Unannounced Indian Test Missile Launch Forces Indonesian Passenger Plane to Return to Jakarta

While traveling through Indian airspace Friday, a passenger jet flying from Indonesia to Saudi Arabia, had to return to Jakarta, when an unannounced missile flew across the sky, forcing the flight to turn back.

The Boeing 747 plane was in flight, when a ballistic missile with nuclear capabilities was launched. There was no government word just how far away the missile was, but The Garuda Indonesia plane, carrying 413 passengers was returned to Jakarta when the Indian control tower informed the pilots the missile was already launched. There was no previous warning issued to alert the passenger plane prior to the flight.

Officials from India had announced Thursday, that they had test-fired a missile, The Agni lll, it's longest range missile.

The United States and other countries had previously urged India not to develop the Agni lll. ( The word "Agni" translated from Hindi means "fire".) The fear is that the development of these long range missiles by India, will escalate a nuclear arms race between Pakistan and India, but India insists it is necessary to defend itself against any possible threat coming from it's western neighbor Pakistan and China to the north. India has had conflicts with both countries in the past.

The missile is believed to have a range of 3,000 kilometers, which is approximately 1,864 miles, and could carry a nuclear warhead as large as 300 kiloton.

A 300 kiloton nuclear warhead would initially explode into a fireball extending more than a mile in diameter.

The temperatures at the center of the explosion would reach 200 million degrees Fahrenheit, which is up to 5 times hotter than the sun's center.

It would create fires for miles around and destroy structures and living beings in it's path.

The explosion would cause melted and disintegrating debris as large as cars to be hurled through the air like missiles.

The destruction from a 300 kiloton nuclear warhead would be many times more destructive than Hiroshima, and it would contaminate areas hundreds of miles downwind from the initial explosion. All this destruction would be caused by one bomb alone.

The Garuda Indonesia flight was able to leave from Jakarta again 7 hours later, but both this flight and another international flight scheduled to depart for Riyadh, the capital and largest city in Saudi Arabia were delayed at a substantial expense to the airline.

The foreign ministry of Indonesia is demanding clarification of the incident from Indian officials. They do not want a repeat occurrence of any similar incident in the future.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/indonesia_india_missile
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/ind-pak/2003/04mis.htm
http://www.wagingpeace.org/articles/2005/11/00_starr_effects-of-300-kiloton-detonation.htm