Bangalore, September 13, 2005, B.R. Srikanth (The Telegraph)

Indian scientists will start flight tests of an unmanned airship (blimp) capable of surveillance and offering help during disasters.

The radio-controlled airship has been designed by scientists at National Aerospace Laboratories (NAL) here and the Defence Research and Development Organisation’s Aerial Delivery Research and Development Establishment, Agra.

“This is the first time India is building such a lighter-than-air airship. It will give us strong surveillance capabilities,” the NAL director, A.R. Upadhya, told reporters today.

The airships can be deployed near the borders for surveillance or used to assess damage from natural calamities or to monitor traffic flow. The size and range of the prototype are being worked out.

The Institute of Aerospace Medicine here is ready to support the Indian Space Research Organisation’s plans for a manned mission to space.

“We are ready for a manned mission. Once the government clears the project, we will upgrade our facilities to train (those picked to fly into space) for the mission,” Air Marshal and director-general of medical services, Padma Bandopadhyay, said today.

She said that in three years, the Institute of Aerospace Medicine will be equipped with a sophisticated human centrifuge that would simulate the conditions (such as zero gravity) in space.

But Isro sources said the plans were only limited to the drawing board (an Indian’s flight to space on board an indigenous rocket).