BrahMos cruise missile test-fired from Orissa coast

Balasore (Orissa), Sep 5 (PTI) India Sunday test-fired
the 290-km range BrahMos cruise missile from the Integrated
Test Range (ITR) at Chandipur off Orissa coast as part of
trials by the defence forces to fine-tune its capability.
"It was a user's trial by the defence forces," said a
Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) official
soon after the missile blasted off from a mobile launcher at
about 11.35 AM from ITR's launch complex-3.
BrahMos-II can potentially be used for surgical
strikes, including at terror camps, without causing collateral
damage.
The missile can fly at 2.8 times the speed of sound
carrying conventional warheads up to 300 kg for a range of
290 km and can effectively engage ground targets from an
altitude as low as 10 metres.
Though the missile is capable of being launched from
multiple platforms, focus in on the development of its
air-launched and the submarine-launched versions.
BrahMos, developed jointly with Russia, is a
supersonic cruise missile capable of being launched from
submarines, ships, aircraft and land-based Mobile Autonomous
Launchers (MAL).
A regiment of the BrahMos-I variant, consisting of 67
missiles, five mobile autonomous launchers on 12x12 Tatra
vehicles and two mobile command posts, among other equipment,
is already operational in the Army.
Similarly, the Navy has begun inducting the first
version of BrahMos missile system in all its frontline war
ships since 2005, defence sources said.
The Army, on its part, is set to induct two more
regiments of the BrahMos Block-II land-attack cruise missiles
(LACM), which have been designed as 'precision strike weapons'
capable of hitting small targets in cluttered urban
environments, they said.
The BrahMos Block-II variant has been developed to
take out a specific small target, with a low radar
cross-section, in a multi-target environment.
The BrahMos missile is a two-stage vehicle that has a
solid propellant booster and a liquid propellant ram-jet
system.
The first flight test of the BrahMos was conducted on
June 12, 2001 at the ITR at Chandipur in Orissa coast in
eastern India and the last trial of the naval version of
BrahMos was carried out in a vertical mode successfully on
March 21, 2010 from Indian navy ship INS Ranvir off Orissa
coast. PTI CORR
MYR