About a fortnight into the new year, if all is a ‘go’, on 15 January 2017, ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) will take the most daring shot in its nearly 50-year-history, never attempted by any space agency in the world. On that day, ISRO will launch 83 satellites in one stroke – most of them from the US, Europe and the UK.
It promises to be a nail-biting mission, and all the satellites, which will be small ones, will be placed in the 580-km sun synchronous orbit. ISRO officials say the major challenge would be to keep the rocket in the same orbit till all the satellites are placed in their respective slots. The rocket for this much-awaited flight will be the highly-proven, advanced version of the four-stage Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV). If this mission succeeds, India’s space programme will once again rocket into global history books.
To date, Russia holds the record for launching the largest number of satellites in a single attempt – 37 on 19 June 2014. This was followed by the US which put into orbit 29 satellites in one single shot on 19 November 2013. On 22 June 2016, ISRO put into orbit 20 satellites in one ‘go.’ The achievement does not end with this. On 26 September 2016, another significant milestone was crossed by our space agency when it placed in orbit eight satellites in two different orbits, in an extremely complex manoeuvre, which was executed flawlessly.
On this day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted: “Our space scientists keep scripting history. Their innovative zeal has touched the lives of 125 crore Indians and made India proud worldwide.’’
And who can forget the ground-breaking Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) which entered Martian orbit on 24 September 2014, in the very first attempt itself – a feat not achieved by any space-faring nation aiming for the red planet. This accomplishment fetched ISRO a number of international awards.
Remember India’s first mission to the moon, Chandrayaan-1, which was launched on 22 October 2008, at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, a two-and-a-half-hour drive from Chennai? This mission set a world record by discovering water on the moon.
It started from a fishing village
Interestingly, the story of these achievements did not have a conventional start either in a workshop or laboratory as it is the case in other countries, but in a beautiful church called St Mary Magdelene Church located at Thumba, not far from Thiruvanathanapuram airport. Quite an unconventional, but auspicious launch. Thumba was once a fishing village before the space department took it over with the full backing of the villagers.
In the 60s when the space programme was taking shape, many of the rooms in the church were converted into workshops and offices, and among those who worked at the place was Dr. A.P.J.Abdul Kalam. The conditions were not too advanced, but the scientists and engineers never complained.
The scenario at Thumba was a picture of contrasts. The hi-tech rocket parts were taken in cycles and sometimes even in bullock carts! The church has since been converted into a space museum attracting several visitors.
It was at Thumba that the Indian space programme had its early beginnings, with the design and development of what are known as sounding rockets, which are used for studying the atmosphere. The first sounding rocket was supplied by NASA (National Aeronautics Space Administration), and it was called Nike-Apache and was launched on 21 November 1963. Apart from the US, countries like France and Russia used Thumba to launch their sounding rockets. ISRO started launching indigenous sounding rockets from 1965, and the experience gained was of immense value in mastering solid propellant technology.
Encouraged by the success of the sounding rocket programme, Vikram Sarabhai who headed the space department, called his team and told them that if India had to be truly an independent space-faring nation, it had to develop its own capability to launch satellites.
The scientists wholeheartedly supported the idea and offered their complete support. Thus came the satellite launch vehicle (SLV) programme.
The story of our first rocket
The first one called SLV-3 was India’s first experimental satellite launch vehicle. It was all-solid propellant, four-stage rocket, which was capable of carrying into orbit 40 kg class of payloads in the low earth orbit. The first flight in August 1979 failed, but the second one in July 1980 was a thumping success. After this, there were two more launches of this rocket in May 1981 and April 1983.
According to ISRO, the successful culmination of the SLV-3 project paved the way for advanced launch vehicles like the Augmented Satellite Launch Vehicle (ASLV), the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), and the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV).
Following the SLV-3 project was the ASLV. With five stages, it was an all-solid propellant rocket, which was developed to place 150 kg class of satellites into a 400-km circular orbit.
After the ASLV came the 44-metre tall, four-stage PSLV which in every sense proved to be India’s super rocket, which has won international acclaim and established itself as one of the world’s most reliable launch vehicles. Operating for over two decades, this rocket has the distinction of carrying spacecraft for historical missions, like Chandrayaan-1, the Mars Orbiter Mission, Astrosat, India’s first space observatory, the space capsule recovery experiment, and the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System.
