India’s first human space flight, scheduled to be launched sometime in the second half of 2021, will, most likely, have at least one woman astronaut on board. Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) K Sivan told The Indian Express that women candidates would be actively considered, although he would not like to pre-judge the selection process which was still to start.
“We, of course, would like to have women also to be there (on the space flight). You would remember our Prime Minister had mentioned son or daughter while announcing the human space flight. It would be very good if a woman is part of the first flight. But these things are still to be discussed and finalised. The selection process (for choosing the astronauts) has not started yet,” Sivan said.
“There are many criteria to be fulfilled (for selection of astronauts). The Air Force, which will provide the candidates, would be part of the entire process. The selection process is long and maybe it is still a bit early to talk about these things with finality,” he said.
Gaganyaan, the great Indian human leap to space by 2022, will soon get cracking under a new Human Space Flight Centre and a dedicated team around five months after it was first unveiled. A team of 800 to 900 people is to be deployed over time to carry it out.
Indian Space Research Organisation on Friday named Unnikrishnan Nair, who led its Advanced Space Transportation Programme at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, as the man to steer it - as also the director of the new centre. Dr. Nair has already been involved in this work for a few years as director, Human Space Flight Project. ISRO.R.Hutton, who has helmed the PSLV light lift vehicle programme, also from Thiruvananthapuram, is the project director in that set-up.
K.Sivan, ISRO Chairman and Secretary, Department of Space announced the new set-up soon after forming it. A handful of deputy directors each for the centre and the project have also been picked.
"Gaganyaan is our highest priority now. We have put in a management structure to realise it. The Human Space Flight Centre [based in Bengaluru] will carry out all activities related to the human programme. Under it will function the Gaganyaan Project."
Dr. Sivan explained, "All work related to the mission will formally begin now," including the schedule, blueprint of various tasks, astronaut selection with the Indian Air Force and systems based on the project report.
He told The Hindu that the nodal Human Space Programme Office set up six months back under V.R.Lalithambika would continue to coordinate mission affairs at the headquarters here, Antariksh Bhavan.
ISRO has projected to the government a manpower requirement of 861 including 761 to be appointed in addition to the routine annual hirings. However, they would be recruited in stages.
ISRO's own Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology, Thiruvananthapuram, which produces around 100 space engineers each year, will be a primary source of talent, said a senior official.
"The year 2019 has started with a big bang with Gaganyaan getting the government's approval and budget for putting threre astronauts in space for seven days," Dr. Sivan said. The astronauts will orbit Earth from an orbit 400 km away.
The project, according to him, will be a major turning point for ISRO, expanding its activities beyond engineering activities of launchers and satellites - and into the realm of developing and handling technologies to sustain humans in space.
"The HSPC will work full steam now. We must select the astronauts, train them, create and ensure livable conditions in space for them bring them back safely and later rehabilitate them in their routine," Dr. Sivan said.
The heavy lift launch vehicle GSLV MarkIII - which got operational in November after its second successive flight in a row, must be suitably certified or human-rated. It will have two non-crew flights in December 2020 and July 2021.
The actual flight with crew is targeted to happen by December 2021 - to meet the Prime Minister's goal of August 2022, India's 75th year of Independence.
It seems that ISRO Standard Timelines are far ahead than Indian Standard Timelines....ISRO starts Human Space Flight centre
ISRO Chairman K. Sivan during a media interaction in Bengaluru on Friday. | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Gaganyaan, India’s mission to send astronauts to space, is slated to happen before December 2021.
Former ISRO chief attributes delay to political factors and changed priorities.
India could have put an astronaut in space in 2015 had the original plan for the human spaceflight programme worked out, former ISRO chairman G. Madhavan Nair has said.
Mr. Madhavan Nair, who headed the space agency from 2003 to 2009, attributed the delay to political factors and the changed priorities of the subsequent ISRO management.
“But it’s never too late. ISRO now has a strong chairman in K. Sivan. The human spaceflight mission will be a turning point in the Indian space programme,” he told The Hindu on Friday, responding to ISRO’s formal announcement that it plans to put three Indians in space in December 2021.
Natural choiceAccording to Madhavan Nair, it was in 2005 that ISRO decided that it was time to think beyond the grand vision of Dr. Vikram Sarabhai. “Dr. Sarabhai wanted India to achieve self-reliance in satellite building, launch vehicle technology and, more importantly, ensure that the common man benefited from these technologies. We took a review in 2005. The question was, what next?” recalls Mr. Nair.
The human spaceflight programme was a natural choice as a target for the future, he said.
“Human access to space had become very important for various reasons. One, ISRO had improved in terms of launch vehicle technology. Second, if we are to send humans to the Moon and Mars, we have to make a beginning,” he said.
