6 ms·

The Iron Dome missile defense system has achieved a nearly 90% success rate

17 points by darthgoogle 12y ago

pling 12y ago
So all you need is 10 missiles to win against the statistics?
- justizin 12y ago
  rockets are not missiles, fyi. less than one percent of one percent of one percent of all rockets fired into israel ever result in casualties, while at least 15 children have been killed in palestine in the past couple of days by F-16 strikes. barbara walters, of course, showed footage of carnage in palestine under the supposition that it was in israel. puke
  - onion2k 12y ago
    The problem with fighting a war based in religion and hate, on both sides, is that any rational person would stop firing rockets with odds like that.
    - sitkack 12y ago
      I am still looking for this magical "rational person." I have already found spherical ones and integrated their surface area and volumes.
    - lostlogin 12y ago
      Are you referring to the odds of a rocket getting through to Israel, or the odds of killing Palestinian children.
      - andreasvc 12y ago
        I take him to be referring to the odds of Palestinian missiles being intercepted, and the retaliation resulting in casualties.
  - jedmeyers 12y ago
    So apparently it's OK to fire rockets as long as they rarely kill someone.
    - testrun 12y ago
      It seems so.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
justizin 12y ago
"A senior Israel Defense Forces officer said Wednesday that the number of rockets to hit Israel can be expected to rise." In other words, Israel is not planning to de-escalate their illegal occupation - in fact it sounds likely they're planning to invade the gaza strip, which they have been bombing quite actively in recent days and hours.
- falsestprophet 12y ago
  To be fair, their activities comply with Israel law.
- xwowsersx 12y ago
  How you managed to grab a sentence from the article about the IDF's assessment that there will likely be more rockets fired on Israel from Gaza and turn that into flagrant incendiary baffles me. "Dogs are cute." In other words, roses are red.
  - madaxe_again 12y ago
    I feel like you wanted to write antisemitism. It isn't. Israel have started a war here. There's nothing incendiary about the truth, except to those who prefer lies.
    - Kanbab 12y ago
      There is an ongoing cold & hot war between Hamas and Israel. Israel maintains checkpoints in the West Bank, and continues to build settlements, while leaving Gaza alone. Hamas undermines West Bank peace by murdering Fatah members, and not negotiating with Israel, claiming they want to ultimately fight all Jews in the world. Furthermore, Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank joined Hamas in a unity government. I think you are mistaken about who started the current fighting. In short, among the backdrop of relative calm: 3 Israelis youths were murdered, Israel searched the West Bank, and arrested numerous Hamas individuals, among other suspects. An Arab boy was murdered, Israel arrested numerous Israeli suspects. Hamas begins firing rockets from Gaza. Then Israel began responding with air attacks in Gaza.
crisnoble 12y ago
Interesting, the BBC reports different stats: "The military said its Iron Dome missile defence system had intercepted 21 of the 82 rockets fired on Wednesday, including three above Tel Aviv, three over Ashkelon and three over Ashdod." source: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28240137 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28240137
- FeeTinesAMady 12y ago
  Iron Dome works by calculating the trajectory of incoming rockets and leaving them alone if they're going to hit an unpopulated area, so that doesn't necessarily contradict the given statistic.
- falsestprophet 12y ago
  They only engage rockets that may land in populated areas.
- GabrielF00 12y ago
  The reason for the discrepancy is that Iron Dome was only activated for 27% of rockets fired. When it was activated, it was 90% accurate. Based on some the Wikipedia article is looks like they don't bother trying to intercept rockets that wouldn't land in populated areas. I don't know if that's for cost reasons or because targeting every rocket wouldn't be technically feasible or would degrade their capability or what.
dewey 12y ago
The Iron Dome is a really amazing system, I was volunteering in the Israeli Army last year and this system was one you really had the feeling is changing the life for the better for people living in the affected areas. Even if they were not standing behind Israel politically they were still very grateful that this system is in place. The problem I see is that it's very expensive to run (I remember something about 50k/rocket, could be wrong though) while the rockets they are shooting down are very cheap to manufacture. They also send a minimum of 2 rockets for every incoming rocket to be on the safe side if I remember correctly. Some more information: http://www.idfblog.com/blog/2013/09/20/clear-skies-ahead-meet-soldiers-iron-dome/ http://www.idfblog.com/blog/2013/09/20/clear-skies-ahead-mee...
- Kanbab 12y ago
  If a rocket were to land in Tel Aviv and damage a building, it would probably cause more than $50,000 in damages. Damages to include are property damage, PTSD of the local population, schools closing, and offices closing.
  - Zaheer 12y ago
    Those costs seem a bit overstated. This is what a Palestinian Quassam rocket impact looks like: http://neuezeitgeist.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/quassam-impact.jpg http://neuezeitgeist.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/quassam-imp... Compare to Israeli rocket impact: http://www.abc.net.au/news/image/5582926-16x9-512x288.jpg http://www.abc.net.au/news/image/5582926-16x9-512x288.jpg
    - Kanbab 12y ago
      Mine is bigger than yours! http://www.pbs.org/newshour/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/slideshow/apthit_slideshow.jpg http://www.pbs.org/newshour/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/sli...
  - madaxe_again 12y ago
    And air strikes in Gaza have killed more than a dozen children this past week alone. What's your point? That you value bus shelters more than human life?
bronxbomber92 12y ago
An MIT professor on NPR radio earlier this evening reported that the Iron Dome missile defense systems has achieved a less than 5% success rate. Him or the article must be wrong, but who?
- mkal_tsr 12y ago
  IIRC the MIT prof. only counted those that hit the missile head-on, not from behind or the side as there is the possibility of any onboard warhead surviving. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-21751766 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-21751766
JumpCrisscross 12y ago
>[Iron Dome] has been activated to intercept about 27 percent of the approximately 180 rockets fired between Monday night and midday Wednesday. Measure what you manage. The system's success rate for attempted targets is a valid measure. But it is also a dangerous one on which to solely rely. A devious commander, seeking only to maximize this metric, would limit Iron Dome interceptions to only those strikes which he is supremely confident it can successfully intercept. May I suggest a complimentary statistic of people injured, and property damaged, per missile fired from Palestinian territory regardless of whether Iron Dome engages or not. This measures, in the long run, both (a) how effective Iron Dome is when it engages and (b) how good Iron Dome is at deciding whether or not to engage. B is missing today. I think it is a crucial component to manage.
hadoukenio 12y ago
The problem is that if it's such a wild success, it may lead to other forms of attacks e.g. suicide bombers which were more effective might become trendy again.
- Demeno 12y ago
  [I hope not to turn this political] Israeli here, as far as I know suicide bombings didn't drop in popularity, they just became much harder to carry out since construction of the fence. Shooting rockets over the fence is just much easier these days...
dodyg 12y ago
I live in Cairo. I cannot help but to compare that this is the third day of the Israel strikes on Gaza and so far 70 people have been killed. This is how many people that we lost in Egypt last year on a single 'mildy bad' chaotic day. Living in the Middle East makes you numb to this common killings.

