The story of IAF’s tryst with MiG-21 fighter planes
The March 17 crash of a MiG-21 Bison in Gwalior — the second this year — has turned the spotlight on India’s longest-serving fighter plane, its safety record and the Indian Air Force (IAF)’s plans to replace the ageing jets with newer ones in the coming years.
The air force got its first single-engine MiG-21 in 1963, and it progressively inducted 874 variants of the Soviet-origin supersonic fighters to bolster its combat potential, said officials familiar with the MiG-21 fleet. But more than 400 MiG-21s have been involved in accidents that have claimed the lives of 200 pilots during the last six decades, earning the fighters ominous epithets such as “Flying Coffin” and “Widow Maker”.
The two Bisons that crashed this year — the first accident took place near Suratgarh in Rajasthan on January 5 — are the most advanced variants of the MiG-21 fighter planes. The MiG-21 Bis (an upgraded variant of the plane flown for the first time in 1976) was further upgraded to MiG-21 Bison in India in 2000.
