AFVOA Newletter August 2020

Section 4 – War Diary CV 2 No. 02 / 2020 Page 44 of 237 2 The Attack on Tiger Hill Air Mshl R Nambiar PVSM AVSM VM & Bar Genre: Gallantry / War On the 24 of June 1999 the Indian Air Force dropped its first LGB in anger. The release was from a Mirage 2000 and I was privileged to have been the pilot in command. In the days that followed I was honoured to drop four more LGBs, thus dropping 5 out of the total of 8 LGBs delivered by the Mirage 2000 in the Kargil Conflict. This is my story. dampur is a major Air Force Base in Punjab and I had been deployed there since 22May 1999 for Operation Safeed Sagar, which was the Indian Air Force monikers for its Air Operations in Kargil. I was then a Wing Commander and posted as the Station Flight Safety & Inspection Officer of Air Force Station Gwalior where the Mirage 2000 is based. I had just over 1900 h on the Mirage and was an Experimental Test Pilot with bags of experience. The Battle Axes were deployed at Adampur and I had been attached to the unit as an “Augementee” along with a few other officers from other units of the IAF. On the evening of 22 June we were tasked to attack Tiger Hill with LGBs the next morning. I was selected to captain a two seater with Sqn Ldr Monish Yadav as my back seater. The target was a set of enemy tents perched at the top. We got airborne in a two aircraft formation at 0630h and set course after take-off in a North Easterly direction to RV with two Mirages from Tiger Sqn, which was operating from Ambala. The join up was uneventful and we maintained R/T silence as we winged our way to the target. Tiger Hill is unique in shape and size when viewed from the ground. But from 30,000 ft up it is indistinguishable from the other tall peaks in the vicinity. The only mountain that stands out in this grand vista is K2, Mount Godwin-Austen, which at 28, 2510 ft towers over its surroundings. The aids on board the Mirage allowed us to spot Tiger Hill with relative ease. We had it in contact by 50 km and were unpleasantly surprised to find a tiny cloud perched right on its tip obscuring the DMPI and rendering the LGB impotent. The endurance of the Mirage allowed us to hold on station for about 30 min, so we went around three more times hoping the cloud would drift away and we could complete our mission. In the fourth attempt, as we turned away from the target, Monish yelled at me to “flare left” indicating a missile launch. I instantly throttled back to idle power and hauled the aircraft A