As said by the Ministry of Defence, on Wednesday, the air version of the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile was test-fired successfully while the launch was described as a major milestone in the BrahMos development.
The Test
The missile was successfully fired from the Indian Air Force’s (IAF) Sukhoi 30 MKI supersonic fighter aircraft off the coast of Odisha. A pre-planned trajectory was followed by the missile while it was stated as a copybook flight by the release while the missile met all its objectives, according to the statement.
The report further added that the structural integrity and functional performance were proven during the test and for the serial production of air version BrahMos missiles within the country, it now clears the system for the same. Previously, the air version was test-fired last July.
The second test in a week
The Vertically Launched Short Range Surface to Air Missile (VL-SRSAM) was test-fired by India from the Integrated Test Range situated in Chandipur off the coast of Odisha on Tuesday, making the BrahMos test, the second one in this week.
Indigenously designed and developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), the air defence system is capable of engaging targets at around 15km while it has been particularly been designed for the Indian Naval Forces with an objective of neutralising various aerial threats at close ranges, including sea-skimming targets, as said by the Defence Research and Development Organisation officials.
In the previous month, the high-speed expendable aerial target (HEAT), ABHYAS, used for evaluation of various missile systems was tested by Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) from the Integrated Test Range (ITR), Chandipur off the coast of the Bay of Bengal in Odisha.
What is BrahMos?
Set up by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and NPO Mashinostroyenia of Russia, BrahMos missiles are designed, developed and produced by BrahMos Aerospace, a joint venture company while it carries a combination of the names of Brahmaputra and Moskva rivers.
Apart from the above-cited version, several other versions of the BrahMos missile (Land, Sea, Submarine and Warships) have already been developed and successfully tested in the past.
BrahMos has been successfully tested multiple times after being test-fired for the first time On November 22, 2017, from the IAF’s frontline fighter aircraft Sukhoi-30MKI against a sea-based target in the Bay of Bengal. Considered as a key strategic deterrence for the adversaries both along the land borders and in the strategically important Indian Ocean Region, the BrahMos equipped Sukhoi-30s which have a range of 1500 kilometres at a stretch without mid-air refuelling plays a key role in the defence systems while they have also been reported to have their presence at various strategic bases by the Indian Air Force. The 222 Sqn at Air Force Station Thanjavur, raised in January 2020, is the first Su-30 MKI squadron equipped with Brahmos.
Back to back tests of Brahmos’s land, sea and air versions were conducted in November in the previous year.