BENGALURU. The Light Combat Aircraft (Tejas LSP8) has successfully completed the Wet (actual) engagement on September 10, by transferring 1900 Kgs fuel from IAF IL78 mid-air refueling tanker. The refueling was carried out at an altitude of 20000 ft. The aircraft speed was 270 knots and all the internal tanks and drop tanks were refueled. A few days ago, the successful dry docking of aerial refueling probe with mother tanker was carried out on September 4 and 6, 2018.

With this, India joins the elite group of countries who have developed the Air-to-Air (AAR) system for military class of aircraft, says Mr R Madhavan, CMD, HAL.

Piloted by Wg Cdr Siddarth Singh of NFTC, this significant milestone was achieved today at 0930 hrs with designers from HAL and ADA closely monitoring the system parameters from the ground station at Gwalior.

The performance of aircraft systems (mainly Fuel & Flight controls systems) during the trial were in-line with the design requirements and was closely matching with the results of extensive ground tests of air-to-air refueling system.