Indian Space News thread.

[Indianfighter]

Army ready for satellite spying
Rajat Pandit
[ 18 Sep, 2006 TIMES NEWS NETWORK ]

NEW DELHI: For a country which views itself as a regional superpower and has a robust space programme, India's use of space-based assets for military purposes has been quite modest so far.

But now, the armed forces are poised to take a major leap forward in harnessing space as 'a potent force-multiplier', with the hush-hush satellite-based surveillance and reconnaissance (SBS) programme making 'steady progress' towards completion, say sources.

A joint Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) venture, worth over Rs 1,000 crore, the SBS project was initially scheduled for completion by 2005-end.

But after slippages, the Cabinet Committee on Security has extended its timeframe to January 31, 2007.

While some problems might still crop up, the armed forces say the SBS project, once fully-operational, will allow them to keep closer tabs on troop movements, missile silos, military installations and airbases of neighbouring countries, as well as augment surveillance over Indian airspace.

"Cartosat-I (launched atop PSLV in May 2005) and Cartosat-II (to be launched by 2006-end) satellites, though primarily civilian, will form an essential part of the SBS project. The armed forces will get direct feeds from them," said a top source.

"With DIPAC (Defence Imagery Processing and Analysis Centre) in Delhi and a satellite control facility in Bhopal, the forces will even have some operational control like shutter-control over the satellites," he added.

This is not to say the forces have not used satellite imagery for tactical and strategic intelligence till now. The Army, for instance, was getting almost one-metre resolution 'image feeds' from the Technology Experiment Satellite (TES).

This 'spy' satellite, launched in October 2001, even provided 'high-quality feeds' of Pakistani troop movements as well as the Afghanistan conflict. "But TES is almost out of its operational life now.

We, of course, also use imagery from other Indian remote-sensing satellites as well as feeds from Russian and Israeli satellites when required," a source said.

Source:

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[Indianfighter]

ISRO's 1-m imagery in market soon

Bangalore April 11 The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is now working at far superior satellite imageries of half-metre resolution and beyond even as it is about to hit the global market with 1-metre Earth pictures.

ISRO is the world's third and only second non-US supplier of 1-m imageries and perhaps the most competitively priced; the data come at a premium of nearly 40 per cent. Some data is internationally priced at $18-20 per picture of a sq km.

Cartosat-2's high-resolution imageries are primarily for urban and infrastructure planning and will be offered at affordable prices to its users, the ISRO Chairman, Mr G. Madhavan Nair, said on Wednesday as he unveiled pictures of Bangalore and Hyderabad taken from over 600 km in the sky.

He said the next move would be towards 0.5-m or better imageries; radar imaging to look through clouds; improved ocean surface imageries through Oceansat-2; and a camera on its forthcoming geostationary Insat-3D.

However, the sub-metre project may not be before 2010. ISRO is still to develop technologies such as 1.2-m telescope, better material such as silicon carbide; and imaging detectors, which its Semiconductor Lab could work on, Mr Nair said.

The 1-m market is large and ISRO would aim at capturing 10-15 per cent of the 1-m market in a couple of years, said Mr K.R. Sridhara Murthi, Executive Director, Antrix Corporation, ISRO's commercial arm. With its competitive pricing, it also hopes to wean domestic users away from sourcing 1-m data of foreign commercial satellites such as Ikonos or Quick Bird. Some 200 data products are being imported and this is set to grow ten-fold, he said.

The national space agency is currently among the top three satellite imagery suppliers and holds nearly 25 per cent of the $ 120-million free-play market.

All IRS (Indian Remote-sensing Satellite) imageries are distributed through the Hyderabad-based National Remote Sensing Agency (NRSA) in the home market and exports through Antrix.

According to ISRO officials, IRS products are the largest selling in this segment, offering over 10,000 products in various categories. The NRSA Director, Dr K.Radhakrishnan, said the 1-m offer would raise the number of products sold from 27,000 to over 40,000 a year.

ISRO reached the 1-m capability in October 2001 with the Technology Experiment Satellite (TES) but did not offer it in the market.