17 points by darthgoogle 12y ago

pling 12y ago

So all you need is 10 missiles to win against the statistics?

justizin 12y ago
rockets are not missiles, fyi. less than one percent of one percent of one percent of all rockets fired into israel ever result in casualties, while at least 15 children have been killed in palestine in the past couple of days by F-16 strikes. barbara walters, of course, showed footage of carnage in palestine under the supposition that it was in israel. puke
- onion2k 12y ago
  The problem with fighting a war based in religion and hate, on both sides, is that any rational person would stop firing rockets with odds like that.
  - sitkack 12y ago
    I am still looking for this magical "rational person." I have already found spherical ones and integrated their surface area and volumes.
  - lostlogin 12y ago
    Are you referring to the odds of a rocket getting through to Israel, or the odds of killing Palestinian children.
    - andreasvc 12y ago
      I take him to be referring to the odds of Palestinian missiles being intercepted, and the retaliation resulting in casualties.
- jedmeyers 12y ago
  So apparently it's OK to fire rockets as long as they rarely kill someone.
  - testrun 12y ago
    It seems so.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

justizin 12y ago

"A senior Israel Defense Forces officer said Wednesday that the number of rockets to hit Israel can be expected to rise." In other words, Israel is not planning to de-escalate their illegal occupation - in fact it sounds likely they're planning to invade the gaza strip, which they have been bombing quite actively in recent days and hours.

falsestprophet 12y ago
To be fair, their activities comply with Israel law.
xwowsersx 12y ago
How you managed to grab a sentence from the article about the IDF's assessment that there will likely be more rockets fired on Israel from Gaza and turn that into flagrant incendiary baffles me. "Dogs are cute." In other words, roses are red.
- madaxe_again 12y ago
  I feel like you wanted to write antisemitism. It isn't. Israel have started a war here. There's nothing incendiary about the truth, except to those who prefer lies.
  - Kanbab 12y ago
    There is an ongoing cold & hot war between Hamas and Israel. Israel maintains checkpoints in the West Bank, and continues to build settlements, while leaving Gaza alone. Hamas undermines West Bank peace by murdering Fatah members, and not negotiating with Israel, claiming they want to ultimately fight all Jews in the world. Furthermore, Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank joined Hamas in a unity government. I think you are mistaken about who started the current fighting. In short, among the backdrop of relative calm: 3 Israelis youths were murdered, Israel searched the West Bank, and arrested numerous Hamas individuals, among other suspects. An Arab boy was murdered, Israel arrested numerous Israeli suspects. Hamas begins firing rockets from Gaza. Then Israel began responding with air attacks in Gaza.

