Our Space Game
The love for knowledge has always compelled the human race to push the boundaries and explore the universe beyond just our own planet. While India strived for independence and economic stability in the mid 20th century, nations like America and Soviet Union had already entered into a space race. Soon after, two pioneering scientists of our Nation, Dr. Vikram Sarabhai and Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam felt the need for India to have its own space programme and thus the ‘Indian Space Research Organisation’ (ISRO) was formed.
ISRO was not formed with the objective of competing with the more developed nations in the space race but to ensure that India remained second to no one while applying advanced sciences and technology to daily life and harvesting the benefits of space technology for the betterment of the country.
This Independence Day, ISRO celebrated its 50th anniversary and over these 5 decades ISRO has not only won the hearts of the nation but the entire nation with what it has been able to achieve.
Let’s take a quick drive through the things that ISRO has surprised the world with :
The Beginning
ISRO’s journey kickstarted in 1975 when its first satellite Aryabhata was successfully launched into space aboard a Russian Launch Vehicle.
Soon after work began upon developing indigenous rockets and in 1983, India was successful in launching a satellite in orbit with its own rocket called the SLV (Satellite Launch Vehicle). Following this multiple rockets with different capacities such as the PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) and GSLV (Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle) and their different variants were developed giving India the ability to create a record of successfully launching the most number of satellites (104) into space in a single launch.
The Progress in other Space Researches
Alongside the development of rockets, ISRO also developed various satellites and communication systems and successfully placed them in orbit. India is one of the very few countries that have their own navigation systems in place and does not need to depend on other nations for its communication needs.
Extra — Terrestrial Missions
Alongside excelling in space research, ISRO also planned extra-terrestrial missions to moon and Mars.
The Chandrayaan
The first moon mission known as the Chandrayaan -1 made India the first country in the entire world to confirm the presence of water on the moon. The Chandrayaan -1 comprised of an orbiter and a Moon Impact Probe (MIB) which together achieved the incredible feat of discovering water on moon. The MIB was designed to crash into the surface of the moon and subsequently made India the fourth country in the world to reach the surface of the moon.
Mangalyaan
The Mars Orbiter Mission (Mangalyaan) has an extremely unique story attached to it. A mission which seemed too impossible at the start with the kind of budget sanctioned to ISRO, was not only completed successfully within the given financial constraints but also made India the first country in the world to reach Mars orbit in it’s maiden attempt and also the first Asian country to reach Mars. Mangalyaan also demonstrated some unique technologies and methods to successfully design cost effective space crafts. Mangalyaan also remains the cheapest Mars mission to date.
Chandrayaan 2
In July 2019, ISRO launched its second mission to the moon, the Chandrayaan 2. Chandrayaan 2 remains ISRO’s most complex and ambitious mission till date.
About the Mission
The Chandrayaan 2 comprises of a orbiter, a lander and a rover. All 3 of these have been designed and developed indigenously. Mission objectives of Chandrayaan 2 include investigating further into the discoveries of its predecessor and estimating the exact quantity of water on the moon, studying the topological conditions and creating a detailed map of the surface of the moon which would enable easier planning of future manned missions to the moon.
The Chandrayaan 2 was launched aboard the GLSV Mk III rocket. After an approximate 45 day journey of complex orbit raising manoeuvres, the space craft was captured into the moon orbit.
The Orbiter
The orbiter of the Chandrayaan 2 was the most important part of the mission as most of the scientific experiments would be carried out by the payloads fit on the orbiter. The orbiter has been performing as per expectations since it has reached the moon orbit and is returning valuable data to ISRO each day. The camera fitted onto the Chandrayaan 2 orbiter is the highest resolution camera used on any moon mission yet.
As opposed to the one year operating period planned earlier, according to the official statements made by K Sivan, Chairman, ISRO, the orbiter has enough fuel to function well for 7 years.
The Lander
The Lander of the Chandrayaan 2 was named Vikram after the founding father of the organisation. ISRO took up the bold challenge and designed Vikram to attempt to land in the south polar region of the moon, a region where no one had landed yet and hence was vastly unexplored. The Vikram lander was designed to soft land on the surface of the moon and if successful would make India the fourth country in the world to manage a soft landing on the surface.
But as has been the recent turn of events, even after smooth operation of the orbiter and lander, as Vikram started it’s descent over the moon surface, it started deviating from it’s trajectory after the completion of the rough breaking phase, during it’s fine breaking phase. And finally at an altitude of 2.1 km above moon surface, Vikram lost contact with ISRO.
The lander carried with it, the rover Pragyaan and a few scientific payloads which would have been used to study the composition of moon surface and detect the presence of water and its quantity.
The Rover
The rover of the mission was named the Pragyaan and it was supposed to explore the moon surface and gather important scientific information of the moon surface. The rover was particularly lighter and smaller weighing in at about just 27 kilograms. The rover has a range of 500 metres from the lander and it’s wheels would leave the imprints of ISRO and the national emblem on the moon surface which would mark India’s presence on the surface of the moon and would also be useful in estimating the distance between Pragyaan and Vikram.
Despite the unfortunate fate of Vikram and Pragyaan, the Chandrayaan 2 is still considered a 95–98% success owing to the fact that the orbiter was the most important aspect of the mission.
Future Plans
Though Chradrayaan 2 couldn’t be completely successful, ISRO has won everyone’s respect in the national as well as the international community due to their bold attempt of landing on the south pole of the moon.
Scientists at ISRO have proven to the entire world what India is capable of achieving even with the financial constraints. They have successfully demonstrated to the world various cost effective techniques to send vehicles to space.
With ambitious missions such as the Gaganyaan, Chandrayaan 3, Mangalyaan 3, Aditya L1 planned in the next decade, ISRO is marching towards creating histories and the lessons learnt from Vikram will definitely be put to test. The entire nation is with ISRO and we wish them all the best for all their future efforts!