Green lightIn 2008, ISRO prepared a project report and submitted it to Space Commission. The same year, a small team was formed at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) to study various aspects of spaceflight and the technologies that such a venture called for. It was headed by S. Unnikrishnan Nair, who was appointed project director, Human Spaceflight Programme (HSP). The team consisted of 10 to 12 people.
“In 2009, the Planning Commission gave the green light for the programme.
“In 2009, the plan was to have the mission in six years. So by 2015, we would have been flying in earth orbit. But unfortunately due to various political factors and probably, the attitude of the subsequent management in ISRO it was put in cold storage,” he said.
AHMEDABAD: The countdown to India’s ambitious manned spaceflight mission Gaganyaan has begun and Isro scientists are at breakneck speeds to achieve the mission’s December 2021 deadline. India’s indigenously developed astronaut crew escape suit, bearing the ‘Made in Vadodara’ tag is the first on Isro’s wardrobe. The suit is 20% lighter and one hundredth of the cost of its foreign counterpart. The astronaut crew escape suit will see the best of both American and Russian space suits. The last time an Indian wore a space suit was in 1984, when wing commander Rakesh Sharma flew aboard Russian Soyuz T-11.
Sure Safety, a Vadodara-based industrial safety equipment manufacturer has designed the suit from scratch after collaborating with Isro’s Space Applications Centre (SAC), Ahmedabad. The firm gave the first glimpse of the space suit at the Futuristic Technology Exhibition inaugurated on Thursday at the Science City. Nishith Dand, managing director of the firm, told TOI that trials for testing the material under lab conditions are almost over, including vacuum chambers tests. “Right from the communications, bio-sensors measuring body temperatures, oxygen and carbon-monoxide levels and to pressure management systems, all technology has been developed indigenously. We are the fourth company in the world to produce a suit for astronauts,” he said. Other feature of the suit are a flexible hood zipper, touch screen sensitive gloves, utility pockets, air diverters and light weight shoes. The space suit operates at temperature ranging from minus 40°C to 80°C.
Talking about how the suit fares compared to its counterparts used by space agencies in the US and Russia, Dand mentioned that the suit is about 20% lighter while maintaining high standards of safety vis-à-vis fire, water and pressure changes. “We can say that functionality-wise, it’s a cross between the suits used by Russia and the US in terms of life support system, oxygen/air management and functionality,” he added. The suit will also be nuclear, biological, chemical (NBC) resistant.
BENGALURU: India will not use animals to test systems for the Gaganyaan project. The Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) will have a humanoid - robot resembling a human - conducting experiments in space twice before actually sending humans by 2022.
"The humanoid is almost ready," Isro chairman K Sivan told TOI , adding, "This mission should serve a purpose beyond displaying our ability to send humans and bring them back safely."
"Our robot will be able to do whatever a man can do, although not as extensively as them. We want to show that even the first flight will not go empty and utilise the opportunity to the maximum. We will use our own humanoid model," he said.
TOI had reported first about the space agency looking at experiments from at least 10 areas ranging from testing medical equipment to microbiological experiments such as air filters and biosensors, and from life support and biomedical waste management to monitoring toxic gases.
Isro has received over 40 proposals from research institutes and they will be evaluated by experts who will make the final selection.
Sivan said the Gaganyaan design configuration may be frozen by next week. The Centre has cleared Rs 10,000 crore for the project.
"We had set up 11 Concept Review Committees with each focusing on one or more sub-systems. All have completed their reviews and we've already had one integrated committee meeting. The design is likely to be finalised and frozen either this week, which will be followed by procurement, making of proto-models and tests" Sivan said.
Dry runsOn August 15 this year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced in his Independence Day speech from the ramparts of Red Fort that India would put its own astronauts in space for the first time. The ambitious project, called Gaganyaan, has gathered speed to meet its December 2021 deadline and the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) is working on war footing. The Union Cabinet in December approved a Rs 10,000 crore budget for the proposed human spaceflight mission. Below is a peep into what all is Isro doing to accomplish this historic feat:
Isro has kick-started the process of selecting experiments that could be performed in the Low Earth Orbit (LEO), where it will send Indian astronauts who will be called Gaganauts. From testing medical equipment in space to micro-biological experiments such as biological air filters and biosensors, and from life support and biomedical waste management to monitoring toxic gases, Isro is looking at a pool of at least 10 experiments. Isro is building three sets of rockets, crew and service module. Each of these sets will be used for one of these three missions — two unmanned missions planned for December 2020 and June-July 2021, and the actual mission by December 2021 or early 2022.
