Indian Navy Upgrades INS Vikramaditya With Barak-1 Air Defense Systems

The Indian Navy has refitted its aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya with Barak-1 air defense systems and Russian made AK-630 close-in weapon system for operational services.

AK-630 close-in weapon system is borrowed from a to-be-decommissioned Godavari-class ship.

The $2.3 billion aircraft carrier acquired from Russia was inducted in the Indian Navy in 2013 without self-protection systems.

"The aircraft carrier will sail out of the harbour after its first short refit and join the Navy in a week," Vice-Admiral P. Murugesan, Vice-Chief of the Naval Staff, said on Tuesday.

The carrier was originally scheduled to receive a long-range surface-to-air missile system under joint development with Israel. But the carrier was inducted without its own air-defense cover due to delay in its development.

Barak 8 is an upgraded version of the Barak system that both the nations use. The missile is being jointly developed by India's Defense Research & Development Organization (DRDO), Israel's Administration for the Development of Weapons and Technological Infrastructure, Elta Systems, Rafael and other companies.

The state-run Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL) will series produce the 70 km-range Barak-8, with 32 missiles to be initially fitted onto INS Kolkata.

The Isreali Barak 8 missile is capable of intercepting incoming missiles. It is able to simultaneously track hundreds of airborne targets to a range of more than 250 Kms. The missile had undergone a successful test in Israel last November.