14-10-2023 | 18:50 PM
The Indian Air Force (IAF) has placed two contracts with Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL) for the Astra Missile.
Key Highlights:
Astra is a state-of-the-art Beyond Visual Range (BVR) air-to-air missile (AAM) system designed to be mounted on fighter aircraft.
It is designed and developed by the Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL), Research Centre Imarat (RCI) and other DRDO laboratories.
Range: It has a range of over 100 km designed to engage and destroy highly manoeuvrable supersonic aerial targets.
Speed: The missile can travel at speeds more than four times that of sound and can reach a maximum altitude of 20 km, making it extremely flexible for air combat.
The missile has been designed and developed for deployment on fighter jets like Sukhoi-30 MKI and Tejas of the IAF and the Mig-29K of the Navy.
The different variants of the missile are Astra Mk-1 (Operational), Astra Mk-2 (Trial-phase) etc.
The range for Astra Mk-1 is around 110 km, and for the Mk-2 is over 150 km.
The ASTRA Mk-I Weapon System integrated with SU-30 Mk-I aircraft is being inducted into the Indian Air Force (IAF).