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[Indianfighter]

India launches first Moon mission

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[aksha]

i know this thread has been dead for a very long time'
don't even know what it is doing in world armed forces

but indian space research organisation made history today


India's spacecraft reaches Mars orbit ... and history

(CNN) -- India's Mars Orbiter Mission successfully entered Mars' orbit Wednesday morning, becoming the first nation to arrive on its first attempt and the first Asian country to reach the Red Planet.
"We have gone beyond the boundaries of human enterprise and human imagination," declared India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who watched from the space agency's nerve center in Bangalore. "We have accurately navigated our spacecraft through a route known to a very few."
The staff at the Indian Space Research Organization erupted into applause and cheers after learning that the Mars Orbiter Mission, also known as Mangalyaan, reached the planet's orbit and made history.
Before Wednesday, only the United States, Europe and the Soviets have successfully sent spacecraft to Mars.
India\'s space agency and Prime Minister Narendra Modi cheer the Mars mission.
India's space agency and Prime Minister Narendra Modi cheer the Mars mission.
"The odds were stacked against us," Modi said. "Of the 51 missions attempted so far, a mere 21 had succeeded. But we have prevailed."
And India reached Mars with significantly less money.
With a price tag of $74 million, the Mars Orbiter Mission cost a mere fraction of the $671 million NASA spent on its MAVEN spacecraft, which arrived to Mars earlier this week. Some space observers noted that India's Mars orbiter cost less than the $100 million budget for the space thriller film "Gravity."
Interactive: Exploring Mars from Viking to MAVEN
"It shows how optimal is the design, that way we're able to cut cost and we're not compromising quality," said S. Satish, a space expert based in Bangalore.
The groundbreaking Mars mission wasn't without controversy -- with some critics who said India should spend the money on other issues.
The spacecraft launched on November 5, and has traveled over 650 million kilometers to enter Mars orbit. Its mission is to orbit the Red Planet, mapping its surface and studying the atmosphere. The Mars Orbiter kicked off its interplanetary debut with its own Twitter account.

The mission has been freighted with patriotic significance for India since its inception and is seen as a symbolic coup over its rival, China, which is also ramping up its space ambitions.
India launches mission to Mars Open Mic: India's Mars mission
China's joint mission with Russia in 2011, which contained the Chinese Mars satellite Yinhuo-1, stalled and eventually fell back to Earth. Japan's 1998 attempt with the spacecraft Nozomi was also unsuccessful due to fuel problems.
READ: Is India's Mars mission the latest escalation in Asia's space race?
Once nears Mars' orbit, India's spacecraft had to execute a series of complicated and critical maneuvers. About half of all spacecraft sent on missions to the planet have veered off course, malfunctioned or crashed.
India's Mars Orbiter Mission is in the company of NASA's two Mars rovers on the ground, a European orbiter and NASA orbiters including the MAVEN, which has been there since Sunday.
The United States has expressed interest in cooperating with India as their spacecraft gather data about the planet.

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the first tweet of the MOM

The first tweet of Isro's Mars Orbiter was the real-time photograph of the Mars while its second tweet said, " I'll be back after breakfast. Good ol' sunlight. It's good for your battery".

heres what nasa says

After a journey of over 10 months, India’s Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) arrived at Mars on Wednesday, 24 September 2014 – following an insertion burn that was confirmed at 7:30am India Standard Time (02:00 UTC; 20:00 EDT in the U.S. on Tuesday, 23 Sept.) – to continue what has so far been a successful technology demonstration mission to showcase India’s entry in the realm of interplanetary research.

Mars Orbiter Mission history:

Beginning as a feasibility study in 2010, the Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) was green lit by the Indian government on 3 August 2012 following completion of a $21 million series of studies surrounding the mission.

Z6With approval and appropriations in hand, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) undertook an expedited 15 month construction process on the spacecraft, aiming for a target launch date of 28 October 2013.

The launch date was calculated to meet the trans-Mars injection requirements needed to place MOM into the correct heliocentric Mars transfer orbit.

These calculations included the location of the launch facility in India, the desired orbital insertion parameters at Mars, and the orbital positions of Earth and Mars vs. the location where Mars would be at the time of MOM’s arrival.

