FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
2002
2002 - 0509.PDF
ASIAN AEROSPACE 2002 The high- performance GSLV launcher will boost India's domestic satellite launch capability three-dimensional pictures. By and large the Indian scientific com munity feels that, just as the USA's manned mission to the moon changed the direction and complexion of industrial and technological growth in the USA, a lunar probe could just be the shot in the arm that Indian science and technology is look ing for. However, this is not to suggest the project has no critics in the country. For example, Dr H S Mukunda, chair man of the aerospace department at at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore asks: "Why don't we work on something ground-breaking? Why do we need to do something that has already been done 30 years ago and many times more?" Preliminary analysis by the ISRO reveals that both the four-stage Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) and the three-stage Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) could be deployed for launching the Indian lunar probe. Studies by the ISRO show that the 294t heavy PSLV equipped with alternate solid and liquid fuel stages, through the modifi cation of its upper stage into a translunar injection stage carrying 2,200kg of propel- lant, can send a 530kg spacecraft on a fly- by mission or a 350kg spacecraft n orbit around the moon. Alternatively, the 401t GSLV equipped with a Russian-supplied cryogenic engine stage can send a 850- 950kg spacecraft on a fly-by mission or a 600kg spacecraft in moon orbit after incor porating the translunar injection stage containing 3.4t of propellant. The PSLV is a candidate to launch India's first-ever Microgravity Research Satellite, which is still at the conceptual stage. The PSI.V was originally designed to launch a It- class IRS into a polar/sun-synchronous orbit. It is being offered as a cost-efficient booster for low- and medium-earth orbit missions. During a flight last October, the PSLV placed into orbit a German-built research satellite and Europe's technology demonstrator Proba as piggyback payloads along with an Indian remote sensing space craft called the Technology Experiment Satellite. This was the second commercial mission performed by the PSLV. Launcher upgrade Meanwhile, the ISRO has decided to uprate the PSLV to make it suitable for geosyn chronous-orbit missions. A flight of the uprated PSLV some time this year would place an Indian weather watch satellite into a geosynchronous orbit. The high-performance GSLV completed its debut flight in April last year. The objec tive of the GSLV is to help India attain a capability to launch its Insat-class domestic satellites, currently orbited using European Arianespace boosters. India is now not only developing an in digenous cryogenic engine stage as a substi tute for the Russian-made engine but is also is involved in developing an uprated GSLV Mark III vehicle capable of launching a 4.5t- class satellite payload into a geostationary orbit. Like the PSLV, India is also planning to market the services of the GSLV. India's almost 40-year journey into space looks like entering an exciting new dimension, with huge potential benefits - and not insignificant risks - for the developing nation. • "We must be second to none in the application of technology to the real problems of man and society" DR VIKRAM A SARABHAI www.flightinternational.com FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 19-25 FEBRUARY 2002 57
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
