Ballistic missile tracking in the presence of clutter using multi-target tracking algorithm

In this work a ballistic missile is tracked in the presence of clutter in the surveillance area. During the re-entry phase a ballistic missile can generate decoys and thus can transforms from one-many components to be tracked. These all components should need to be tracked by the tracking system as any of the component can be a true target containing the explosives. The presence of clutter in the area makes it much more difficult for the tracking system to efficiently create the track of the target. This work uses the joint integrated probabilistic data association (JIPDA) algorithm to handle the multi-target scenario during the re-entry phase. A number of simulations are performed to judge the performance of the JIPDA algorithm for the given scenario. The results of the algorithm shows that all the target components are tracked in an optimal way in the presence of clutter using the JIPDA algorithm.