Tejas: IAF test flies homegrown fighter jet

Bangalore: India joined the select club of countries making a fighter jet from scratch when Indian Air Force (IAF) flew for the first time the lightweight indigenous multi-role Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas in a clear wintry sky for initial operational clearance (IOC).
Defence Minister A.K. Antony handed over the service certificate of the world's smallest military aircraft to Chief of Air Staff Air Chief Marshal P.V. Naik in the presence of top defence and government officials.
The supersonic fourth generation fighter will form a 200-strong fleet for the IAF to replace the ageing Russian-made MiG-21 fleet and increase the squadron strength as a potent strike force by 2012.
"This is the first time an indigenously designed and developed military fighter aircraft has been certified for air force operations," state-run Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) official K. Jayaprakash Rao told IANS here.
The IOC involves specific process, including validation tests to determine the aircraft's various operational functions, including avionics, subsystems, thrust, aerodynamics, propulsion and radar.
The certificate was given by the Regional Centre for Military Airworthiness (RCMA) of the Centre for Military Airworthiness and Certification (Cemilac), a lab of the defence research organisation.
10/01/11 IANS/Economic Times

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Categories: New Jan 2011