11/10/2023 0 Comments Nuclear silo maintenance![]() Step 16A of this new checklist calls for a crew member to “Insert unlock code in CODE INSERT thumbwheel switches in accordance with SAC directives” prior to flipping the enable panel switch. It states that “under normal conditions the CODE INSERT thumbwheel switches will be set at P7P7P7P7P7P7. The revised launch checklist found in the technical manual dated March 1, 1978, refers to unlock codes for the first time in the series going back to 1962. This represented a real change, one that introduced for the first time a technical obstacle to launching missiles without proper authorization. ![]() Real unlock codes needed to be received from an external source and inserted, and then the switch flipped, or else the missiles would ignore any launch signals from the crew. It no longer sufficed just to flip one switch. What happened in 1977? The Strategic Air Command replaced the old enable panels with new ones requiring the crews, in the event of war, to dial into their thumbwheel switches an enable code transmitted to them in the launch order sent by higher authority. The checklist contains no reference to an unlock code, and no step for inserting any new codes into the thumbnail switch prior to flipping the enable switch. In their missile launch checklist, Step #5 calls for a crew member to move the enable switch to ENABLE. During the firing sequence, a crew member simply turned it rightward by 45 degrees, at which point the “secure code for enable command is made available to PROGRAM CONTROL panel for enable command transmission. As the picture shows, a triangular enable switch sits in the vertical position. On the right: The new panel with its thumbnail switches set to P7P7P7P7P7P7.Īs I and thousands of other older launch crew members can attest, they remained at 00000000 during the (abnormal) firing process as well. ![]() On the left: An enable panel for a Minuteman ICBM showing eight code insert thumbwheel switches, all set to zeros. As the manual says, “under normal conditions CODE INSERT thumbnail switches will be set at 00000000”. It shows eight ‘code insert thumbwheel switches’, all set to zeros. A second panel called the LAUNCH ENABLE PANEL feeds a special code to the PROGRAM CONTROL panel. The enable command is initiated at the PROGRAM CONTROL panel. The unclassified technical manual for Minuteman, effective June 1973, says that “missile enabling prepares the missile for recognition of execute launch commands. Their launch checklists instructed them to double check that the ‘enable’ panel was set to all zeroes before they turned a switch that unlocked (enabled) their missiles. The crews knew this eight-digit code, and knew that the missiles under their command would not accept a key-turn launch command from them without it. In a nutshell, my claim was, and is, that prior to 1977 a panel inside Minuteman underground launch control centers used to electronically ‘unlock’ their silo-based strategic missiles had to be set to eight zeroes – 00000000 – prior to the crews turning keys to fire them. Congress to rebut my claim to the contrary. Air Force document specially prepared for the U.S. “A code consisting of eight zeroes has never been used to enable or launch a MM ICBM, as claimed by Dr.
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