Angel Island Nike History & Photos
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The Nike System
The Nike surface-to-air missile system was named for the Greek goddess of victory. Planning for Nike was begun before the end of WW II, when the U.S. Army realized that conventional anti-aircraft artillery would not be able to provide an adequate defense against jet aircraft.
The two-stage, supersonic missile could be guided to its target by means of ground-based radar and computer systems.
Early in the Cold War, the Soviet Union developed long-range bombers which could reach the United States, and soon after exploded their first atomic bomb.
The mission of Nike within was to act as a "last
ditch" line of air defense for selected areas. The Nike system would have been
used if Air Force's interceptors failed.
Nike sites
were built in "rings" around major urban and industrial areas, and key Strategic
Air Command bases The number of sites constructed within varied upon many
factors. Due to the short range of the original Nike missile, the Nike "Ajax",
many bases were located close to the center of the areas they protected.
Frequently, they were located within heavily populated areas. The
Nike Site on Angel Island was built in 1954. Other nearby sites were on
Wildcat Peak near Orinda, in Tilden Park in Berkeley, in the Bollinger
Canyon area of San Ramon, near Lake Chabot and at the Presidio.
A typical Nike air defense site consisted of the Integrated Fire Control Area (IFC) in this case on Mt. Livermore, and the Launcher Area, in this case at Point Blunt. At the launcher area, Nike missiles were stored horizontally within heavily constructed underground missile magazines. A large, missile elevator brought the Nikes to the surface of the site where they would be pushed (manually) by crewmen, across twin steel rails to one of four satellite launchers. The missile was then attached to its launcher and erected to a near-vertical position for firing. The slightly angled firing position ensured that the missile's booster rocket (lower stage) would not crash directly back onto the missile site.
Work
on a successor to the early Nike Ajax, was initiated well before the first Ajax
missiles were deployed. In
the late 1950's an updated system, the Nike
Hercules, was adopted and the Ajax base at Angel Island became obsolete;
it was closed in 1962. Changes in the Soviet threat meant that the air defense
role, for which Nike was originally intended, became relatively less critical .
Defense dollars were needed for other projects (including the development of
American ICBMs and potential missile defenses) and also to fund the rapidly
growing war in Vietnam. All Nike Ajax sites in the continental United States
were closed down by 1964. Closures of select Nike Hercules sites began during
the mid 1960s and all bases were closed by the mid1970's.
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