By Venkatachari Jagannthan, IANS,
Sriharikota (Andhra Pradesh) : An Indian rocket Sunday successfully launched into orbit two foreign satellites, marking Indian space agency ISRO’s 100th mission in the presence of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
“As ISRO’s 100th space mission, today’s launch is a milestone in our nation’s space capabilities,” the prime minister said here after the launch.
Exactly at 9.51 a.m., the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle-C21 (PSLV-C21), standing around 44 metres tall and weighing around 230 tonne, with a one-way ticket, hurtled itself towards the skies ferrying two the satellites – SPOT 6, a French earth observation satellite weighing 712 kg, and a 15 kg micro satellite Proiteres from Japan.
The PSLV, costing around Rs.75 crore, blasted off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, around 80 km from Chennai.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has now completed its 100th mission since the launch of first satellite Aryabhata in 1975 by a Russian rocket.
With a rich orange flame at its tail and plume of white smoke, the rocket ascended towards the sky amid cheers of ISRO scientists and media team assembled at the launch centre.
People perched atop the nearby buildings too happily clapped as the rocket went up.
Space scientists at ISRO new rocket mission control room were glued to their computer screens watching the rocket escaping the earth’s gravitational pull.
At around 18 minutes into the flight, PSLV-C21 delivered SPOT 6 and a few seconds later Proiteres into a 655 km polar orbit inclined at an angle of 98.23 degree to the equator.
Immediately on the successfully ejection of the two satellites, scientists at the mission control were visibly relieved and started clapping.
Manmohan Singh, who along with Minister in Prime Minister’s Office, V. Narayanasamy, witnessed the launch, congratulated ISRO scientists and engineers and EADS Astrium of France and Osaka Institute of Technology of Japan for the successful launch of their satellites.
“Questions are sometimes asked about whether a poor country like India can afford a space programme and whether the funds spent on space exploration, albeit modest, could be better utilised elsewhere.
“This misses the point that a nation’s state of development is finally a product of its technological prowess,” the prime minister said.
ISRO Chairman K. Radhakrishnan thanked the scientists and engineers after the launch.
The remote sensing satellites send back pictures and other data. The SPOT and Indian remote sensing satellites are the two leading earth observation satellite series.
Interestingly, SPOT 6 is the heaviest foreign satellite to be carried by a PSLV rocket since 1999 when ISRO started launching satellites owned by foreign agencies.
Proiteres, the Japanese satellite, intends to study powered flight of a small satellite by an electric thruster and observe Japan’s Kansai district with a high-resolution camera.
ISRO has been carrying foreign satellites since 1999 initially as an add-on luggage to its own satellite.
It was with Agile, a 350 kg Italian satellite, that ISRO started flying a commercial rocket. Till date, ISRO has launched 27 foreign satellites successfully and the Sunday mission took the tally to 29.
Here is a timeline of the five decades of India’s space programme:
1962 – Indian National Committee for Space Research set up by the Department of Atomic Energy. Work starts on Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station (TERLS) in Kerala.
1963 – First sounding rocket launched from TERLS Nov 21.
1965 – Space Science and Technology Centre set up in Thumba.
1968 – Experimental Satellite Communication Earth Station set up in Ahmedabad, Gujarat.
1969 – Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) formed Aug 15 under the Department of Atomic Energy.
1971 – Satish Dhawan Space Centre (formerly SHAR Centre) formed in Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh.
1972 – Department of Space (DoS) established and ISRO brought under it. ISRO Satellite Centre set up in Bangalore and Space Applications Centre in Ahmedabad.
1975 – Satellite Instructional Television Experiment using an US satellite. First Indian satellite, Aryabhata, launched into space April 19.
1977 – Satellite Telecommuncation Experiments Project (1977-79) using Franco-German Symphonie Satellite.
1979 – Bhaskara-1, an earth observation experimental satellite, launched. First experimental launch of Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV-3) carrying the Rohini satellite. The satellite not placed in the orbit.
1980 – Second experimental launch of SLV-3 with Rohini. Mission successful.
1981 – First developmental launch of SLV-3. Rohini placed into orbit. Launch of APPLE, an experimental geo-stationary communication satellite. Launch of Bhaskara-2 by an USSR rocket.
1982 – Launch of Insat-1A communication satellite by an US rocket.
1983 – Second developmental flight of SLV-3 placed Rohini into orbit. Insat system commissioned with launch to Insat-1B satellite.
1984 – First Indian cosmonaut, Rakesh Sharma, spends eight days in Russian space station Salyut 7. He flew in Russian rocket Soyuz T-11.
1987 – First development launch of Augmented SLV (ASLV) with satellite SROSS-1. Mission failed.
1988 – Launch of Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) satellite – IRA-1A through a Russian rocket. Second developmental flight of ASLV with SROSS satellite. Mission failed.
1991 – Launch of second operational remote sensing satellite IRS-1B.
1992 – First successful launch of ASLV placing SROSS-C satellite. Launch of Insat-2A, the first satellite of the indigenously-built second generation Insat series, followed by the 3 and 4 series.
1993 – First development flight of Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) with IRS-1E. Mission failed.
1994 – Fourth developmental flight of ASLV with SROSS-C2. Mission successful. Successful launch of PSLV placing IRS-P2 in orbit.
1996 – Third developmental flight of PSLV with IRS-P3.
1997 – First operational launch of PSLV carrying IRS-1D.
1999 – PSLV started carrying foreign payloads (Korean and German satellites) along with ISRO’s satellite Oceansat.
2001 – Successful launch of heavy rocket Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) with GSAT-1 satellite. Launch of PSLV with India’s Technology Experimental Satellite and satellites from Belgium and Germany.
2002 – Launch of Kalpana-1 satellite on-board a PSLV rocket.
2003 – Launch of GSat-2 on board GSLV and Resourcesat-1 by PSLV.
2004 – Launch of Edusat by GSLV’s first operational flight.
2005 – Commissioning of second launch pad at Sriharikota. Launch of Cartosat-1 and Hamsat by PSLV.
2006 – Second operational flight of GSLV with Insat-4C. For the first time, an Indian rocket carried a communication satellite. The mission failed.
2007 – Launch of Cartosat-2 with Space Capsule Recovery Experiment and two foreign satellites and successful recovery of the space capsule. Launch of Italian satellite AGILE by PSLV and Insat-4CR by GSLV.
2008 – Launch of Israeli satellite Tecsar by PSLV. Launch of two Indian and eight foreign satellites by a single PSLV. India’s first moon mission Chandrayaan-1 by PSLV.
2009 – Launch of Radar Imaging Satellite (Risat-2) and Anusat from Anna University (first satellite from an Indian university) by PSLV. Launch of seven satellites by PSLV, including India’s Oceansat.
2010 – Failure of two GSLV missions. Launch of Cartosat-2B, STUDSAT and three small foreign satellites by PSLV.
2011 – Launch of Resourcest-2 and two small satellites by PSLV. Launch of GSAT-12 by PSLV. Launch of Megha Tropiques and three small satellites by PSLV.
2012 – Launch of Risat-1 by PSLV. Launch of French satellite SPOT 6 and Japanese satellite Proiteres.
(Venkatachari Jagannathan can be contacted at [email protected])