Washington: Defence minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday visited a modern US Navy testing facility for ships and submarines at Memphis in Tennessee at a time when India is looking at setting up a similar facility for locally produced platforms, the defence ministry said on Sunday.
Singh visited the William B Morgan large cavitation channel (LCC) at the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Memphis, where senior officials briefed him on one of the world’s largest and most technically advanced high-speed, variable-pressure water tunnel facilities.
He was accompanied by senior navy and DRDO (Defence Research and Development Organisation) officials.
“The discussions intend to support the ongoing proposal for establishment of a similar facility for indigenous design and development in India,” the defence ministry said in a statement.
The LCC is part of the Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock Division, one of the US Navy’s preeminent research and development facilities that specialises in critical ship and submarine design.
Operational since 1991, it provides significant cost savings for testing large-scale models of advanced ship and submarine system designs and full-scale torpedoes in a controlled environment, according to the US Navy.
It permits the US Navy to measure submarine and surface ship power, efficiency, and propeller noise by using models in a controlled but realistic environment. The facility has commercial use too.
Singh was greeted by deputy under secretary of the US Navy for Policy Anne Gebhards and Naval Surface Warfare Center and Undersea Warfare Center Commander Rear Admiral Todd Evans.
“Witnessed the pathbreaking experiments at the facility. India and the US look forward to work together and benefit from each other’s experiences,” Singh wrote on X.
