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| India-Pakistan |
| India launches first Moon mission |
| 2008-10-22 |
| India has successfully launched its first mission to the Moon. The unmanned Chandrayaan 1 spacecraft blasted off smoothly from a launch pad in southern Andhra Pradesh to embark on a two-year mission of exploration. The robotic probe will orbit the Moon, compiling a 3-D atlas of the lunar surface and mapping the distribution of elements and minerals. The launch is regarded as a major step for India as it seeks to keep pace with other space-faring nations in Asia. Indian PM Manmohan Singh hailed the launch as the "first step" in a historic milestone in the country's space programme. "Our scientific community has once again done the country proud and the entire nation salutes them," Mr Singh said in a message. The launch was greeted with applause by scientists gathered at the site. The chief of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), Madhavan Nair, said it was a "historic moment" for the country. "Today what we have charted is a remarkable journey for an Indian spacecraft to go to the moon and try to unravel the mysteries of the Earth's closest celestial body and its only natural satellite," Nair said. The BBC's Sanjoy Majumder in Delhi says there has been a lot of excitement about the event, which was broadcast live on national TV. An Indian-built launcher carrying the one-and-a-half-tonne satellite blasted off from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, an island off the coast of Andhra Pradesh, at about 0620 local time (0050 GMT). One key objective will be to search for surface or sub-surface water-ice on the Moon, especially at the poles. Another will be to detect Helium 3, an isotope which is rare on Earth, but is sought to power nuclear fusion and could be a valuable source of energy in future. Powered by a single solar panel generating about 700 Watts, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) probe carries five Indian-built instruments and six that are foreign-built. The mission is expected to cost 3.8bn rupees (£45m; $78m). The Indian experiments include a 30kg probe that will be released from the mothership to slam into the lunar surface. The Moon Impact Probe (MIP) will record video footage on the way down and measure the composition of the Moon's tenuous atmosphere. "Chandrayaan has a very competitive set of instruments... it will certainly do good science," said Barry Kellett, project scientist on the C1XS instrument, which was built at the Rutherford-Appleton Laboratory in the UK. C1XS will map the abundance of different elements in the lunar crust to help answer key questions about the origin and evolution of Earth's only natural satellite. Researchers say the relative abundances of magnesium and iron in lunar rocks could help confirm whether the Moon was once covered by a molten, magma ocean. "The iron should have sunk [in the magma ocean], whereas the magnesium should have floated," Mr Kellett told BBC News. "The ratio of magnesium to iron for the whole Moon tells you to what extent the Moon melted and what it did after it formed." The instrument will look for more unusual elements on the Moon's surface, such as titanium. This metallic element has been found in lunar meteorites, but scientists know little about its distribution in the lunar crust. Chandrayaan (the Sanskrit word for "moon craft") will also investigate the differences between the Moon's near side and its far side. The far side is both more heavily cratered and different in composition to the one facing Earth. The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) rocket will loft Chandrayaan into an elliptical "transfer orbit" around Earth. The probe will later carry out a series of engine burns to set it on a lunar trajectory. The spacecraft coasts for about five-and-a-half days before firing the engine to slow its velocity such that it is captured by the Moon's gravity. |
| Posted by:john frum |
| #15 Double ditto 3dc. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2008-10-22 20:59 |
| #14 Fu ck NASA - I want private companies not nations doing space big time. SpaceX is one of the bright spots. Another Rutan. Let NASA do science missions. Let companies exploit and develop. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2008-10-22 20:50 |
| #13 NOTSOMUCH THE MOON. However, if Chinese and Indians will make it to the Moon, the U.S. will make sure to quickly re-focus. NASA adminitrator, Griffin what's his name was just talking about it the other day. |
| Posted by: General_Comments 2008-10-22 19:36 |
