ISRO's Mission to Mars Gears up for a Tricky Manoeuvre

[Brahmos_2]

Bangalore: In this season of soccer, the Indian Space Research Organisation or ISRO is gearing up to play a bit of football of its own -- albeit of the celestial variety -- with its Mars mission Mangalayaan.

At 4.30 pm today, the space agency will gently nudge India's Mars Orbiter Mission a tad closer to the red planet.

It is a risky operation; if things go wrong, the Rs. 450 crore mission launched on November 5, 2013 from Sriharikota could well get lost.

Nearly 20 per cent of the 51 missions headed for Mars, launched by various countries, have been lost en-route.

ISRO chairman K Radhakrishnan told NDTV, "It is not a routine operation. Great precision is required in calculating and correctly firing the four small rocket engines on board the spacecraft in the exact direction,"

He added that the ISRO team working on the project was 'confident' about executing the command.

Mangalayaan has so far covered nearly 466 million kilometres or nearly 70 per cent of its arduous 680 million kilometre-long journey.

For the last six months, since it was launched, the spacecraft has been in a state of induced slumber.

Today, its rocket engines will be fired for a mere 16 seconds, but this is a tricky manoeuvre as the rocket engines have to be fired in the right direction.

Among the factors that can affect the outcome of the operation is solar wind, which can make inter-planetary spacecraft drift from course. If the firing goes awry, the spacecraft can easily get lost.

Today's gentle nudge will help Mangalyaan score a goal on September 24, 2014, when it is supposed to finally rendezvous with the red planet.

Mangalyaan is currently travelling with a velocity of 28 km/s or about 100,800 kilometres per hour. It is now the fastest and farthest ever-traveling Indian object in space. It is so far away that it takes a radio signal almost five minutes to travel from Bangalore to the Mangalyaan.

If the Mars mission manages to reach within 440-560 km of the red planet's surface after its epic marathon, India will become the third country in the world to achieve such an exacting target on a maiden journey.



ISRO's Mission to Mars Pulls Off Tricky Manoeuvre - NDTV

 

[Aarush]

All the best....ISRO.........make india proud again....

 

[TejasMk3]

It's completed guys, at 4:30, 15 seconds of firing, they received the signal that firing was completed.

Now we are just waiting for them to confirm the calculations about the trajectory.

Yes it’s 4:30 PM now. The TCM2 firing should have started! We’ll know for sure when the antenna is reoriented back towards Earth post-firing and not to forget, an additional 5 minutes 40 seconds signal delay.

A missive from MOM confirms TCM2-Firing completion. Team MOM is busy crunching numbers to determine the post-TCM2 trajectory.

Edit added the updates from the facebook page, (cant post links yet).

 

[PoKeMon]

Best of luck ISRO.

 

[IND151]

Best luck to ISRO.

 

[rockstarIN]

Best of luck!!!

 

[Reviewer21]

Go for it ISRO 1.2bln people's wishes are with you. Good luck!

 

[Rajaraja Chola]

Fingers in my mouth...! Awaiting the final result...!

 

[Reviewer21]

If the Mars mission manages to reach within 440-560 km of the red planet's surface after its epic marathon, India will become the third country in the world to achieve such an exacting target on a maiden journey.

We Will!

 

[Robinhood Pandey]

Good luck ISRO. make us proud

 

[trident2010]

Fingers crossed !!