Special team for Rafale readies ground work, to visit France
Chethan Kumar | TNN | Updated: Oct 4, 2016, 09.39 PM IST
BENGALURU: Indian Air Force's (IAF) elite test pilots are preparing the groundwork for constituting a project management team that will soon travel to France and work with Dassault in customising the aircraft for India's operational needs. India signed a Rs 60,000 crore deal with Dassault to procure 36 fighters under the medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) programme recently.
The team will be constituted at the Aircraft & Systems Testing Establishment (ASTE) headquartered in Bengaluru, its commandant Air Vice Marshal Sandeep Singh confirmed to TOI.
It was ASTE which did the field trials for all six contenders—Lockheed Martin's F-16; Boeing's F/A-18 E/F; European Eurofighter Typhoon; the Swedish Gripen; the French Dassault's Rafale and the Russian Mig-35.
Out of the six contenders only the Eurofighter Typhoon and Rafale met all the 750 quality requirements, including weapon systems. ASTE clarified that they do not compare aircraft and that only clear them based on requirement and that the decision of picking one is made at a higher level.
Singh, explained that the team, once constituted will have pilots, engineers and air crew. "The size of the team will vary. For the Su-30MKI for example, we had a 10 member team," he said.
Chethan Kumar | TNN | Updated: Oct 4, 2016, 09.39 PM IST
BENGALURU: Indian Air Force's (IAF) elite test pilots are preparing the groundwork for constituting a project management team that will soon travel to France and work with Dassault in customising the aircraft for India's operational needs. India signed a Rs 60,000 crore deal with Dassault to procure 36 fighters under the medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) programme recently.
The team will be constituted at the Aircraft & Systems Testing Establishment (ASTE) headquartered in Bengaluru, its commandant Air Vice Marshal Sandeep Singh confirmed to TOI.
It was ASTE which did the field trials for all six contenders—Lockheed Martin's F-16; Boeing's F/A-18 E/F; European Eurofighter Typhoon; the Swedish Gripen; the French Dassault's Rafale and the Russian Mig-35.
Out of the six contenders only the Eurofighter Typhoon and Rafale met all the 750 quality requirements, including weapon systems. ASTE clarified that they do not compare aircraft and that only clear them based on requirement and that the decision of picking one is made at a higher level.
Singh, explained that the team, once constituted will have pilots, engineers and air crew. "The size of the team will vary. For the Su-30MKI for example, we had a 10 member team," he said.