The accidental firing of a supersonic Brahmos missile to Pakistan in March 2022 was an "unfaithful accident", sacked Indian Air Force wing commander Abhinav Sharma said in a counter to a reply filed by the IAF in the Delhi High Court. He claimed that the reply filed by the IAF in the court is misleading, and attempts to conceal material facts and fails to address many averments.
Developed by BrahMos Aerospace, the Brahmos supersonic cruise missile can be launched from land, air, and water. The missile had entered Pakistan airspace from Suratgarh in Rajasthan and fell near Mian Channu city in Punjab province, in what the defence ministry of India later claimed was an accident.
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Sharma said there were "blatant gaps and ambiguities in the SOP (standard operating procedure) as regards who, amongst the combat crew and OPs officer, was responsible for disconnecting the combat connectors post health check," according to an ET report.
He also claimed that he was not included or informed about the altered mission which was communicated directly by the CO (commanding officer) to the OPs officer.
He said the decision on connection/disconnection of combat connectors is entrusted only to the OPs officer and the engineering officer, which he was, did not have any specific duty to connect or disconnect the combat.
The IAF had claimed that the accidental firing was due to its combat connectors ‘staying connected to the junction box.’ “The combat crew, (despite) knowing that that the combat connectors of combat missiles are connected to the junction box, failed to intervene to prevent the Mobile Autonomous Launcher commander from committing an unsafe act of launching the Combat Missile, resulting in a launch into the neighbouring nation, thereby causing a potential threat to any airborne/ground object/personnel,” the IAF had told the high court.
The IAF had also dismissed a claim by Sharma that he was in no position to avert the firing of the missile.
According to the ET report, Sharma said the squadron leader who was available during the pre-combat brief where the mission with one missile was briefed by the commanding officer to the combat team. "However, before assigning the mission to MAL (Mobile autonomous launcher), an altered mission with three missiles was demonstrated to Air cmdr Kurien in presence," he said in the rejoinder.
Observing that for such sophisticated new weapon systems, engineering officers are either selected from the beginning of their specialist training or based on their previous experience in similar missions, he said "no such criteria were available for the selection of operation officers who are directly appointed to important decision-making portfolios like MAL commander/flight commander (CO) with a limited period of operator training".