Dry runsAll systems for a space launch are designed with redundancies, but a human-rated mission needs a much higher degree of redundancy. The reliability targeted for human-rated launch vehicle is 0.99, which means only 1 out of 100 can be unreliable. For the crew escape system, Isro targeting greater than 0.998, that’s almost 100 per cent, reliability.
Isro has kick-started the process of selecting experiments that could be performed in the Low Earth Orbit (LEO), where it will send Indian astronauts who will be called Gaganauts. From testing medical equipment in space to micro-biological experiments such as biological air filters and biosensors, and from life support and biomedical waste management to monitoring toxic gases, Isro is looking at a pool of at least 10 experiments. Isro is building three sets of rockets, crew and service module. Each of these sets will be used for one of these three missions — two unmanned missions planned for December 2020 and June-July 2021, and the actual mission by December 2021 or early 2022.
Selecting GaganautsAll systems for a space launch are designed with redundancies, but a human-rated mission needs a much higher degree of redundancy. The reliability targeted for human-rated launch vehicle is 0.99, which means only 1 out of 100 can be unreliable. For the crew escape system, Isro targeting greater than 0.998, that’s almost 100 per cent, reliability.
Isro is working with the Indian Air Force (IAF), whose agency, Institute of Aerospace Medicine, will be responsible for selecting and training the astronauts. IAF is getting ready to identify a pool of ace pilots who would undergo a battery of tests, including psychological assessments. The selection would be over by the end of this year.
While parameters have not yet been identified, officials have told ET that IAF test pilots — who are specially trained to handle emergency situations and experimental aircraft — are likely to be part of the first manned mission.
The Indian mission will also have a woman astronaut who will be selected from the pool of military pilots in India.
'Made in Vadodara' space suitThe IAF has recently inducted women fighter pilots who could be considered for the project. It also has a pool of women pilots with considerable experience in flying transport aircraft and choppers. While many other countries, including Russia, have promised support to train an Indian crew for the mission, efforts will also be made to put an Indian system in place which will be able to select personnel and train them with the creation of special facilities here. The Institute of Aerospace Medicine will play a critical role in the selection and training of astronauts which will involve the extensive use of simulators and the human centrifuge system.
This is a small but very significant achievement for 'Make in india' programme. India’s indigenously developed astronaut crew escape suit will bear the ‘Made in Vadodara’ tag. The suit is 20 per cent lighter and one hundredth of the cost of its foreign counterparts. The astronaut crew escape suit will see the best of both American and Russian space suits. The last time an Indian wore a space suit was in 1984, when wing commander Rakesh Sharma flew aboard Russian Soyuz T-11.
'Made in Agra' parachutesSure Safety, a Vadodara-based industrial safety equipment manufacturer has designed the suit from scratch after collaborating with Isro’s Space Applications Centre (SAC), Ahmedabad. The firm gave the first glimpse of the space suit at the Futuristic Technology Exhibition inaugurated on Thursday at the Science City. “Right from the communications, bio-sensors measuring body temperatures, oxygen and carbon-monoxide levels and to pressure management systems, all technology has been developed indigenously. We are the fourth company in the world to produce a suit for astronauts,” Nishith Dand, managing director of the firm, told TOI. Other features of the suit are a flexible hood zipper, touch screen sensitive gloves, utility pockets, air diverters and light weight shoes. The space suit operates at temperature ranging from minus 40°C to 80°C.
When the three Indian astronauts return to the earth after spending a week in the space, they would use parachutes manufactured in Agra. The astronauts will be brought back to the earth by a pair of parachutes specially-made by Aerial Delivery Research and Development Establishment – one of the laboratories under the Defence Research and Development Organisation, according to a Deccan Herald report.
ADRDE had supplied 10 of such high-strength parachutes to Isro for trials.These recovery systems were used by the space agency while bringing the crew module back in the Bay of Bengal in December 2014 and later for the successful pad abort test in July 2018.
On their journey back to earth, the astronauts would first have to lower the Gaganyaan to a 120 km orbit, where the separation of crew module will take place. After separation, they will take about 36 minutes to descend. The splash-down would be at a place close to the Gujarat coast in the Arabian Sea. These parachutes will reduce the speed of the crew module from 216 mt per second to 11 mt per second on touchdown.
Indian Speace Research Organisation (ISRO) today announced that it will send two unmanned mission to space in December next year and in July 2021. Speaking to Media in New Delhi, ISRO Chairman Dr K Sivan said to boost innovation and creativity and galvanise hightech aerospace industry, ISRO has lined up many plans this year.
He said country's first manned space flight - Gaganyaan - will send three humans into space for seven days by December 2021. Dr Sivan said ISRO's unmanned test missions for Gaganyaan in 2021 will carry humanoids not animals.
