Indian Martian exploration program

[kseeker]

Isro prepares for propellant filling in PSLV C25 | Business Standard

The Rs 450-cr Mars mission is slated for lift-off at 2:38pm on Nov 5 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota

Almost 28 hours prior to the historic moment of launching its Orbiter to Mars, the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) said that it has started preparing for propellant filling operation of Second Stage (PS2) in the spacecraft, which will carry Mangalyaan to the Mars.

"Mandatory checks and preparation for propellant filling operation of Second Stage (PS2) of PSLV C25 launch vehicle for ISRO's Mars Orbiter Mission are in progress," said Isro officials.

On Sunday, at 6.08 am sharp at Sriharikota, the final 56-and-a-half-hour countdown for the launch of India's Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) started. The Rs 450-crore Mars mission is slated for lift-off at 2.38pm on November 5 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, located on the island of Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh. On November 1, Isro's launch authorisation board had given the final green signal for the launch of the MOM.

Despite the cyclone threat on the southern coast of Tamil Nadu, which is heading towards Sri Lanka, the spacecraft will take off as planned as the weather is fine in the Andhra Pradesh coast, where Sriharikota located. Isro officials added weather is fine.

India will be the sixth country, after US, Russia, China, Japan and the European Union, to launch a Mars mission. Once launched, the satellite is expected to take more than 40 minutes to get injected into Earth's orbit.

The orbiter will remain in Earth orbit till December 1 when it starts its 300-day voyage to Mars. It is expected to reach the orbit of the red planet on September 24, 2014, after traversing 400 million km.

Isro officials said that Mars has drawn more space missions than the rest of the Planets in our Solar system.

However, historically, only a third of all the missions to the red planet have tasted success. Locking horns with this red dot in the skies is excruciatingly challenging in terms of the technological mettle required in the domains of Navigation, propulsion System design, deep space communication systems, ground segment and thermal and radiation management.

 

[kseeker]

Mars mission countdown begins - The Hindu

PSLV-C25 to lift off from Sriharikota at 2.38 p.m. on Tuesday

India's ambitious mission to Mars moved ahead smoothly on Sunday with the 56.5- hour countdown beginning at 6.08 a.m. at the Sriharikota spaceport. If the countdown progresses without any "hold," the four-stage Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C25) will lift off from the first launch pad at 2.38 p.m. on Tuesday (November 5) and put the 1,350-kg Mars Orbiter in a long, elliptical earth-orbit. That will signal the first step of the spacecraft's 300-day odyssey to the Red Planet.

"All is well. The countdown is progressing smoothly. Everything is fine," Director of Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) in Thiruvananthapuram S. Ramakrishnan told The Hindu from Sriharikota around 7 p.m. on Sunday.

"We are relaxed," said M.Y.S. Prasad, Director of Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) at Sriharikota.

Both Mr. Ramakrishnan and Dr. Prasad said separately that the filling of the PSLV-C25's fourth stage with liquid propellants was completed just minutes ahead of 7 p.m. on Sunday. The second stage would be filled with liquid propellants on Monday. The first and third stage were filled with solid propellants.

K. Radhakrishnan, Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), said the cost of the Mars mission was about Rs.460 crores. This included building the spacecraft and the ground radar stations and augmenting the capacity of ISRO's Deep Space Network Station at Byalalu, near Bangalore.

Criticism

Asked about the criticism that a "poor" country like India is wasting money on sending a spacecraft to Mars, Dr. Radhakrishnan said, "We want to tell this country that Mars has a relevance"¦Science leads to understanding"¦ Some people ask, "Why are you spending Rs.460 crores?" Others will say that Rs.460 crores is only some four rupees per head in this country. Then some others will say it is only the price of an aircraft. So there are different ways of looking at it"¦We want to tell this country that this is a complex mission."

M. Annadurai, Programme Director of Indian Remote-sensing Satellites and Small Satellites Systems, ISRO, called the Mars Orbiter Mission "a logical extension of Chandrayaan-1." "The mission profile is similar to that of the moon mission. The powerful PSLV-XL , which put Chandrayaan-1 into orbit, will swing into action in the Mars mission also.

