[Athena-H]

ALMOST 3 1/2-FOOT-TALL SOUNDING ROCKET WIND TUNNEL MODEL. 

The Athena-H test vehicle was a joint US Airforce Space and Missile Systems Organization/US Army project that began in 1964 to use subscale models of ballistic reentry vehicles to perform Advanced Ballistic Reentry Systems (ABRES) tests. Despite some missteps, like an instance in 1970 when an Athena H rocket went off course and flew 200 miles into Mexico, the program had a successful run through 1977. Most of the rockets were launched from Green River Launch Complex in Utah to impact points in the US Army’s White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico – 760 km distance. The 60-foot tall, four-stage, solid-propellant rocket would reach altitudes of over 300 km and peak velocities of 6700 m/s or about 15,000 mph.

The present finely machined model is about 1:17 scale and can be separated into sections and bolts to the base through the bottom threaded section, which would have been used to secure it in a wind tunnel.