Construction on MOM was successfully completed on schedule on 2 October 2013, and the spacecraft was shipped to its launch site in Sriharikota.

2014-09-23 21_52_40-India MOM PSLV - Google SearchThere, MOM was integrated on top of its PSLV-XL (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) rocket – which had been under assembly since 5 August.

The use of the PSLV-XL rocket was a change from the original mission proposal which called for the use of the more-powerful Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV).

However, the GSLV had failed twice in 2010, and a fix to the root cause of the issue was not available by the time MOM needed to launch in October 2013.

Not wanting to delay the mission until 2016 (when the next Mars launch window would open), the ISRO decided to put MOM atop the less-powerful PSLV rocket in its XL variant – six stretched solid rocket motors using 12 tons of solid propellant instead of the 9 tons used in the standard PSLV variant.

See Also

ISRO MOM UPDATES
L2 Mars Section
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The switch in launch vehicle, however, meant that MOM could no longer be launched directly into a Mars transfer orbit.

Rather, the craft would have to launch into Earth orbit and then perform a series of orbit raising maneuvers designed to increasingly raise the its apogee while using Earth’s gravity to sling-shot it into the correct Mars transfer orbit.

As launch preparations continued, MOM’s launch date was realigned from 28 October to 5 November 2013 because of the delayed arrival of a necessary telemetry ship at the Fiji Islands.

2014-09-23 21_51_12-ISRO MOM Launch - Google SearchOn 5 November 2013, the MOM mission lifted off right on time at 09:08 UTC from First Launch Pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre. Over the next 42 minutes, the PSLV-XL inserted MOM into Earth orbit, a process completed at 09:50 UTC.

With MOM’s successful launch, India began its first interplanetary mission.

The day following launch, a series of four planned orbit raising maneuvers began, controlled by spacecraft engineers from the Spacecraft Control Center at ISRO’s telemetry, tracking and command network in Peenya, Bangalore.

Z5Of the four planned maneuvers, the first was a 416 second firing of the spacecraft’s liquid engine, the second a 570.6 second burn, and the third a 707 seconds burn.

At this point, MOM’s apogee was 71,636 km.

During the fourth burn, an under burn prevented the spacecraft’s apogee from reaching the planned 100,000 km. Instead, MOM was in a 78,276 km apogee orbit.

The resulting under burn mandated the addition of a fifth and sixth orbit raising maneuver to boost the spacecraft to an apogee of 192,874 km.

With the needed apogee achieved, spaceflight controllers initiated a 23 minute engine firing maneuver on 30 November 2013 at 19:19 UTC to place MOM into a heliocentric transfer orbit to the red planet.

Cruise to Mars:

Since leaving Earth orbit, a total of three trajectory course maneuvers have been performed to ensure that MOM is aligned into the proper trajectory for Martian arrival.

On 22 September at 09:00 UTC, spacecraft controllers successfully fired the 440N liquid apogee motor for 3.9 seconds.

*Click here for more Mars News Articles*

The test firing confirmed the engine’s viability for planned orbital insertion operations 41 hours later.

Mars Orbital Insertion:

As MOM approached Mars for orbital insertion, the spacecraft reoriented itself to align its thrust vector with the craft’s line of travel.

2014-09-23 22_01_44-India MOM PSLV - Google SearchOnce in the proper orientation, MOM, already under the influence of Mars’ gravity, passed into the shadow of Mars.

This entry into the Martian shadow occurred five minutes before the start of the Mars Orbit Insertion (MOI) burn.

As the MOI burn began, MOM’s main liquid engine and eight smaller thrusters fired to begin reducing the vehicle’s velocity by 1,098.7 m/s.

As this burn began, the spacecraft moved behind Mars as viewed from the telemetry and tracking stations on Earth, thereby severing the radio communications link between the spacecraft and ground controllers.

The duration of the mission-critical MOI burn occured while communications with the spacecraft were blocked.

After the MOI burn:

Once the MOI burn was completed, the spacecraft began reorienting itself to point its main communications antenna toward the location where Earth will be when the spacecraft emerged from the communications blackout period.

