NEW DELHI: A heavy-duty drone or remotely-piloted aircraft, assembled in India by Adani Defence and Aerospace under license from Israel, crashed into the sea during pre-acceptance trials off Porbandar in Gujarat on Monday.
The medium-altitude, long endurance (MALE) drone called Drishti-10 by the Adani group, based on the Hermes 900 Starliner of Israeli firm Elbit Systems, was being operated by the vendor from the Porbandar naval air enclave when it ditched into the sea.
“The vendor has retrieved the drone and will analyse what went wrong. It has no financial implications for the Navy since the drone was yet to be delivered,” an official said.
The Army and Navy in 2023 ordered two each of these satcom-enabled drones, which are touted to be capable of operating at an altitude of up to 30,000-feet with an endurance of 36 hours and a 450-kg payload, under emergency procurement provisions.
Each of these drones, which are designed for long-range ISR (intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance) missions, costs around Rs 120 crore. While the first Drishti-10 was delivered to the Navy in Jan last year, the Army got the second in June. The one that crashed on Monday was earmarked for the Navy.
The armed forces, which over the years have imported a large number of Israeli Searcher, Heron Mark-I and Mark-II drones for long-range surveillance and precision-targeting, require almost 150 new MALE remotely-piloted aircraft systems.
India in October last year had inked the Rs 32,350 crore contract with the US for 31 armed MQ-9B `Predators’, which are high-altitude, long endurance (HALE) drones. Under it, 15 MQ-9B Sea Guardians are earmarked for the Navy, while the Army and IAF will get eight Sky Guardians each, all armed with Hellfire missiles, GBU-39B precision-guided glide bombs and other weapons.