After the Chandrayaan-1 mission in 2008, ISRO chose to head towards Mars because there are several similarities between the Earth and Mars. They include solid surfaces, seasons, the duration of their day and the polar ice caps. Also, if water exists on Mars, there may be microbial life on the planet.

After India established itself among world leaders in building application-oriented remote-sensing, communication, weather and surveillance satellites, which were "our bread and butter missions," it was "a natural corollary" that India should turn its attention to science satellites, ISRO scientists said. Hence Chandrayaan-1, the Mars mission, Chandrayaan-2 in 2016, Astrosat for study of cosmic sources and Aditya-1 to study the solar corona.

Suspenseful 43 minutes

Unlike the previous PSLV missions, which lasted about 18 minutes to put remote sensing satellites into orbit, the flight duration of PSLV-C25 will last a suspenseful 43 minutes before the rocket's fourth stage puts the spacecraft into orbit. "This is the speciality of the mission," said B. Jayakumar, Vehicle Director. As Mr. Jayakumar and R. Hutton, Associate Vehicle Director, stood a couple of hundred metres in front of the Mobile Service Tower encasing the four-stage PSLV-C25 on October 30, they asserted that "the PSLV is a rain-proof vehicle."

Besides the 43-minute flight, yet another missionspeciality is the 25-minute coasting phase between the third stage burn-outand the fourth stage ignition. A third speciality is that it is only 37seconds after the fourth stage burn-out that the spacecraft will be injected into orbit.

V. Seshagiri Rao, Associate Director, SDSC, said several ground stations, including two ship-borne radars in the South Pacific Ocean, would track the vehicle and its positional information would be received every 100 milliseconds.

 

[kseeker]

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...elp-for-Mars-mission/articleshow/25238936.cms

Isro chief seeks divine help for Mars mission

CHENNAI: "Everything is going on fine; but then, anxiety is a human trait." That - coming from Indian Space Research Organization (Isro) satellites programme director Mylswamy Annadurai — summed up the mood at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota on Monday, the eve of India' first Mars orbiter mission.

Some 1,000 scientists have been checking every parameter at the spaceport from where PSLV-C25 will lift off at 2.38pm, carrying the Mars orbiter. And rocket science sought to co-opt spiritualism. Carrying on with a tradition followed by his predecessor G Madhavan Nair, Isro chairman K Radhakrishnan offered pujas at the Tirupati Venkateswara temple, about 100km from the launch pad, with miniature replicas of the rocket and the Mars orbiter spacecraft.

Coming out of the temple, Radhakrishnan told reporters: "It's a long mission, and the spacecraft is expected to reach the Mars on September 24, 2014." After the countdown began at 6.08am on Sunday, customary checks and propellant filling operations have been going on with textbook precision. Scientists said it was all "very serious business" but they are enjoying it with enough lighter moments.

A scientist quipped if it was more than a coincidence that the Mars mission named Mangalyaan falls on a Mangalvaar (Tuesday, the day of Mars, called Mangala in Indian astronomy). "We know we have done a great job," chipped in another, "but let's not complain if there is a little divine intervention." The launch was postponed from October 28 since one of the two radar-fitted ships that are to track the rocket from the South Pacific Ocean had not reached its destination due to bad weather.

Irrespective of the launch date changing by a few days, the orbiter is expected to reach Mars on September 24, since it would be in an Earth orbit till the wee hours of December 1. Till then, the orbiter will go in an elliptical orbit 250km at its nearest point to Earth and 23,500km at the farthest. Thereafter, the spacecraft will start a 300-odd day journey to Mars, through the phases of influence of Earth, Sun and, finally, Mars.

"We are all relaxed," said Annadurai, who was the project director of Isro's Chandrayaan-1 mission in 2008 that eventually found moisture on the polar region of moon. "In fact, I am moving out of Sriharikota now to Bangalore for the post-launch operations," he told TOI on Monday evening.

