India test fires nuclear-capable Agni-II

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NEW DELHI: India's nuclear-capable, surface-to-surface Agni-II ballistic missile, with a strike range of 2000 kms, was on Friday test-fired as part of user trial by the army from the Wheeler Island off Orissa coast.

The indigenously developed missile was fired by personnel of the Strategic Forces Command (SFC) of the army from Launch Complex-IV of the Integrated Test Range (ITR) at about 0930 hours, defence sources said.

Agni-II, developed as one of the key weapon systems of country’s nuclear deterrence programme, is already under production and has been inducted in the Indian Armed Forces.

The two-stage solid fuel propelled Agni-II missile, developed by Advanced System Laboratory (ASL) and other DRDO laboratories, has a length of 20 metres, diameter of one metre and weighs around 17 tonnes, they said.

It is equipped with a special navigation system to achieve high degree of accuracy. The system is also equipped with anti-ballistic defence counter measures. It can be transported both by rail and road, they said.

The last trial scheduled on August 29 2011 was aborted due to some technical problem, the sources said.

A user trial of the missile conducted on May 17 2010 from the same base was successful.