The Hindu : National : `Hypersonic air vehicle will be ready in three years'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Dec 22, 2004

National

National

`Hypersonic air vehicle will be ready in three years'

By Our Staff Reporter

VELLORE, DEC.21. The Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) has started work on a hypersonic air vehicle with a capability of flying at a speed 10 times and an altitude thrice that of the Airbus.

It is expected to be ready in another three years, according to Prahlada, Director of the DRDL and Chairman of the Integrated Guided Missiles Development Programme (IGMDP).

"We have successfully completed development of all tactical missiles — Trishul, Nag, Akash and BrahMos." During the last one year, the DRDL had demonstrated that they could locate, intercept, hit and destroy the targets.

While the supersonic anti-ship missile, BrahMos, an Indo-Russian project, was successfully launched from an operational ship of the Navy on November 3, Akash, a fully indigenous surface-to-air missile was expected to be demonstrated this week, Dr. Prahlada said in an exclusive interview to The Hindu during his visit to the Vellore Institute of Technology to inaugurate the 21st All- India Manufacturing Technology Design and Research Conference on Monday.

Astra getting ready

He said the DRDL had also started work on Astra, an air-to-air missile which would become operational after five years. The DRDL was working with the Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. (HAL), Bangalore, for fitting a missile in a helicopter. The HAL has recently developed for the first time, an Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH).

Dr. Prahlada said the DRDL was working on several common areas of research, which could be applied not only for defence but also for national and internal security and several essential non-defence purposes, including the Railways and disaster management.

The technology available for tracking an enemy military tank could also be used for keeping a tab on a terrorist within the country. Aero-satellites equipped with radars could be used for internal security.

The jammers used in aircraft could be used to jam the telecommunication signals and inactivate mobile phones whenever necessary for internal security purposes.

A lot of technology exchange was taking place between the Department of Defence and the Forensic Department of the police, he said.

"Electronic balloons"

"Electronic balloons" could be used for the surveillance of an entire city. Another application which would be useful for the Revenue Department would be the technology to provide the exact measurement of the land on which individual buildings were constructed, and the plinth area on which houses had been built. This would help the Revenue Department to take action on those furnishing wrong information about their immovable property, he said.

The Andhra Pradesh Revenue Department had already sought the help of the Defence Department in this connection, he said.

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