Relevance: Mains: G.S paper III: Science and technology
Context
- Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) carried out two successful tests of the latest variant of the BrahMos missile, one from the land platform and the other from air.
- BrahMos, developed through a collaboration between India and Russia, is one of the most advanced weapons in India’s armoury.
The missile
- BrahMos is a cruise missile, meaning it can be guided towards a pre-determined land- or sea-based target. With a capability to attain speeds 2.8 times that of sound (Mach 2.8), BrahMos is classified as supersonic cruise missile.
- A newer version under development is aimed at flying at speeds greater than Mach 5. These are called hypersonic cruise missiles.
- Besides decreasing the reaction time of the enemy, higher speeds also substantially reduce the chances of the missile getting intercepted.
- An amalgam of the names of the rivers Brahmaputra and Moskva, BrahMos is being produced by BrahMos Aerospace, a joint venture company set up by DRDO and Mashinostroyenia of Russia in 1998.
- The first version of the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile was inducted into the Indian Navy in 2005, meant to be fired from INS Rajput.
The test
- India’s arsenal for long, it is continuously upgraded and updated with new hardware and software. This is what necessitates periodic tests of the missile.
- DRDO scientists said that in every such exercise of a specific variant of BrahMos, different parameters are put to test.
- Though the exact details are not disclosed, additional hardware and software systems are tested based on the inputs from the user, against more complex targets, and under different atmospheric conditions.
- The test results and observations are important for future analysis and further advancement.
Air-based test
- The Sukhoi-30 MKI fighter jets of the Indian Air Force as the base. The missile destroyed a target at sea.
- This was the third air-based test of the missile and marked the completion of the integration of BrahMos missile with the Sukhoi-30 MKI aircraft.
- The BrahMos Air-Launched Cruise Missile (ALCM), as it has since been called, has been a significant addition in IAF’s air combat capability from stand-off ranges.
- Stand-off range missiles are ones that are launched at a distance sufficient to allow an attacking party to evade defensive fire expected from the target area.
- The successful testing of air-platform of BrahMos has further strengthened the tactical cruise missile triad — land, sea and air — for India.