Radhakrishnan had earlier said that getting the orbiter around Mars in itself would be a success. "There have been 51 launches by the US and Russia. Only 21 of them have been successful," he said. India would be the sixth after the US, USSR/Russia, European Union, China and Japan to launch a Mars mission.

 

[Sridhar]

Nov 05, 2013

All vehicle systems are switched ON for the final eight and half hour countdown starting at 6:08 hrs (IST).

Second Stage (PS2) Propellant filling operations completed.

Nov 04, 2013

Second Stage (PS2) Propellant filling commenced.

Mobile Service Tower (MST) withdrawal upto 50m is completed.

 

[sayareakd]

This is difficult mission for ISRO. I am hoping to celebrate my next birthday (24 Sep 2014) with India reaching Mars. Best of luck guys.

 

[Sridhar]

Nov 05, 2013
Mobile Service Tower (MST) withdrawal to final parking (150m) completed. Countdown is normal.

 

[indian_blues]

Launch of PSLV-C25/Mars Orbiter Mission - Live from Sriharikota - YouTube

live stream

 

[Illusive]

Best of luck ISRO:thumb:

 

[Sridhar]

lift Off Sucessfull

 

[Free Karma]

Succesfull!! Woooot!!!!!! So happy.

Now we wait for about a year! hope all goes well!!
But for the time being...

Machchiii! Open the bottle!

 

[SajeevJino]

This is the Launch seq and Data

Just check the Alt time and the Range ..there is a small deviation from projected trajectory ..Still now The Rocket is Normal and on 4th Stage

we are on the way to Mars

 

[Blackwater]

congrats my fellow Indians and ISRO.


Dont know about successes of this mission but by just successful launch it created burning a.s.s in western media specially sky news ans BBC news, both covered the news ""why India need this ?""where 1/5 Indian have no toilets loll


and burned a.s.s paki media did not cover the news so far

 

[A chauhan]

Congrats! :clap: Isro.

 

[kseeker]

why India need this ?

Leave aside western media and pakis...

For arguments sake, Why do we need Mars mission ? To boost our ego ? For chest thumping ? isn't it ?

 

[sayareakd]

Congrats to all and specially ISRO project team.

I must say that 450 crores are well spend, Now China and others know that we can reach Mars with the accuracy therefore no space on earth is out of our reach.

Rest of the party will happen on 24th Sep 2014 on my birthday when ISRO will reach Mars.................

 

[drkrn]

congratulations to ISRO and fellow INDIANS for successfull launch of mangalyan mission

 

[SajeevJino]

here it is from Newyork Times

"These missions are important. These are things that give Indians happiness and bragging rights," said Raghu Kalra of the Amateur Astronomers Association Delhi. "Even a poor person, when he learns that my country is sending a mission to another planet, he will feel a sense of pride for his country, and he will want to make it a better place."

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2013/11/05/world/asia/ap-as-india-mars-mission.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=tw-nytimes&_r=0

 

[rugved]

ISRO should now fund a project of sending people like Digvijaya Singh, Shakeel Ahmad, Rahul Gandhi, Nitin Gadkari, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley, etc. on a one way trip to Mars.

 

[Blackwater]

Leave aside western media and pakis...

For arguments sake, Why do we need Mars mission ? To boost our ego ? For chest thumping ? isn't it ?

i think we neeed this . apart from chest thumping and ego .it will help ISRO and our space programme to flourish and expertise in this space area

AND dont forget recent cyclone of orissa was predicted by ISRO satellite result in saving of 1000 of lives

 

[happy]

Leave aside western media and pakis...

For arguments sake, Why do we need Mars mission ? To boost our ego ? For chest thumping ? isn't it ?

Come on !!!! You can do better !!!

As K.S.Radhakrishnan said, It is a technology demonstrator showing the world the true potential of India (my take : the true potential of indian missiles).

Hearty congratulations to ISRO and DRDO :chicken: