One Army technician was killed and two pilots injured after a Dhruv Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH) on an operational mission made a hard landing on Thursday morning on the banks of Marua river in Kishtwar region of Jammu and Kashmir.
The three personnel sustained injuries and were evacuated to Command Hospital in Udhampur where the technician, CFN Pabballa Anil, died of his injuries, the Army said.
This is the third incident involving an ALH in two months. After a Navy ALH-MkIII was ditched at sea on March 8, the entire fleet was grounded for checks, with only a few batches cleared recently for flying. Senior defence officials said the recent inquiry pointed to a critical design issue with the control rods which was the reason for several incidents.
“As per inputs, the pilots had reported a technical fault to the Air Traffic Controller (ATC) and proceeded for a precautionary landing. Due to the undulating ground, undergrowth and unprepared landing area, the helicopter apparently made a hard landing,” the Army’s Udhampur-based Northern Command said in a statement. “Immediate rescue operations were launched and Army rescue teams reached the site.”
A Court of Inquiry has been ordered and further details were being ascertained, it said.
The mean time for checks for the helicopter which was originally 600 hours has been brought down to 300 hours and it has been learnt that it has been further brought down to between 100 and 150 hours of flying.
The Navy had said that the ALH crashed after it experienced “sudden loss of power and rapid loss of height”. Later, a Coast Guard ALH also suffered an incident. In October 2022, a Rudra of the Army crashed in Arunachal Pradesh killing all five personnel onboard.
The ALH is indigenously designed and manufactured by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. Together, there are over 300 ALH of different variants flying with the three Services and the Coast Guard, which include the Mk1, Mk2, Mk3 and the Mk4 also called the Rudra Weapon System Integrated (WSI). The Army operates over 145 indigenous ALH, 75 of which are Rudra. Another 25 ALH Mk-III are on order and will be inducted over the next two years. The Air Force has over 70 ALH, the Navy 18 ALH and the Coast Guard has 20 ALH in service.
