M24 mine

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The M24 was a U.S. off-route mine based around the M28A2 HEAT rocket originally fired by the M20 3.5 inch rocket launcher. The rocket was launched from a M143 plastic launch tube.

The mine was developed by Picatinny Arsenel in December 1961, and it entered service in September 1968.

[edit] Operation

A trigger cable was laid across a road, when enough pressure was applied to the trigger cable two conductors inside the cable were forced together creating a circuit. The trigger cable consisted of two segments, requiring simultaneous pressure on both segments to trigger the mine. For wheeled vehicles, the cable was laid directly across the road so that wheels on both sides of the vehicle would touch the cable at the same instance, while for tracked vehicles the cable was laid at an angle of fifteen degrees to prevent the cable slipping between the treads on the tracks.

The rocket had an maximum effective range of about 30 meters beyond which it became too inaccurate to reliably strike the target.

The mine is long out of production and no longer in US service. The mine has possibly been used in Angola.