US Company Boeing on 27th July signed a contract with India for four more P-8I Poseidon Aircraft for Indian Navy. The contract was inked during the ongoing visit of US under Secretary for Defence on Acquisition Frank Kendall, and is seen as a sign of growing Indo-US defence ties.
This came at a time when Chinese nuclear and conventional submarines are making frequent forays in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).
Here are 10 features and facts about the P-8I Poseidon aircraft:
- The P-8I is an “anti-submarine warfare, anti-surface warfare, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft.”
- The P-8I is the Indian Navy variant of the P-8A Poseidon that Boeing has developed for the US Navy. The Indian Navy is the first international customer for the P-8I aircraft.
- The twin-engine jet has a range of about 2,222 kilometres, or more than 1,200 nautical miles, which allows the Indian navy to monitor the country’s vast coastline.
- It has a maximum speed of 907 kmph and an operating range of 1,200 nautical miles, “with four hours on station”.
- The P-8Is provide the reach and flexibility to undertake extensive maritime surveillance and intelligence-gathering missions.
- The planes will provide strategic blue water and littoral undersea warfare capabilities as well as armed intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance to the navy.
- The planes, a replacement for the Soviet-era Tu-142 fleet, are expected to be in naval service not before 2050.
- The underbelly of the dual-cockpit plane, capable of high rates of descent and short-field landings, has a bomb bay for torpedoes and launching tubes for sonar listening buoys. It can carry missiles, bombs and mines.
- The Navy is already using the eight P-8Is, armed with deadly Harpoon Block-II missiles, MK-54 lightweight torpedoes, rockets and depth charges, to keep an “intelligent hawk-eye” over the entire IOR.
- Based at the naval airbase INS Rajali at Arakkonam (Tamil Nadu), the P-8Is are also been extensively used in the ongoing search operation for the missing AN-32 aircraft.
Apart from the 12 P-8Is, the major deals inked with the US previously include ones for 13 C-130J Super Hercules aircraft ($2.1 billion), 10 C-17 Globemaster-III giant strategic airlift aircraft ($4.1 billion) as well as 22 Apache attack and 15 Chinook heavy-lift helicopters ($3.1 billion) and the $737 million 145 M-777 ultra-light howitzers deal under the Pentagon’s foreign military sales programme.
