DRDO NGARM:- India’s Next Gen Radar Destroying Anti Radiation Missile

An anti-radiation missile (ARM) is a missile designed to detect and home in on an enemy radio emission source.Typically, these are designed for use against an enemy radar, although jammers and even radios used for communications can also be targeted in this manner.

Most ARM designs to date have been intended for use against ground-based radars. Commonly carried by specialist aircraft in the Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses (SEAD) role. The primary purpose of this type of missile is to degrade enemy air defenses in the first period of a conflict in order to increase the chances of survival for the following waves of strike aircraft. They can also be used to quickly shut down unexpected surface-to-air missile (SAM) sites during an air raid. Often, SEAD escort aircraft also carry cluster bombs, which can be used to ensure that, after the ARM disables the SAM system’s radar, the command post, missile launchers, and other components or equipment are also destroyed to guarantee that the SAM site stays down.

DRDO NGARM was tested for the first in Jan 2019. Equipped with dual pulse motor, the missile ensures terminal phase maneuver accurately. NGARM can destroy any ground based radar system at 100 – 125km away with precision strike capability. The fact that NGARM uses a laser proximity fuze (LPF) for detonating its warhead (which is of pre-fragmented type and is specifically designed to attack key radar parts) is also indicative of a desire to fully exploit the imaging capability of its terminal guidance scheme to accurately target the most vulnerable parts of an enemy emitter.

NGARM was sanctioned for development in 2012 at a cost of Rs 317.20 crores with a project completion date (PDC) of December 2017. However, that PDC has been extended according to DRDO sources and developmental trials are still underway. Like most other anti-radiation missiles (ARMs), NGARM’s primary guidance system is an on-board passive homing head (PHH) with broadband capability, which allows it to discriminate and lock on to a target of interest among a number of emitters available in its field-of-view (FoV).

The future battle is very tough with modern capabilities, the one who controls the space eventually wins the war. Almost all nations military’s have mobile radar battery and air defense missiles to counter incoming air targets like helicopters and fighter jets. Radar’s are the only option to scan the sky for any intruders in long range.

It will be an Air-to-Surface missile (ASM) with a range of 100 to 125 km.This missile will be mounted on advanced air superiority fighter Su-30MKI and indigenously developed LCA Tejas.This missile is completely indigenous including its radiation seeker.

The shape and other features of the anti-radiation missile will be similar to Astra missile but its size may be larger than Astra.Instead of thrust propulsion, Indian Anti-radiation missile uses dual pulse propulsion system as in the case of LR-SAM. The dual pulse propulsion will widen the envelope as well as the engagement capability of the missile.

The missile uses the exact dual pulse motor used in the Barak 8 missile, The missile have two stages, when launched from the air craft the first engine ignites and go through the designated way point, once the missile’s seeker found the target and locks himself, it uses the second high speed motor in the terminal phase.

But what promises to make NGARM a truly contemporary system, is the fact that it could possibly be equipped with a millimeter wave (MMW) seeker in the future, which one could speculate operates in the W- band for the endgame. This would very much be in tune with Western trends towards the use of terminal guidance on ARMs to counter emitter shutdowns. MMW-based terminal guidance means that by simply shutting down their radars quickly or by changing position and/or using decoys, enemy operators do not ensure the survivability of their systems. A good MMW seeker head should be able to discriminate between decoys and actual targets and also locate emitters that have packed up and are on the move within an arc of a few km.

 

 

Image:- Kuntal Biswas

Source:- Life of solider, AMCA Facebook Page