AD-1 Ballistic Missile Defence Interceptor Missile tested by DRDO

AD-1 is a long-range interceptor missile designed for both low exo-atmospheric and endo-atmospheric interception of long-range ballistic missiles and aircraft

The Defence Research and Development Organisation on Wednesday successfully conducted the maiden Flight Test of Phase-II Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) interceptor AD-1 missile with a large kill altitude bracket from the APJ Abdul Kalam Island.

The flight test was carried out with the participation of all BMD weapon system elements located at different geographical locations.

AD-1 is a long-range interceptor missile designed for both low exo-atmospheric and endo-atmospheric interception of long-range ballistic missiles and aircraft. It is propelled by a two-stage solid motor and equipped with an indigenously-developed advanced control system, navigation and guidance algorithm to precisely guide the vehicle to the target.

According to the DRDO, all sub-systems performed as per expectation during the flight test and the same was validated by the data captured by a number of range sensors, including radar, telemetry and electro-optical tracking stations deployed to capture the flight data.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh congratulated DRDO and other teams associated with the successful flight trial of AD-1. He said that AD-1 is a unique interceptor with advanced technologies that are available to very few nations in the world and that it will further strengthen India's BMD capability to the next level.

The DRDO Chairman too congratulated his team for the successful trial of AD-1 and said this interceptor would provide great operational flexibility to the users and have the capability to engage many different types of targets.