According to ISRO, the PSLV is essentially used for carrying remote sensing satellites, and with 11 of them in this category now in orbit, they are one of the largest constellations in the world. These satellites have applications in the field of agriculture, land reforms, fisheries, just to name some of the areas. Their images are also in demand by foreign space agencies. Going by the success rate of the PSLV, foreign countries are in a queue to have their satellites, be it for universities or remote sensing purposes, launched by this rocket. The PSLV has also launched student satellites, and so far, eight have been placed in orbit. The most recent one is Pratham, a satellite designed by the students of Mumbai IIT.
Following the PSLV, was the three-stage geosynchronous satellite launch vehicle which was once nick named “naughty boy,’’ but has now become a “good boy.’’ It was called a “naughty boy”, because of its initial spotty record. Of the nine launches since April 2001, four had failed. The upper stage of this rocket uses the cryogenic engine initially procured from Russia, and subsequently it had indigenous ones having a good success rate.
The GSLV is used for carrying two-tonne class of INSAT-series communication satellites. They are one of the largest domestic communication satellite system in the Asia-Pacific region, with nine of them placed in the geo stationary orbit, which is 36,000 km from the equator. They help in the area of telecommunication, TV broadcasting, weather forecasting, disaster warning, and search and rescue operations.
In the latter half of 2017, probably on 21 September 2017, India’s first private mission to the moon by a Bengalaru-based organisation, Team Indus, will be launched. The rocket for this much-awaited historical flight will be the advanced version of ISRO’s PSLV-XL.
It is a part of the worldwide Google Lunar X Prize competition, and Team Indus is the sole Indian participant. The competition stipulates that after landing on the moon, the rover which will fly with the mission, has to move about 500 metres on the lunar surface transmitting images and videos to the ground stations. There is no reason why Team Indus should not be the winner.
India wants to launch communication satellites in the four-tonne class. It is therefore developing a rocket called LVM-3. Its first flight was on 18 December 2014, and the second one is slated for January 2017. This rocket will also be used for ISRO’s human space flight programme once the green signal is received from the government.
Till LVM-3 becomes operational after a few more test flights, India is launching its four-tonne communication satellites by the European rocket, Ariane-5, operated by Arianespace. The lift off is from European spaceport of Kourou in French Guyana.
All these rockets – the PSLV, GSLV and LVM-3 – are expendable ones. In layman’s parlance it simply means that once they fly and put a satellite in orbit, their role ends. This makes the operation pretty expensive.
So, what is the solution? ISRO is therefore, focussing on low cost access to space, which will substantially reduce launch costs. For this it is developing a reusable launch vehicle (RLV) which is a combination of a rocket and an aircraft. It will take off like a rocket and land like an aircraft. The first test flight was on 23 May 2016, and the vehicle landed like an aircraft in the Bay of Bengal, and three more test flights have been scheduled, though no time limit has been fixed. The first flight met all the objectives. According to ISRO, “The design and development of the RLV was the most technologically challenging endeavours of ISRO.’’
Quite understandable, considering the somewhat chequered record of similar launch vehicles in other countries – NASA’s space shuttle, Russia’s Buran and Japan’s Hope.
In another significant development, ISRO is working on an air breathing rocket which will inhale oxygen from the atmosphere during the flight. The advantage of this is that it will considerably reduce the amount of propellant needed to place a satellite in orbit. In the bargain, the payload mass can be increased. In plain terms, it means that more instruments can be carried on the spacecraft or the weight of the instruments themselves can be increased. It tested this on 28 August 2016, with what is known as a scramjet engine.
Small budget, big gains
All this has been achieved by ISRO with a budget of $ 1.2 billion. Compare this with the budget of NASA which is $79.27 million. With a frugal budget of $74 million, ISRO pulled off the Mars Orbiter Mission, grabbing global headlines. Again, in contrast, the budget for NASA’s Maven mission to Mars was $671 million dollars and that of the European Space Agency’s Mars Express cost $ 386 million. India’s second mission to Mars called Mars-2 is tentatively slated for launch in 2020.
And finally, the country’s second mission to the moon, Chandrayaan-2 with an orbiter, lander and rover, will touch down on the lunar surface in December 2018. All in all it has been an exciting and a thrilling nearly 50-year-old journey for the nation’s space programme, from a church to the stars. It is now poised to go further and further.
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Srinivas Laxman
Srinivas Laxman worked with the Times of India as a reporter, where his focus was on aviation. He later graduated to the space sector covering numerous launches at Sriharikota. He has visited various NASA centres and the European spaceport of Kourou in French Guyana. He has interacted with well-known luminaries like Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Kalpana Chawla, Sunita Williams and Rakesh Sharma. Laxman has written four space-related books – two about India’s mission to Mars, one about the Indian moon mission, and a biography of Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam. [/column]