Dr Sivan said 32 planned missions including Chandrayaan-2 are in the pipeline. He said Chandrayaan-2 is a complex and challenging mission and it will land near south pole.
The Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) first unmanned mission to space will have a humanoid — a robot that looks and acts like a human — on board. This was revealed by K Sivan, chairman of ISRO on January 18, 2019, according to a media report.
But there seems to be certain confusion around the status of this humanoid. In the first report, Sivan claimed that "we have our own humanoid model that will be used" and it is "almost ready".
But two days later another media report narrated the story of a meeting between two ISRO scientists, Tirtha Pratim Das and Raghu N, with an amateur humanoid developer, Ranjeet Srivastava, from Ranchi. The scientists wanted to check if Srivastava could customise Rashmi, the robot developed by him, for use by ISRO.
ISRO wants its humanoid to be able to simulate activity as close as possible to human physiology and characteristics, so that it can get its space modules ready for human space flight. But if ISRO already had a humanoid ready then why were its scientists scouting for another.
The scientists later told Srivastava that the decision on whether Rashmi would be the first Indian humanoid in space will be taken after a review is conducted by ISRO in Bengaluru.
This is not the first time that a humanoid would be used for space travel as agencies of United States (US), Japan, Canada and Germany have built and successfully sent humanoids to conduct various experiments in space.
The National Aeronautical and Space Administration (NASA) of US built the first humanoid in space, called Robonaut 2, which has been assisting astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) since 2011.
According to NASA, “Robonaut not only looks like a human, but is designed to work like one, with human-like hands and arms that can operate the same tools crew members use.”
Robonaut can flip switches, remove dust covers, install handrails and perform other duties using the Robonaut Task Board inside the ISS. NASA also claims that “with further development and enhancements, humanoid robots will be able to work alongside humans on spacewalks.”
NASA worked on the Robonaut project for 15 years before sending it to space. The first version of the humanoid took four years to be created.
Russia is also planning to send a humanoid called FEDOR aboard its Soyuz unmanned spacecraft to ISS. FEDOR had created controversy in 2017 when Dmitry Rogozin, the deputy prime minister of Russia, had tweeted a video of the robot shooting guns with both its hands.
If ISRO is able to successfully launch its humanoid in space project then it would be a major boost to the humanoid industry in India, and will also be useful to the Indian space industry.
“I think that it’s a good idea to send a humanoid into space first. If an animal goes there, it would have needs which would be difficult to meet. For example, there will be the problem of providing oxygen and waste management inside the module,” says Santosh Hulawale, an independent innovator and developer of humanoids, based in Mumbai.
“A humanoid will not require these facilities and work like a human being. Even better it can work long hours without getting tired. The robot can also be remotely controlled from Earth and given commands to do specific tasks. Apart from this there are no chances of fatalities which would be the case if animals are used,” he adds.
Hulawale has worked on humanoids since 2008 and developed his first robot, INDRO, in 2016. Subsequently, he has also developed two other versions of the humanoid known as INDRO 2.0 and INDRO 3.0—which has around 47 individual joints and 29 servo motors, which make it very close to simulating human movement.
“Taking cue from tests done with human-like dummies to check the safety of cars, a humanoid with sensors attached to it can also tell us if it will be safe for a human being to travel in the same module to space and simulate human space flight from the generated data,” Hulawale adds.
However, he flagged some challenges with the current status of humanoid research. “Current humanoids are designed to do specific tasks but people want them to do everything, which at current state of technology is not possible. Humanoids like Sophia which can talk to people are based more on basic artificial intelligence, which comprises of software application and learning algorithms where significant work has been done. But less work has happened on making these robots move like human beings,” says Hulawale.
Dr. K Kasturirangan, Former Chairman, ISRO in the presence of Dr. K Sivan, Secretary, DOS/Chairman, ISRO, inaugurated Human Space Flight Centre (HSFC) today (30th Jan’2019) at ISRO Headquarter campus in Bengaluru. Directors of other ISRO Centres, former Chairman and other dignitaries were also present during this event. A full scale model of GAGANYAAN’s crew module was also unveiled during this event.
HSFC shall be responsible for implementation of GAGANYAAN Project which involves end-to-end mission planning, development of Engineering systems for crew survival in space, crew selection & training and also pursue activities for sustained human space flight missions. HSFC will take support of the existing ISRO Centres to implement , the first development flight of GAGANYAAN under Human Space Flight Programme. Dr. S Unnikrishnan Nair is the founder Director of HSFC and Shri R Hutton is the Project Director of GAGANYAAN project.
If somebody wanted to know what's that antenna like thing on every manned rocket and how will ours look like.
First one will be seen in 2020. Slant the boosters and ogive the fairing bus in image at left.