The Navy Not in Favour of A Second Indigenous Aircraft Carrier (IAC-2)
After prioritizing the development of six nuclear attack submarines over the construction of the second indigenous aircraft carrier with 65000 tone displacement, Navy seems no more interested in IAC-2 project.
However, the Navy still plans to seek approvals in the latter part of the decade and has quietly turned downed suggestions of development of second Vikrant sister class aircraft carrier in 45000 tone displacements made by some of the officials in the MOD.
India’s indigenous aircraft carrier 1 (IAC 1) INS Vikrant successfully passed basin trials at Cochin Shipyard Limited in Kochi last year and most of the fabrication work on the flight deck and weapons integration work is going smoothly and it is expected that INS Vikrant will start user trials by end of this year and will commence air operations trials after that and will be commissioned by end of 2022.
A leading Defence Media site was informed that INS Vikrant sister ship could have been economical and could have been much cheaper, but the design has its limitations, and also bigger 65000 tons conventional aircraft carrier can be equipped with the next-generation aircraft launching system Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) and can field newer generation locally developed fighter jets like TEDBF.
Source: IDRW
