India has moved closer to self-dependence in precision-guided ‘smart glide bombs’ as it conducted covert trials of these bombs successfully at Pokharan firing range in Jaisalmer on August 17 last month. Christened as ‘Garuthmaa’ and ‘Garudaa’ , the ‘glide bombs’ are being indigenously developed by the Defence Research and Develoopment Organisation (DRDO) . Of these two drop trails, the test of Garudaa, the non-winged glide-bomb, was carried out to evaluate its precision for a range of 30 kilometres while in another set of drop trails, both Garudaa and ‘Garuthmaa’ were successfully tested from a Su-30 MKI aircraft, a DRDO official said in a newsletter released recently by the Aeronautical Society of India (AESI, Hyderabad branch) at a meeting here. Garuthmaa, the 1,000 kg winged smart glide bomb, was tested for its maximum 100-km range , Top DRDO officials termed the tests as a ‘major success’. Sources in DRDO said that guided by on-board navigation systems, Garuthmaa was tested for its first phase of trials in Thar Desert for assessing its occuracy in hitting a target after gliding for 100 kilometres. ” The bomb was dropped from a Su-30 MKI aircraft for which we got full support from the Pune airbase. The IAF has been involved in development and related trials of this ‘smart bomb’ from the beginning”, said an official, adding that non-winged Garudaa was tested for 30-km range and would be tested for bigger ranges (up to 100 Km) in future. ” Garudaa”, the non-winged version of this guided bomb with a range of 30 kilometres was tested initially three years back. DRDO officials shared that contrary to the conventional ‘dumb bombs’ which take a free flight after being dropped, guided bombs like ‘ Guruthmaa’ have winglets and on-board navigation and guidance systems enabling these to hit the target with precision after being dropped from varying heights. Both ‘Garuthamaa’ and ‘ Garudaa’ are a brainchild of various laboratories of DRDO including Research Centre Imarat in Hyderabad, Defence Avionics Research Establishment (DARE) in Bengaluru, Terminal Ballistics Research laboratory (TBRL) in Chandigarh, Armaments Research and Development Establishment (ARDE) in Pune.
Source: https://defenceupdate.in/
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