By News Dispatches NEW DELHE: Military technicians aborted the test launch of an Indian made ballistic missile for a second time May 1 delaying a program intended to make India the seventh nation with proven medium range rocket capability, a defense official said.
“During the final stage of countdown sequence … a data error was detected by the computer in one of the subsystems,” the official said, quoting a report from the launch site in Chandipur, 800 miles southeast of New Delhi.
“The mission authorities have decided to postpone the launch in order to rectify the error and to continue with the launch program,” the official said.
The Press Trust of India reported the computer discovered leakage of an unspecified gas required to boost the intermediate range ballistic missile named Agni, Hindi for fire, prompting the abort order 11 seconds before scheduled lift off. The Press Trust quoted scientists as saying the problem was unrelated to a technical snag that stopped an April 20 launch, It said scientists planned to give the missile a thorough checkup before trying to fire it again in about a week.
Senior officials, including Defense Minister K.C. Pant, had gathered for the test in eastern Orissa, where officials paid adult residents of nearby villages $5 each to leave for a day and stay in government run shelters.
Some 11,000 people were evacuated but locals object to the establishment of the launch site because the government’s long term plan involves permanent relocation of residents of the area of fertile farmland.
Agni’s success would make India the seventh nation to have a proven ability to develop medium range missiles, after the United States, Soviet Union, Britain, France, China and Israel, but New Delhi is unlikely to soon introduce the weapon into its rapidly expanding arsenal.
Experts agreed with the government’s claims that the missile is a “technology demonstration vehicle” that would not go into full production without dozens of tests. They said the missile is about 45 feet tall and has two stages, with both engines propelled by a blend of liquid oxygen and hydrogen rather than solid fuel.
Agni’s second stage includes technology from New Delhi’s short-range Prithvi surface to surface missile fired in February 1987, while the first stage is closely linked to boosters that sent several satellites into orbit for India’s civilian space program, they said.
The design is totally indigenous and is comparable in technology to the American Viking rockets developed during the early 1950’s as nuclear delivery vehicles, exnerts said.
Analysts said the significance of the test will not lie in putting a dummy warhead into an orbital trajectory since India has already proven that capability in its civilian space program but more in the ability to bring a one ton payload back to Earth.
The test will confirm that Indian technicians have mastered metallurgy techniques required for making heat shields one of which is to protect the incoming warhead during its searing reentry at more than 25,000 mph.
Conflicting claims surround the missile’s range with reports varying between 600 and 1,800 miles, and accuracy, which some experts claim could be as low as 15 miles off target. Experts hold the test will be a 600mile shot, with the warhead aimed at the southern Bay of Bengal, though which various naval vessels have been deployed to track the projectile and receive telemetry data. Agni is also part of what Indian defense experts claim is a gradual program to put into place an infrastructure should New Delhi decide to build a nuclear deterrent.
They maintain India has not embarked on full-scale development of atomic weapons, even though it demonstrated its capability in 1974 when it detonated an underground nuclear device and was subsequently placed under Stringent restrictions by the nuclear powers.
Article extracted from this publication >> May 12, 1989
