IAF chief RKS Bhadauria flies sortie in HAL's 'Made in India' HTT-40 trainer aircraft

Air Chief Marshal Rakesh Kumar Singh Bhadauria on Thursday flew in indigenous basic trainer aircraft HTT-40 in Bengaluru. The Air chief undertook a sortie in a prototype of HTT-40 trainer aircraft which is still under development by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL).

Tweeting a set of pictures, HAL said, "ACM RKS Bhadauria, CAS flew HTT40, tested its flying capabilities for one hour. First serving Air Chief to fly in the prototype as Chief of Air Force."

The Air Chief assessed the aircraft's flying characteristics including stall and spin during the sortie, the HAL said in a statement.

HAL said the aircraft took to the skies at 1.20 pm and remained airborne for an hour. Bhadauria was accompanied by HAL's chief test pilot, Gp Capt (Retd) KK Venugopal, it added. 

ACM RKS Bhadauria, CAS flew HTT40, tested its flying capabilities for one hour. First serving Air Chief to fly in prototype as Chief of Air Force. Details follow.@drajaykumar_ias @SpokespersonMoD @DefProdnIndia @gopalsutar pic.twitter.com/s3goGyTJ8Z

— HAL (@HALHQBLR) November 14, 2019

"ACM Bhadauria became the first serving Air Chief to fly in HAL developed aircraft at the prototype stage as Chief of Air Force," HAL said.

He expressed his satisfaction with the aircraft performance and appreciated the design, project and flight test teams for having achieved the commendable progress, the statement said. 

"The project now needs to be speeded up for certification and HAL must target setting up of modern manufacturing facilities with high production rate from the beginning," he was quoted as saying by the company. 

The design team at HAL is motivated with the Air Chief's sortie. 

HTT 40 specifications

HTT 40 is an 1100 HP turboprop aircraft and its development was announced in 2012. But that very same year, the IAF announced a decision to buy Swiss-made 75 PILATUS PC 7 basic trainer aircraft and put HTT-40's future in doubt. However, the Ministry of Defence again showed interest in 2015 and placed an order of 68 units. 

The HAL developed its first prototype in February 2016 which took its first flight in May that year. The flight passed all basic test and the second prototype passed the test a year later. In November 2018, HTT-40 passed spin test and passed other tests subsequently. 

HAL hopes to get initial operational clearance by the end of the year and IAF will get the first delivery within a year. 

The HTT-40 has completed all major test points and meets the Preliminary Staff Qualitative Requirements (PSQR) issued by Air Headquarters, the HAL said.

It has successfully completed stalls, engine relights, inverted flying, acrobatic flying and systems testing.

The Basic Operational clearance and user evaluation trials readiness is expected soon, it added.

Technical Parameters

Max TOW: 2800 Kg

Speed: 450 Km/hr

Range: 1000 KM

Engine Thrust: 950 SHP

Cockpit: Tandem seating, Air conditioned cockpit

Modern Aircraft System: All metal, FADEC control Turbo Prop trainer aircraft with Zero-Zero ejection seats and Multifunction displays

Projected requirement: 106

Roles

Basic flying training

Aerobatics

Instrument Flying

Navigation

Night Flying

Close formation