India test-fires indigenous missile Prithvi-II

Balasore: India on Thursday successfully test-fired its nuclear capable Prithvi-II ballistic missile from the Integrated Test Range at Chandipur as part of the user's trial by the Army.

"The indigenously developed missile mounted on a mobile launcher was test-fired from the launch complex-3 in the ITR at around 0905 hours and the trial was fully successful", defence sources said.

"Earlier also, Prithvi-II missile had proved its robustness and accuracy repeatedly during many trials," a Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) official said.

"Taken from routine production lot during earlier user s trials by Indian Army, the missile had achieved single digit accuracy reaching close to zero circular error probability (CEP)," the sources said.

Prithvi-II with features to deceive any anti ballistic missiles, had demonstrated flight duration of 483 seconds reaching a peak altitude of 43.5 km in the 2008 user's trial.

Similarly, as a part of the operational exercises by Armed forces, two Prithvi-II missiles, aimed at two different targets at 350 km from launch point of ITR, at Chandipur were successfully launched within minutes of each other on October 12, 2009 and all the mission objectives were met.

The sleek missile once again proved its accuracy when the user tried it in a salvo mode on March 27 and June 18, 2010 from ITR, Chandipur. It was the fourth successful Prithvi-II flight within a period of eight months.

With a striking range of 250 to 350 km, Prithvi-II missile is capable of carrying a pay-load of 500-1000 kg warhead.

The test firing of the surface-to-surface missile, which has already been inducted into Indian armed forces, was a routine trial conducted by the personnel of "strategic force command" (SFC), the sources said.

"The trial was conducted in the presence of senior officials as part of routine training exercises," they said.

'Prithvi', the first ballistic missile developed under the country's prestigious Integrated Guided Missile Development Programme (IGMDP), is propelled by liquid

propulsion twin engine.

With a length of nine meter and one meter diameter, Prithvi-II uses an advanced inertial navigation system with manoeuvrings trajectory.

"The entire trajectory of today's trial was tracked by a battery of sophisticated radars, electro-optic telemetry stations and ships launched in the down range impact point area in the Bay of Bengal for the post-launch analysis", the sources said.