The Indian MoD said that VSHORADS is a manportable air defence system (MANPAD) designed and developed by the DRDO and Indian industry partners. (Indian Ministry of Defence)
India's Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has completed two flight tests of its very short-range air-defence system (VSHORADS) missiles, the Indian Ministry of Defence (MoD) said.
According to a press release by the MoD on 27 September, the tests were conducted from the Integrated Test Range (ITR) in Chandipur off India's northeastern coast in Odisha.
“VSHORADS is a manportable air defence system (MANPAD) designed and developed indigenously by DRDO and Indian industry partners,” the MoD added.
The DRDO is developing VSHORADS for the Indian Army, a source at DRDO told Janes .
The source added that the “DRDO does not have any orders from the Indian Army to produce VSHORADS but [the organisation] is developing the system to meet the requirements of the Indian Army”.
“The Indian Army will evaluate the prototype developed by [the] DRDO. Once [the] VSHORADS prototype meets the Indian Army's requirements, it will [issue] a tender for production,” the source said.
The source said that current flight tests of the VSHORADS were conducted as a part of initial trials.
“The current flight tests were not conducted on the final product. The tests were just initial trials. More trials will follow,” the source said. The source added that the trial was successful but that the DRDO could not disclose detailed test results at the time of publication.
According to the MoD, the VSHORADS missile incorporates many new technologies including a miniaturised reaction control system (RCS) and integrated avionics, which have been “successfully proven during the tests”.
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