Indian Army test-fires BrahMos land-attack cruise missile

Demonstrating the weapon's potent operational capability, the Indian Army on Saturday successfully test-fired the BrahMos land-attack cruise missile against a designated target in Rajasthan's Pokhran test range, an official said.

The test was conducted at 10 a.m. on Saturday.

The missile was launched from a mobile autonomous launcher (MAL) and carried out in the user-deployment configuration by trained army personnel. It met all the mission objectives.

The firing was witnessed by senior army officials, who congratulated the operational team for its successful launch.

"BrahMos missile system, the most lethal and potent weapon system for precision strike available with the Indian Army, has proved again its effectiveness in today's successful launch," Sudhir Mishra, chief of BrahMos Aerospace, said in a statement.

Defence Research and Development Organisation director general S. Christopher congratulated the Indian Army and BrahMos Aerospace for the successful flight test.

The Indian Army has already inducted three regiments of BrahMos in its inventory. All are equipped with Block-III version of the missile, which was previously tested on May 8 and 9.

The land-attack version of BrahMos has been operationalised in the Indian Army since 2007.

The fire-and-forget BrahMos has the capability to take on surface-based targets by flying a combined hi-lo trajectory, thus evading enemy air defence systems.

The inclusion of this powerful weapon system in the Indian Army has given it a distinct operational advantage to knock down any enemy target even in the most difficult and hidden terrains.

The BrahMos missile, with a range of 290-km and a speed of Mach, is capable of being launched from land, sea, sub-sea and air against sea and land targets.

Earlier this month, the sea version of the missile was test-launched from the Indian Navy's newest stealth destroyer INS Kochi and successfully homed in on its target, a decommissioned vessel.

The Indian Air Force has already recieved a modified version of the Sukhoi SU-30MKI combat jet capable of carrying the BrahMos missile and the first air launches are expected to begin early next year.

BrahMos is a joint venture between DRDO and NPOM of Russia.