| #12 INDIA has Chicoms its NE, Islamists and Maoists on multiple external and domestic fronts, Sikhs and Pakis on the LOC, and Christians, etc in-between, etc. > AGZ SUCH POTENT SECTARIANISM, INDIA NEEDS SOMETHING TO RESTORE THEIR SELF-ESTEEM, NATIONAL UNITY, + GEOPOL CREDIBILITY. The USA is focused more on VENUS, MARS, AND OTHER EXPLORATION anyhoo, NOTSOMUCH THE MOON. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2008-10-22 19:33 |
| #11 Ok, maybe bought from the U.S. in the 60's - what is it doing in the Indian museum of national space achievements?? ;) |
| Posted by: General_Comment 2008-10-22 18:41 |
| #10 a Russian sooopercomputer. You asked, and I've got an attitude :-) |
| Posted by: Frank G 2008-10-22 18:37 |
| #9 Looks tidy, but what's that 60's looking piece of equipment behind the capsule on lower left? Oscilloscope? |
| Posted by: General_Comment 2008-10-22 18:16 |
| #8 |
| Posted by: john frum 2008-10-22 17:44 |
| #7 Werner von Braun on a trip to India told APJ Abdul Kalam "If you have to do anything in rocketry do it yourself ... you should always remember that we do not just build on success, we also build on failure". Buying the technology won't build the research capability and the private sector spin-offs. ISRO does tech transfer to private industry in order to build an aerospace industry in India. The components of their rockets are now made by the private sector. They developed heat resistant tiles for their SRE-1 experiment (which spashed down from orbit into Bay of Bengal) which may find use in a crew vehicle. |
| Posted by: john frum 2008-10-22 17:43 |
| #6 and lastly, it probably does cost them less to indigenously develop the technology than buy it. |
| Posted by: sludge 2008-10-22 17:17 |
| #5 I'm no expert, but I would think they'd learn more if they developed the technology themselves as opposed to just buying it. And buying technology doesn't contribute to "national pride" nearly as much as doing it yourself, not to mention, making a statement to the rest of the world. Finally, they need to keep their engineers employed somehow. |
| Posted by: sludge 2008-10-22 17:15 |
| #4 John, Why not just buy the technology? |
| Posted by: 3dc 2008-10-22 16:21 |
| #3 India to build new launch-pad, astronaut training centre India plans to build a new satellite launch pad and a major training facility for astronauts as it proposed to undertake a manned space mission by 2015. "It (the cost of setting up the launch pad) is around Rs 600 crore. A major national facility (for training astronauts) will be established here (Bangalore),Indian Space research Organisation Chairman G Madhavan Nair told PTI. It would be the third launch pad in the Sriharikota spaceport on the east-coast in Andhra Pradesh, some 100 kms north of Chennai. Nair said the manned mission has been approved by the Space Commission, and a formal government nod is expected in the next few months. The Technologically-challenging manned mission (human space flight) envisages development of a fully autonomous manned space vehicle to carry crew (two members) to low earth orbit and their safe return to earth, development of critical/new technologies for crew module, service module, launch escape system, establishment of long-term facilities and identifying detailed elements required for undertaking the venture. "Basically, technology elements required for development of habitable module is the top-most priority", Nair, also Secretary in the Department of Space, said. "Technology elements required for improving the reliability of launch systems have been identified.Crew escape and mission management system has to be in place," he said. In 2006, ISRO said the preliminary estimated cost for the manned space mission was Rs 10,000 crore spread over a period of eight years. |
| Posted by: john frum 2008-10-22 15:37 |
| #2 Project director of Chandrayaan-1, M Annadurai rarely appears on television and not many of us know about him. He is the man in-charge of India's first satellite to study the moon. Annadurai, the son of a school teacher, is a first generation engineer and comes from a small village in Tamil Nadu. He doesn't have a foreign degree and spent the first few years of his life without seeing what a streetlight looks like. "I think I was born and brought up in a small village called Kodavadi near Coimbatore, until the age of seven. I did not see street lights even in my village," said M Annadurai. "But I had the fortune of seeing the moon, which was like a natural planetarium," he added. |
| Posted by: john frum 2008-10-22 15:34 |
| #1 Hurrah for India! Well done! (Should we feel the teensiest bit sorry for Pakistan about this?) |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2008-10-22 12:39 |