Sunday, October 06, 2013
By : Defence News
The Indian Air Force's first upgraded Mirage 2000H fighter made its debut flight at the Istres-Le Tube air base in France yesterday.
The Indian Air Force's first upgraded Mirage 2000H fighter made its debut flight at the Istres-Le Tubé air base in France yesterday. The upgraded Mirage 2000, sporting a brand new avionics suite, self-protection suite, the Thales RDY-2 multimode radar and other systems, is the first of 49 aircraft that will be upgraded over the next seven years.
The upgraded Mirage 2000H fighter jet is effectively now at 'Dash-Five' standard. Last year two Mirage 2000 fighter jets crashed in India in quick succession, forcing a fleet grounding of more than 50 days.
India paid $2.4 billion to upgrade 49 Mirage jets and $2.4 billion to buy 45 brand new Mig-29K's and 400 BVR missiles at an additional cost of $1.23 billion for the Mig-29K jets. A contract has also been signed with MBDA, France, for procurement of MICA air to air missiles for the Mirage 2000 aircraft. Delivery of MICA missiles for the Mirage jets is scheduled between 2015 and 2019.
The real question is how does the 49 Mirage face off against the brand new 45 Mig 29K's.
The upgrades to the Mirage 2000 fighter jet include:
1) New avionics, including an advanced navigation system, mission computers, Mil 1553 B data with Digibus, a pulse doppler radar that can find objects out to 70 nautical miles
2) Two displays and an advanced head-down display in a glass cockpit
3) Electronic warfare systems, including new radar warning receivers with instantaneous wide-bank receivers, an integrated missile warning receiver with continuous time-to-impact information, and new jammers and countermeasure systems
4) Increased fuel capacity
5) Four Derby beyond-visual-range missiles
6) Two short-to-medium-range Python V missiles
7) Long-range smart munitions
8) Full mission simulators
The upgraded aircraft will have a warranty of 24 months or 3600 operational hours.