The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) launched the second developmental flight of the Small Satellite Launch Vehicle (SSLV) on Friday at 9.18 am. The SSLV is ISRO’s smallest launch vehicle. The mission, called SSLV-D2, or EOS-07, was launched from the First Launch Pad, Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh. The maiden mission of SSLV, which was launched on August 7, 2022, had failed to place its payloads into the intended orbit.
SSLV-D1, the first developmental flight of SSLV, was supposed to place two satellites into a 356-kilometre circular orbit. However, the satellites were instead placed into a 356 km × 76 km elliptical orbit. ISRO said that the issue was reasonably identified, and that the “failure of a logic to identify a sensor failure and go for a salvage action caused the deviation”.
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The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will undertake a series of missions this year and prepare for manned space mission, Gaganyaan. According to ISRO, Gaganyaan project envisages demonstration of human spaceflight capability by launching a crew of three members to an orbit of 400 km for a three-day mission and bringing them back safely to earth, by landing in Indian sea waters. This will be one of India’s biggest space missions.
ISRO will also turn its focus on science experiments this year with dedicated missions to the ‘Sun-Aditya-and the moon-Chandrayaan-3’ even as the nascent start-up sector is set to soar in the space applications segment. The year 2023 will also witness a series of experiments on India’s maiden human space flight ‘Gaganyaan project’ with the first un-crewed mission expected in the last quarter of 2023 aimed at validating the performance of the human-rated launch vehicle, orbital module propulsion system and recovery operations.
Numbers of Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) and Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) missions are also scheduled through the year. Friday’s successful LV D2 launch has ‘set the tone’ for ISRO’s busy schedule ahead. Currently ISRO is preparing the next launch of GSLV MKIII, the LVM 3 M3 mission leading to the launch of OneWeb India-2 (with) 36 satellites, which will happen by mid-March.
ISRO further plans to conduct the first runway landing experiment (RLV-LEX) of the reusable launch vehicle from Aeronautical Test Range in Karnataka’s Chitradurga, Union Minister of State in Prime Minister’s Office Jitendra Singh had mentioned in the Parliament this month.
Indian start-ups that marked their arrival with the sub-orbital flight by Skyroot Aerospace’s Vikram-S rocket, the first by a private sector company and the launch of Pixxel’s hyperspectral satellites Shakuntala, on SpaceX’s Falcon-9 rocket in April and Anand onboard ISRO’s PSLV in November.
Skyroot Aerospace, which launched India’s first privately developed rocket in November last year, plans to put a client satellite in orbit sometime this year, while Agnikul Cosmos, a start-up incubated on the IIT-Madras campus, has also lined up the test flight of its highly customisable Agnibaan rocket.
The start-ups are eyeing the huge space applications market in the country, which was earlier the sole domain of ISRO, carving a niche for themselves in the earth imaging sector, developing rockets to launch small satellites, designing cheaper fuels for satellites and even planning to take tourists on a space journey.
DhruvaSpace had launched two satellites Thybolt 1 and 2 onboard ISRO’s PSLV C-54 mission that demonstrated the ability to conduct amateur satellite communication which will help ham radio operations. The movement in this arena is rapid and India is cantering to catch-up to the global competition.
