Express News Service
Bangalore:
Nirbhay, India’s first subsonic cruise
missile had a bad outing on Tuesday, after scientists terminated its maiden
test-firing 20-minutes into its mission. Celebrated as Bangalore’s first
missile, Nirbhay travelled almost 250 km towards the target after the launch,
but a technical snag dented its designated flight path, forcing the Range
Safety Wing at the Interim Test Range (ITR) in Balasore to abort the mission. (Termination
or abortion is done by switching off the engine.)
Designed
and developed by the Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE) in C V Raman Nagar,
Nirbhay’s failure is now being dubbed as ‘partial success’ by the Defence Research
and Development Organisation (DRDO). “The lift-off from the canister, the
booster separation, ignition of cruise vehicle engine at high altitude, wing
deployment, control guidance and way-point navigation capabilities have been
proven. For a missile designers these are crucial milestones achieved,” Avinash
Chander, Chief Controller (Missiles and Strategic Systems), DRDO told Express
from Bhuvaneshwar.
He
claimed that for a first flight, the objectives achieved are encouraging. “We
were able to launch it as a missile first, then convert show its longevity as an
aircraft. We will study what went wrong and get back with another missile within
six-eight months so as to go the full distance. We have enough data from this
flight and we have tested all stages of the missile, which was very crucial,”
Avinash said.
A
top source who didn’t want to be identified said that the missile was travelling
closer to the Odhisa cost. “We intentionally designated the path closer to the
coast so that we could track it. But when it started deviating, we had to abort
the mission taking into account the safety of the coast. It will take a week to
assess which part malfunctioned and the initial data analysis will tell us more,”
the official said.
ADE Director P S Krishnan said that his team will ensure that
everything falls in place next time. “Nirbhay met 90 per cent of its mission
parameters. It was the first test and we will quickly find out from the data which
part gave up. We will fix it and prove the missile’s full-duration (1000 km) capabilities,”
Krishnan said.
DRDO’s
decision to go undercover till the launch of the missile is attributed mainly to the snub it
received for letting out too many details of sensitive projects. A senior military
intelligence official said that DRDO was warned twice in the recent past, a fact Express couldn't verify independently.Copyright@The New Indian Express
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