India successfully tested the Extended Range Pinaka (Pinaka-ER) Multi Barrel Rocket Launcher System at the Pokhran Range today, Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) said.
The system, which is an upgraded version of the earlier Pinaka rockets, has been designed by the DRDO, Development Establishment laboratory and Pune-based High Energy Materials Research Laboratory.
"The DRDO, along with the Army, conducted series of performance evaluation trials of these industry produced rockets at field firing ranges during the last three days," the Defence Ministry's statement said.
"In these trials, enhanced range Pinaka rockets were test-fired at different ranges with various warhead capabilities. All the trial objectives were met satisfactorily," the statement added.
Additionally, indigenously-developed "proximity fuzes" for Pinaka rockets have also been tested, the defence ministry informed.
The multiple rocket launcher Pinaka which have been used by the Indian Army for over a decade, will now have enhanced range, the DRDO informed.
Although the range is not known yet, the Pinaka MK-I rocket system has a range of around 40 km while the Pinaka II variant can hit targets at a distance of 60 km.
In June this year, the DRDO test-fired 25 enhanced range versions of Pinaka rockets. This was done in quick succession mode as part of saturation attack simulation.
Two different variants were simultaneously test fired from the Pokhran range by DRDO in December this year as well.
Both of these tests were successful.
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