SOURCE: SHIVA MUDGIL / FOR MY TAKE / IDRW.ORG
Dr. AK Ghosh, director of India’s AMCA fifth-generation fighter program will be a relieved man today after incoming new Air Chief Marshal Rakesh Kumar Singh Bhadauria completely backed India’s only 5th generation AMCA fighter jet program and also stressed that IAF is not keen on importing Fifth Generation fighter aircraft like Su-57E or F-35 from Russia or USA, thus making AMCA jet lone 5th Generation fighter jet marked for entry in the IAF in near future.
Ghosh while speaking at Aero India 2019 earlier this year had informed that he aircraft design is in final stages of the development and full 1:1 scale model of the AMCA will be ready for RCS measurements at ORANGE (Open Test Range Facility for radar Cross Section Antenna Measurement) laboratory later this year.
Ghosh also stressed that like the LCA-Tejas program, AMCA will have its first flight by 2025-26 and will have a developmental timeline of at least 10 years for induction to take place by 2035. In the initial stage, AMCA Prototypes will use a Baseline F-414 engines supplied by the General Electric but will switch to high power engines with thrust vectoring nozzles at later stages.
AMCA will be getting an upgraded Next Generation UTTAM AESA Fire Control Radar which is already under development. IAF is likely to place orders for nearly 200 AMCA fighter jet when it is ready for induction from 2035 onwards when most of India’s fighter jet fleet of French and Russian original will start retiring.