Singapore Navy Employs Barak-1 Point Defence Missile Against Simulated Surface Target

22 April 2016

A Barak-1 missile launched by RSS Vigour streaks towards a simulated surface target in this screen capture from an official video. (photo : Sing Mindef)

The Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN) has successfully conducted a live firing drill against a simulated surface threat with the Barak-1 anti-air/anti-missile point defence missile system aboard the Victory-class guided missile corvette RSS Vigour (P 92), Singapore's defence minister, Ng Eng Hen, revealed in an official video posted on his Facebook account in late March.

A Barak-1 missile is seen being launched from Vigour , which then performs a turnover manoeuvre using its thrust vector control before adopting a straight and level approach and successfully impacting on a designated target platform that appeared to be stationary.

"The [RSN] tested its anti-missile [anti-air and anti-surface too] missile called the Barak fired from Vigour ," Ng wrote on his Facebook page. "It detected and tracked the target and launched the Barak missile to hit spot-on."

The Barak-1 missile system - developed by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems - comprises the missile, launcher, and fire-control system (FCS). The system employs an automatic command-to-line-of-sight guidance, with the missile performing a short inertial navigation system-assisted automatic flight before its onboard guidance system receives radio-frequency command signals from the ship's ELTA EL/M-2221 FCS during the terminal phase of operation.

The missile effector is 2,175 mm in length, has a maximum diameter of 170 mm, and weighs 98 kg at launch. It is powered by a solid-propellant, dual-pulse rocket motor that enables it to engage missile and aircraft targets from up to 5 and 12 km away, respectively, with a 22 kg high-explosive blast/fragmentation warhead. The engagement envelope for surface targets is not known.

Despite repeated requests for clarification following the release of the video, Singapore's Ministry of Defence (MINDEF) had not responded to IHS Jane's by the time of publishing, while IAI declined to comment on whether an anti-surface warfare (ASuW) capability has been introduced to the missile.

(Jane's)