuses, and employed longer range radar, which gave them earlier warning of incoming sorties. The attempt to establish the contribution of various defensive measures to kamikaze destruction is rendered difficult by the conflicting evidence of the numbers and results of kamikaze raids. Several sources agree that the Navy expended approximately 2300 aircraft and 2500 pilots and crewmen, suggesting that at least 2100 kamikaze aircraft were single-place planes. The Japanese army apparently expended slightly more aircraft, so that-approximately 5000 kamikaze sorties must have been flown in all.

Kamikazes known to have hit ships or to have struck near enough to cause damage comprised 54 percent of those estimated to have appeared over the force in the Philippines and 32 percent of those estimated to have appeared over the force at Okinawa. Assuming that most of the kamikazes which did not hit were splashed by anti-aircraft suggests AA effectiveness of approximately 46 percent in the Philippines and 68 percent of Okinawa. For the Philippines campaign, over a quarter million rounds of 40mm ammunition were expended, for a rate of almost 2500 rounds per kill. Far fewer kamikazes were killed by the larger, longer-range 5-inch gun. But the average open-fire ranges (6400 yards for major combatants) were such that the longer range weapons were unable to take advantage of range superiority to fire early; and the number and rate of fire of the smaller weapons were more important.

During World War II, the Navy established a Jet-Propelled Missile Board which, in response to the threat to Navy ships from Japanese Kamikaze attackers, authorized work on a surface-to-air missile called the Lark. The Lark featured a liquid-propellant main engine and solid-propellant booster, with midcourse correction, semiactive homing, and terminal guidance.

The design of the Lark began in 1944, but it was not developed in time for use in World War II. After the Allied victory, many of the lines of development in guided weapons were not pursued in weapons development programs. But perhaps more important, interest turned to nuclear weapons; one did not require much accuracy to destroy a target. Thus, tactical missile development was limited to air defense, largely against attack by nuclear weapons carriers. Moreover, the demands were quite high - not even a single attacker could be allowed to penetrate over a wide area.

The full-scale Fairchild Lark was flown at constant angle of attack. The lift increments for maneuvering were gained by deflection of the horizontal wing flaps, and the longitudinal control surfaces were used only as trimmers. In 1947, the NACA was requested by the Bureau of Aeronautics, Navy Department, to make flight tests of the Fairchild Lark pilotless aircraft configuration to evaluate the longitudinal stability and control characteristics at high subsonic speeds in order to predict the behavior of the full-scale aircraft. In order to obtain this information 0.5-scale models, externally geometrically similar to the Fairchild Lark, were constructed and flown at the Flight Test Station of the Pilotless Aircraft Research Division at Wallops Island, Va.

Placing the tail in line with the wings resulted in a considerable reduction in the effectiveness of the longitudinal trimming control. This configuration was statically stable with large increases in the longitudinal stability occurring above Mach 0.7. Deflecting the horizontal wing flaps 60° with the tail interdigitated with the wings results in a reduction in the effectiveness of the trimming control.

Lark was used extensively from 1946-1950 as a test missile, providing valuable experience to US military personnel in the handling and deployment of missiles. Aside from the Army Bumper launches, the majority of launches at Cape Canaveral in the early 1950s were Air Force winged missile launches. The first Air Force launch at the Cape occurred on 25 October 1950 when a team launched a Lark interceptor missile. The Air Force’s Lark flight lasted less than two minutes and covered only one mile. The Air Force continued to launch Larks at the Cape until August 1953. Some flights were made at sea. The Lark was also the first U.S. surface-to-air missile ever to intercept a moving air target.