MOSCOW. Nov 23 (Interfax-AVN) - The MIG aircraft corporation has launched preparations for the demonstration of the new MIG-29MRCA multifunctional frontline fighter to specialists of a Latin American country, a MIG official said on Friday.
The plane was created in a record term, as only 11 months passed between the making of decision to draft technical documents on the plane and its first flight, Andrei Karasyov, deputy constructor general and first deputy director of the Mikoyan design bureau's engineering centre, told Interfax-Military News Agency.
The MIG-29MRCA has made 20 test flights. Experts say that the fighter fully meets flight and technical requirements. The plane took off for the first time on September 26, 2001. It was first shown to the general public at the MAKS 2001 air show in the Moscow region in August. The plane made its first foreign appearance at the LIMA 2001 air show in Malaysia, where it was piloted by test pilot Pavel Vlasov. A pilot of the Malaysian Air Force was allowed to make a flight on the plane, too. According to him, the new aircraft is easier to control and more manoeuvrable than the MIG-29N Fulcrum in the inventory of the Malaysian Air Force.
The MIG-29MRCA is a two-seater modification of the MIG-29UB combat and training plane. According to Karasyov, MIG constructors have designed a single-seater variant that is much cheaper than the two-seater. The new multifunctional fighter boasts a radar capable of detecting aerial and ground targets simultaneously, as well as a central computer that processes data from all on-board systems and displays them on the pilot's liquid crystal indicators.
The plane is equipped with the most up-to-date armament of the air-to-air and air-to-surface classes, including H-29 and RVV-AE missiles. It can use KAB-500 guided air bombs and other aircraft armament. The plane and its armament can be controlled from both cockpits.
The market price of the MIG-29MRCA depends of the customer's requirements to the plane's complete set, but it is much lower than that of analogous U.S. planes, such as the latest modification of the F-16 tactical fighter.