crisnoble 12y ago

Interesting, the BBC reports different stats: "The military said its Iron Dome missile defence system had intercepted 21 of the 82 rockets fired on Wednesday, including three above Tel Aviv, three over Ashkelon and three over Ashdod." source: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28240137 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28240137

FeeTinesAMady 12y ago
Iron Dome works by calculating the trajectory of incoming rockets and leaving them alone if they're going to hit an unpopulated area, so that doesn't necessarily contradict the given statistic.
falsestprophet 12y ago
They only engage rockets that may land in populated areas.
GabrielF00 12y ago
The reason for the discrepancy is that Iron Dome was only activated for 27% of rockets fired. When it was activated, it was 90% accurate. Based on some the Wikipedia article is looks like they don't bother trying to intercept rockets that wouldn't land in populated areas. I don't know if that's for cost reasons or because targeting every rocket wouldn't be technically feasible or would degrade their capability or what.

dewey 12y ago

The Iron Dome is a really amazing system, I was volunteering in the Israeli Army last year and this system was one you really had the feeling is changing the life for the better for people living in the affected areas. Even if they were not standing behind Israel politically they were still very grateful that this system is in place. The problem I see is that it's very expensive to run (I remember something about 50k/rocket, could be wrong though) while the rockets they are shooting down are very cheap to manufacture. They also send a minimum of 2 rockets for every incoming rocket to be on the safe side if I remember correctly. Some more information: http://www.idfblog.com/blog/2013/09/20/clear-skies-ahead-meet-soldiers-iron-dome/ http://www.idfblog.com/blog/2013/09/20/clear-skies-ahead-mee...

Kanbab 12y ago
If a rocket were to land in Tel Aviv and damage a building, it would probably cause more than $50,000 in damages. Damages to include are property damage, PTSD of the local population, schools closing, and offices closing.
- Zaheer 12y ago
  Those costs seem a bit overstated. This is what a Palestinian Quassam rocket impact looks like: http://neuezeitgeist.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/quassam-impact.jpg http://neuezeitgeist.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/quassam-imp... Compare to Israeli rocket impact: http://www.abc.net.au/news/image/5582926-16x9-512x288.jpg http://www.abc.net.au/news/image/5582926-16x9-512x288.jpg
  - Kanbab 12y ago
    Mine is bigger than yours! http://www.pbs.org/newshour/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/slideshow/apthit_slideshow.jpg http://www.pbs.org/newshour/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/sli...
- madaxe_again 12y ago
  And air strikes in Gaza have killed more than a dozen children this past week alone. What's your point? That you value bus shelters more than human life?

bronxbomber92 12y ago

An MIT professor on NPR radio earlier this evening reported that the Iron Dome missile defense systems has achieved a less than 5% success rate. Him or the article must be wrong, but who?

mkal_tsr 12y ago
IIRC the MIT prof. only counted those that hit the missile head-on, not from behind or the side as there is the possibility of any onboard warhead surviving. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-21751766 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-21751766

JumpCrisscross 12y ago

>[Iron Dome] has been activated to intercept about 27 percent of the approximately 180 rockets fired between Monday night and midday Wednesday. Measure what you manage. The system's success rate for attempted targets is a valid measure. But it is also a dangerous one on which to solely rely. A devious commander, seeking only to maximize this metric, would limit Iron Dome interceptions to only those strikes which he is supremely confident it can successfully intercept. May I suggest a complimentary statistic of people injured, and property damaged, per missile fired from Palestinian territory regardless of whether Iron Dome engages or not. This measures, in the long run, both (a) how effective Iron Dome is when it engages and (b) how good Iron Dome is at deciding whether or not to engage. B is missing today. I think it is a crucial component to manage.

hadoukenio 12y ago

The problem is that if it's such a wild success, it may lead to other forms of attacks e.g. suicide bombers which were more effective might become trendy again.

Demeno 12y ago
[I hope not to turn this political] Israeli here, as far as I know suicide bombings didn't drop in popularity, they just became much harder to carry out since construction of the fence. Shooting rockets over the fence is just much easier these days...

dodyg 12y ago

I live in Cairo. I cannot help but to compare that this is the third day of the Israel strikes on Gaza and so far 70 people have been killed. This is how many people that we lost in Egypt last year on a single 'mildy bad' chaotic day. Living in the Middle East makes you numb to this common killings.