A load of crap from an idle brain

The PSLV-C12, carrying 300-kg Radar Imaging Satellite (RISAT-2) and 40-kg Micro Satellite ANUSAT lifted off from ISRO’s Satish Dhawan space Centre here on Monday morning. At the end of the 48-hour countdown, the 44-meter tall four-stage PSLV-C12 blasted off from the second launch pad with the ignition of the core first stage.

PSLV C-12 at the launch pad early morning today

The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, weighing 230 tonnes at the time of launch, soared into a clear sky at 6.45am(local time) from the spaceport here, about 90 km north of Chennai. This is the 15th flight of ISRO’s workhorse PSLV, which had launched 30 satellites (14 for India and 16 for foreign countries) into a variety of orbits since 1993.

The launch vehicle carries two payloads – RISAT-2 (with all weather capability to take images of Earth) and ANUSAT (the first satellite built by an Indian University to demonstrate the technologies related to message store and forward operations).

The ANUSAT satellite made by the Anna University, Chennai

The rocket would place both the satellites in their orbits around the earth shortly. The SAR, developed by Israel Aerospace Industries, gives RISAT defence capabilities.

ANUSAT is the first satellite developed by an Indian university (Anna University), which would demonstrate the technologies related to message storing and forward operations. University sources said scores of students and faculty from different streams had worked on this satellite for the last six years.

ANUSAT is a store-and-forward communication satellite that will help transfer confidential academic materials, including exam question papers, to prevent question paper leakages. It will also help monitor drought and wasteland, urban planning and other studies.

Above news from: TimesofIndia & pics from ISRO

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Chandrayaan-1, India’s first unmanned spacecraft mission to moon, entered lunar orbit today (November 8, 2008). This is the first time that an Indian built spacecraft has broken away from the Earth’s gravitational field and reached the moon. This historic event occurred following the firing of Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft’s liquid engine at 16:51 IST for a duration of 817 seconds. The highly complex ‘lunar orbit insertion manoeuvre’ was performed from Chandrayaan-1 Spacecraft Control Centre of ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network at Bangalore.

Indian Deep Space Network (IDSN) at Byalalu supported the crucial task of transmitting commands and continuously monitoring this vital event with two dish antennas, one measuring 18 m and the other 32 m.

Chandrayaan-1’s liquid engine was fired when the spacecraft passed at a distance of about 500 km from the moon to reduce its velocity to enable lunar gravity to capture it into an orbit around the moon. The spacecraft is now orbiting the moon in an elliptical orbit that passes over the polar regions of the moon. The nearest point of this orbit (periselene) lies at a distance of about 504 km from the moon’s surface while the farthest point (aposelene) lies at about 7502 km. Chandrayaan-1 takes about 11 hours to go round the moon once in this orbit.

moon impact probe

The performance of all the systems onboard Chandrayaan-1 is normal. In the coming days, the height of Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft’s orbit around the moon will be carefully reduced in steps to achieve a final polar orbit of about 100 km height from the moon’s surface. Following this, the Moon Impact Probe (MIP) of the spacecraft will be released to hit the lunar surface. Later, the other scientific instruments will be turned ON sequentially leading to the normal phase of the mission.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00AvB-9RFUI&feature=related]

It may be recalled that Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft was launched on October 22, 2008 by PSLV-C11 from India’s spaceport at Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) SHAR, Sriharikota. As intended, PSLV placed the spacecraft in a highly oval shaped orbit with a perigee (nearest point to Earth) of 255 km and an apogee (farthest point to Earth) of 22,860 km. In the past two weeks, the liquid engine of Chandrayaan-1 has been successfully fired five times at opportune moments to increase the apogee height, first to 37,900 km, then to 74,715 km, later to 164,600 km, after that to 267,000 km and finally to 380,000km, as planned. During this period, the Terrain Mapping Camera (TMC), one of the eleven payloads (scientific instruments) of the spacecraft, was successfully operated twice to take the pictures, first of the Earth, and then moon.

With today’s successful manoeuvre, India becomes the fifth country to send a spacecraft to Moon. The other countries, which have sent spacecraft to Moon, are the United States, former Soviet Union, Japan and China. Besides, the European Space Agency (ESA), a consortium of 17 countries, has also sent a spacecraft to moon.

Above news and pictures courtesy: ISRO

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Other than a press conference and a brief note on the ISRO’s website, there doesnt seem to be much news about the Israeli spy satellite launch in the Indian papers. The Israeli papers are indicating that the satellite is meant to keep an eye on Iran.

India successfully launched an Israeli spy satellite into orbit in a boost to the South Asian nation’s efforts to win a share of the multi-billion-dollar space launch market.

The launch of the Tecsar satellite by an Indian-made rocket was carried out in clear weather at 9:15 am local time (0345 GMT) from the Sriharikota space station in southern India, the Indian Space Research Organisation said.

The 300-kilogram (650-pound) satellite, sometimes referred to as the Polaris, was steered into orbit about 20 minutes later, said Antrix Corporation, the marketing arm of the Bangalore-based space agency.

The satellite was designed and developed by MBT Space, a division of Israel Aerospace Industries. It is equipped with a camera that can see through clouds and carry out day and night all-weather imaging.

Full article here.

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BMW already has it, so has Mercedes-Benz. The technology for a hydrogen car is already present in the market for years. But what needs to be studied is if the cost of a hydrogen car can be bought down to manageable levels. TATA Motors is already working on a Rs 1 lakh car (approx USD 2500). But does it have the technology to build a cheaper car, powered by hydrogen, for mass consumption is the crux of the matter. We do live in interesting times

Automobile major Tata Motors and space agency Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) are gearing up to launch the prototype of the world’s cleanest car that will run on hydrogen and emit a mere wispy trail of water vapour. Making this announcement in Bangalore on Thursday, ISRO chairman Madhavan Nair said that the car would roll out early next year.Nair said that an agreement for the pilot project to see whether hydrogen can be used as fuel for automobiles had been signed and work had already commenced on the project. He said that ISRO is working with the Tatas and, if all goes well, the car will be rolled out in early 2008.

This car will have engine as it will be completely electricity-driven, and hydrogen and atmospheric oxygen will be combined in the fuel cell to produce electricity that will propel the car. The car will also have hydrogen storage and regulatory control systems, Nair added.

Full article here.

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India will put a constellation of seven satellites into a geo-synchronous orbit in the next six years to create a comprehensive navigational system for the South Asian region, ISRO chairman G Madhavan Nair said today. The system, to be called the Indian Regional Navigational Satellite System (IRNSS), will provide invaluable positioning and timing data to aircraft and ships operating in the region. The constellation is being designed on the lines of the US Global Positioning System (GPS).

“This will be a very important step in the direction of having an efficient navigation system for countries in the region,” Nair said, adding that the first of the seven satellites would be launched in 2009. All of them will be carried on PSLVs and the total cost of the project is estimated to be Rs 1600 crore.

Like GPS data, information produced from IRNSS is likely to be freely available for everyone to use. This constellation would be part of nearly 60 launches that ISRO has planned over the next five years. Admitting that launching so many satellites would put severe strain on ISRO, Nair said he did not think that the target was unrealistic.

“Right now we do about four launches a year against a capability of five or six. By outsourcing more of our work to the industry, like manufacture of satellite components, we are quite hopeful of achieving that target,” Nair said. In the next twelve months, ISRO plans two GSLV and three PSLV launches.

Article courtesy: Indian Express

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