India Is All Set To Test Fire Home-Grown Cruise Missile Nirbhay Today

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is all set to conduct a fresh trial of the indigenously developed cruise missile Nirbhay later today. The test, as reported by The New Indian Express, will be conducted from the Integrated Test Range at Chandipur in Balasore district of Odisha.

Nirbhay is an all-weather, low-cost, long-range cruise missile capable of carrying conventional and nuclear warheads and is believed to have a range of 750 - 1,000 km.

The surface version of the missile was test-fired for the first time on 12 March 2013 and was partially successful. The second test, performed on 17 October 2014 was the fist successful test of the subsonic missile. The missile was tested again on 16 October 2015 to analyse its low-flying capabilities.

The two side wings of the missile enable it to fly at different altitudes ranging from 500 m to 4 km above the ground. The missile can deliver 24 different types of warheads depending on mission requirements and uses an inertial navigation system for guidance.