Teja drops real bombs (finally)

Tejas crosses a milestone

Ravi Sharma

BANGALORE: In a milestone, a Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas took off from here and for the first time dropped live stores (bombs) at a firing range.

The dropping of two 25-pounder bombs, with one striking the target and the other falling within the inner 25 yard circle, was undertaken by Prototype Vehicle-3 of the LCA programme.

The successful dropping of the light, marker bombs will enable the Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA) – designers of the fly-by-wire LCA – to not only prove the working of the aircraft’s flight control software for weapon drops and aiming, but also take forward the LCA’s weaponisation programme.

ADA officials said the flight control system software had to recognise and adjust for the dropping and still maintain the highly unstable flying platform’s handling qualities. So finally the LCA drops some real bombs, take that DDM. Read the full story here.