INDIA REACHES MARS!!!#IndiaAtMars India created history today, becoming the first country in the world to succeed on its first Mars mission when Isros Mangalyaan slipped into Martian orbit after a few nail-biting moments. The country joined the United States, European Space Agency and the former Soviet Union in the elite club of Martian explorers with the Mars Orbiter Mission, affectionately called MOM. Earlier, there were some tense moments at the Indian Space and Research Organisation (Isro), which commanded a series of tricky manoeuvres to position the spacecraft in its designated orbit around Mars. The insertion started at 4.17am when the spacecrfat switched over to the medium gain antenna for providing the communication link during the insertion. At 6.56am, the spacecraft initiated the process of forward rotation, reducing its speed. At 7.17am, the scientists had to grapple with the most critical moment — whMost of MOM’s Mars orbit insertion happened in the dark because the spacecraft was around the surface of the planet that did not receive sunlight. The first images of Mars will be transmitted to Isro’s Indian Deep Space Network facility at Byalalu in Karnataka in the afternoon. Mangalyaan, which relies on homegrown technology, is a remarkably low budget mission of about $75 million. NASAs Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution mission, or Maven, which reached its position around the Red Planet on Sunday has a price tag of $671 million - nearly nine times that of MOMs. Scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory had wished their Indian counterparts luck a day ago. “Good luck MOM. From your JPL family,” read the message posted on Isro’s Facebook page. Indias feat gains significance in the light of the fact that more than half the worlds previous attempts - 23 out of 41 Mars missions - have failed, including attempts by Japan in 1999 and China in 2011. India has said its spacecraft is chiefly meant to showcase the countrys high-tech space abilities. Already, India has successfully launched a lunar orbiter, Chandrayaan-1, which discovered key evidence of water on the Moon in 2008.en the liquid apogee motor had to be fired. The motor was woken up for four seconds on Monday during a test-fire after 300 days of long sleep. The motor was fired for 24 minutes, reducing the velocity of the spacecraft by 4.2km per second in relation to Mars. This was soon followed by moments of tension and anxiety when the communication broke as the spacecraft slipped behind Mars as the scientists waited for the good news. At 7.45am, the occult ended and after two minutes, communication with the spacecraft resumed and data was flashed about the performance of the liquid apogee motor. Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated Isro scientists after the mission met with success. Source:Hindustan Times
Posted on: Wed, 24 Sep 2014 03:22:25 +0000
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