‘Historic milestone’: Light combat aircraft makes maiden landing on INS Vikrant

KOCHI: The Indian Navy has achieved a historic achievement by successfully landing a light combat aircraft on the Indian-made aircraft carrier INS Vikrant. No other country has been able to land an aircraft carrier within five months of its commissioning. India has overtaken America in this regard. Navy sources said the fighter jet was test-launched in US only after a year on an indigenously built aircraft carrier. So, this a proud achievement for India. INS Vikrant built at Kochi Shipyard, was commissioned on September 2, 2022.

Yesterday, a fighter jet landed for the first time in Vikrant while it was traveling in the Kochi coast. The arduous task of landing to a fixed location and taking off on a runway of only 200 meters on a moving ship was made successful. This is a Russian-made MiG-29K fighter jet. The plane landed in 13 seconds. The twin-engine aircraft is capable of flying 3000 km continuously. Vikrant continues travelling in the sea doing experiments. Earlier, helicopters were landed on INS Vikrant.

"A historical milestone achieved towards Aatma Nirbhar Bharat (self-reliant India) by Indian Navy as naval pilots carry out landing of LCA (Navy) on board the INS Vikrant.”, said a spokesperson of Indian Navy.