Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar dedicated a Seakeeping and Manoeuvring Basin (SMB) to the nation and handed over the Advanced Torpedo Defence System “Maareech” to the Indian Navy at the Naval Science and Technological Laboratory (NSTL) in Visakhapatnam.
About SMB – Seakeeping and Manoeuvring Basin
The Rs.168-crore SMB is a state-of-the-art hydrodynamic testing infrastructure facility to validate the design of naval platforms and weapon systems. The facility was designed and developed using Indian equipment.
- It is for experimental hydro dynamics for testing ship models and submerged bodies built for the use by Indian Navy. It could be used even by civilian ship builders
- SMB helps test models to predict performance of newly designed ships and submerged bodies under different environmental conditions.
- It will optimise the motion characteristics of the hull form and effectiveness of the control devices under various operations.
About Expendable decoy – Maareech
Maareech Advanced Torpedo Defence System (ATDS) have been developed by Naval Physical and Oceanographic Laboratory (NPOL), Kochi, along with the Naval Science and Technological Laboratory (NSTL), Visakhapatnam.
- It is an anti-torpedo system with towed and expendable decoys.
- The system is capable of detecting, confusing, diverting and decoying the incoming torpedoes.
- The decoy helps in exhausting the energy of the torpedo and prevents them from homing in to the targeted platform with its advanced counter-measure capabilities.
Varunastra – a heavy torpedo, designed and developed by the NSTL, has gone through user evaluation trials and a clearance is awaited for its production.