Lotto Method of Computing Kill Probability of Large Warheads
Abstract
A method is described for computing the kill probability of large warheads against multiply vulnerable targets, either for a single shot or a number of shots during an engagement. A sample of burst positions is drawn at random from the distribution of guidance errors. This can be done in a number of ways. It has been done so far by drawing a card for each of the three cartesian coordinates of the burst position of each shot. The box of cards is made up to represent guidance errors for particular conditions of engagements. Each burst is positioned with respect to a scale model of the target. The distance and direction of each vital component of the aircraft from the burst is measured. The kill probability for each such component, determined from vulnerability and fragmentation data, is read from a graph for the measured distance and direction. A random number table is used to determine whether a particular component was killed by a particular burst. A score is kept on the number of bursts which killed enough components to bring down the target aircraft. One hundred sample bursts are enough to estimate the probability of kill within the accuracy of the vulnerability data, provided this probability is about .3 or higher. The lotto method can be adapted to estimation of low kill probabilities, but it may be necessary to speed up some of the sampling and summarizing by use of punchcard machines.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Dec 18, 1950
- Accession Number
- AD0802147
Entities
People
- F. G. King
Organizations
- Ballistic Research Laboratory