A "Sea Skua" guided missile misfired Thursday, in the first test conducted in Southeast Asia, in the waters off Kuala Beruas near Pantai Remis in Perak, Chief of Navy Admiral Datuk Ilyas Din said. Matra BAE Dynamics of the United Kingdom, which conducted the test for the Royal Malaysian Navy (RMN), identified a technical problem as the cause of the failure, he added.The missile, fired at 11 am from a Super Lynx 300 attack helicopter at a wreckage of a ship eight nautical miles away, failed to hit its target and fell into the sea without exploding.
The company would carry out an investigation to determine the cause of the problem in two or three days, well before the second test that is scheduled a week from now, Ilyas told reporters on board the RMN vessel, KD Mahawangsa, here.
Thursday's Sea Skua missile test was the first conducted in Southeast Asia because Malaysia is the only country in the region to purchase the missiles, the complete package of which cost 16 million pounds sterling (about RM103 million). The agreement to purchase was made in 2001 and the supply of the missiles to the RMN began last year.