Cryogenic-powered rocket mission fails
PTI
SRIHARIKOTA, APRIL 15
India’s Rs 330 crore mission to flight test the first indigenous cryogenic engine failed today after the rocket powered by it crashed into the sea five minutes after a perfect lift-off in a setback to its space programme.
The Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) carrying a 2,200 kg communications satellite plunged into the Bay of Bengal after it deviated from its flight-path dashing the country’s hopes of joining an exclusive club of five nations that has mastered the complex cryogenic technology on which ISRO was working for 18 years.
The satellite was to have been put into a Geostationary orbit, 36,000 km above earth, but the initial euphoria after the textbook launch turned into disappointment.
Announcing the ambitious mission that would have given India self-reliance in all areas of launch vehicle technology was unsuccessful a grim Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Chairman K Radhakrishnan said scientists would test another cryogenic engine-powered GSLV within a year.
“Flight testing of indigenous cryogenic technology during the GSLV space mission was not successful,”
Radhakrishnan told reporters at the Satish Dhawan Spaceport here shortly after shocked scientists watched blips on huge computer screens tracking the rocket’s path disappear. The rocket swerved off its path 505 seconds after the launch in perfect weather.
Hundreds of space scientists were visibly disappointed by the sudden turn of events.
