“Raven” and “Spike Firefly” to be inducted in Indian Army

It will add lethality to its ground infantry apart from the long-range artillery shells

• The Indian army is all set to acquire hand-launched, remote-controlled unmanned vehicle Raven from the United States
• Procurement of 200 pieces of AeroVironment RQ-11 Raven and talks for purchase of Israeli flying ammunition- Spike Firefly is in advance level
• The forces will use the hand-launched, remote-controlled unmanned vehicle to conduct reconnaissance mission

Move of Defense Acquisition Council (DAC)

• Defense Acquisition Council (DAC) is likely to acquire the remotely controlled unmanned aerial vehicle- Raven from the United States and Israel’s Spike Firefly
• As per media reports, procurement of 200 pieces of AeroVironment RQ-11 Raven and talks for purchase of Israeli flying ammunition- Spike Firefly is in advance level
• The aim is to add lethality to its ground infantry apart from long-range precision artillery shells with a range of over 40 km
• The forces will use the hand-launched, remote-controlled unmanned vehicle to conduct reconnaissance mission
• The small, light and agile weapon kit system includes three loitering munitions (LMs) and Control Unit (CU) with standard bidirectional data link

Key highlights of AeroVironment RQ-11 Raven

• The RQ-11 Raven is a remotely controlled unmanned aerial vehicle that is launched with hand
• It is manufactured by AeroVironment (U.S. California based Defense Contractor)
• RQ-11 Raven can fly up to an altitude of 500 feet from the ground level with a speed of between 45-97 Kilometers per hour
• RQ-11 Raven can fly up to 10 Kilometres

Key highlights of Spike Firefly

• The Spike Firefly is developed under a joint venture of Israeli company- Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Israel’s Ministry of Defense
• The Spike Firefly has loitering capability and can be carried by a soldier as a part of his kit
• The Spike Firefly can be operated from a table by a single user without requiring any special skills to operate
• It was the capability to identify and track the target and also to a unique abort/wave-off capability in which the operator can call the Spike Firefly back to the command safely
• The weight of the Spike Firefly is 3 Kg
• It is one of the newest technology developed by Israel, it has been ordered for the first time by Israel’s Ministry of Defense for their Defense Force

Indian Force to acquire fighter jets from France

• Indian Air Force is all set to get five Rafale multi-role fighter jets from France this month
• India and France had inked the delivery of 36 Rafale jets to India under the Rs. 59,000 crore deal in September 2016
• The Indian government has also asked France to speed up the delivery of the fighter jets
• The first batch will be comprising 4 to 5 jets are likely to arrive in India on July 27, 2020
• The development can be seen in the midst of the ongoing standoff between India and China on the Line of Actual Control

Pic courtesy : fresherslive.com