Z9With MOI burn successfully accomplished, MOM, at 07:30 IST (02:00 UTC; and 20:00 EDT on 23 Sept.), entered a highly elliptical orbit around the red planet.

This elliptical orbit will give MOM an orbital characteristic of 80,000 x 423 km and an orbital period of 75.8 Earth hours.

Once a stable orbit is achieved, the bulk of the mission’s primary objectives will be realized.

Stemming from the notion that this is a technology demonstration flight, the core concepts of the Mars Orbiter Mission are, according to ISRO: the design and realization of a Mars orbiter with a capability to preform Earth-bound maneuvers, cruise phase of 300 days, Mars orbit insertion/capture, and on-orbit phase operations at Mars.

Furthermore, the mission is designed to demonstrate India’s capability to perform deep space communication, navigation, mission planning, and management; and incorporate autonomous features to categorize and handle contingency situations.

2014-09-23 22_45_49-mars_orbiter_1385531570_540x540.jpg (540×583)In fact, so much is this mission one of technical demonstration that actual scientific observation of Mars is listed as a secondary objective.

Nonetheless, if all goes according to plan, once MOM enters orbit of Mars, the secondary mission objectives will be realized, too, with MOM exploring the Martian morphology, surface features, mineralogy, and atmosphere.

In fact, there is even the added benefit of working, after the fact, with NASA’s newly arrived MAVEN spacecraft in a post-data collection sharing of the information recorded by both spacecraft over the same period of time.

In all, the mission has already demonstrated India’s ability to perform in deep space; even more so, with orbital insertion of MOM achieved, India became only the fourth nation/space program to reach Mars (behind the former Soviet Union, NASA, and the European Space Agency).

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[Bernard]

i know this thread has been dead for a very long time'
don't even know what it is doing in world armed forces

but indian space research organisation made history today


India's spacecraft reaches Mars orbit ... and history

heres what nasa says

I read this last night! Congrats, this is huge. The cheapest successful mars project ever, and the only country to get to mars orbit successfully on their first time. And it is 3 times cheaper than NASA's most recent project called MAVEN.

 

[Tri Nitro Toluene]

Let me revive thread, starting from the 10th flight and 3rd consecutive test success of Indian Cryo Engine, which has made India world's 6th country to have an operational cryogenic rocket.

Sep 08, 2016
GSLV-F05 / INSAT-3DR
GSLV-F05

GSLV-F05 is the tenth flight of India's Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV), launching INSAT-3DR, an advanced weather satellite, weighing 2211 kg into a Geostationary Transfer Orbit (GTO). GSLV is designed to inject 2 - 2.5 Tonne class of satellites into GTO. The launch took place from the Second Launch Pad at Satish Dhawan Space Centre SHAR (SDSC SHAR), Sriharikota on September 08, 2016.

GSLV-F05 flight is significant since it is the first operational flight of GSLV carrying Cryogenic Upper Stage (CUS). The indigenously developed CUS was carried on-board for the fourth time during a GSLV flight in the GSLV-F05 flight.

GSLV-F05 vehicle is configured with all its three stages including the CUS similar to the ones successfully flown during the previous GSLV-D5 and D6 missions in January 2014 and August 2015. GSLV-D5 and D6 successfully placed GSAT-14 and GSAT-6 satellites carried on-board in the intended GTOs accurately.

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Images from camera of INSAT 3DR:

 

[Tri Nitro Toluene]

By the year end, India will operationalize a new mid heavy rocket to double the payload capacity.

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India has further plans to replace current fleet with a more efficient rocket family.

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As per the government sources, a HLV (Heavy Lift Vehicle) with nearly a capacity of 10 tonnes to GTO (nearly may be 20-25 tonnes to LEO) is in study.

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In 2010, it was reported that Super HLVs with capacities ranging from 80 to 100 tonnes to LEO are for long term plan.

 

[Tri Nitro Toluene]

More images from INSAT 3DR (IR):

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Screenshots from above PDF↑:

 

[Tri Nitro Toluene]

Continued.....

 

[Tri Nitro Toluene]

Seems that Official Representation for India's Second Mars mission will be there in 2017.
As of now, difficult to say whether it will be with lander and rover an improved and heavy orbiter.

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