KOCHI: Marking completion of the critical stage of phase-II constriction, Indigenous Aircraft Carrier INS Vikrant was undocked on Wednesday afternoon.
Though undocking marked completion of a crucial phase, neither the Navy nor the Cochin Shipyard organised a formal function in connection with the event.
The undocking which was scheduled to be held on May 29 was postponed many times owing to heavy deposit of silt in the channel and certain technical problem in the dock gate.
“A vessel is undocked when the work that is to carried out in the dry dock is completed. In the case of Vikrant, all underwater works have been finished and the ship is ready to float out. The remaining work can be completed while the ship is floating,” sources said.
The ship is supposed to begin sea trials in 2017, and inducted into the Navy by 2018-end. When the first phase of the construction was completed in August 2013, the warship was launched by then Defence Minister A K Antony’s wife Elizabeth, and was named INS Vikrant.
INS Vikrant is capable of carrying 36 fixed-wing aircraft, including Russian-made MiG-29K and the yet-to-be-inducted indigenous Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas, developed by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL).