HAL rolls out first indigenously upgraded Hawk Mk132

BENGALURU: Public sector Hindustan Aeronautics Limited has rolled out the first indigenously upgraded Hawk Mk132.

"This is the 100th Hawk aircraft produced at HAL and we are proud that it has 'Make in India' mark," Hindustan Aeronautics Limited Chairman and Managing Director T Suvarna Raju said in a statement here.

The aircraft was rolled out on the eve of Republic day.

Raju said that HAL had conceived a programme for indigenous upgradation of the Hawk Mk132 for achieving self-reliance and has successfully accomplished it.

"This aircraft, which was rolled out on the eve of Republic day, would be on the flying display in the forthcoming Aero-India 2017 at Bengaluru," he said.

The upgrade was taken up so as to be independent in matters like integration of new sub-systems or modifications, obsolescence management of avionics systems and to enhance the aircraft operational and training capabilities, Raju said.

HAL rolled out its own aircraft with the upgrades in a record time, he added.

In the Hawk upgradation programme, imported Mission Computer and Data Transfer Units have been substituted with HAL designed and developed systems, Raju said.

This indigenous Mission Computer in the dual redundant configuration has additional capabilities such as Digital Map Generation which provide improved situational awareness, he said.

The Embedded Virtual Training System offers improved training capability over the existing system, Raju said.

HAWK-i also provides secured voice communication and data link capability by integration of Softnet Radio and pilots can configure and select cockpit Human Machine Interface for different aircraft platforms, he added.