NAL-Mesco pact for 2-seater Hansa light aircraft production

The National Aerospace Laboratories, Bengaluru, Friday inked a pact with Delhi based Mesco Aerospace Ltd for the design, development, production and marketing of the Hansa-Next Generation aircraft.

The NAL said in a release that the NG aircraft development project has been approved by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), under which NAL operates, andDepartment of Scientific and Industrial Research, New Delhi.

The two-seater aircraft will be ready for its first flight by next year around September orOctober and would begin its commercial flight from 2020, it said.

According to the release, once the project starts its commercial operations, it will ease the availability of indigenous aircraft for pilot training to obtain private pilot and commercial pilot licenses.

Post certification, the NAL said, the Hansa-NG shall bemanufactured by Mesco Aerospace under a license agreement.

Mesco Aerospace would also set up service centre for Hansa andundertake marketing of HansaNG in India and abroad.

The NAL said the targeted selling cost of the aircraft would be around Rs 80 lakh for the basic version and Rs one crore for fully loaded version.

The two-seater plane can also be used in bird reconnaissance at airfield, cadet training, coastal surveillance and hobby flying in the country, it said.

CSIR-NAL has built 14 production version 2 seat aircraft of Hansa-3 from 2001 to 2010 of which 11 were delivered to Directorate General of Civil Aviation, one to IIT-Kanpur and two to CSIR-NAL out of which one has been leased to Mesco Aerospace Ltd during Aero India 2017.

Those who used Hansa-3 have suggested some changes, the release said, adding that CSIR-NAL with Mesco would modify the Hansa-3 aircraft upgrading it with the latest technologies.