“Next moon mission by ISRO in 2012” says Madhavan Nair

ISRO, Indian Space Research Organisation crossed a milestone by exploring Chandrayaan-I lunar mission by Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV). ISRO proved that India is the first nation to achieve the greatest feat.

On September 23, 2009, ISRO again took a successful step towards the launch of PSLV C-14 that released Oceansat-2 and six nano satellites into the orbit.

G. Madhavan Nair, the wise chairman of ISRO and the recipient of Padma Vibhushan took over the in charge of ISRO from September 2003 to October 2009 and is responsible for its 27 successful missions during his period.

Nair explained about the working of ISRO in planning large objects as ISRO uses “Decade Plans” which includes proper planning of its future missions. The plan also includes the finalization of the five year plans and the planning of the final program for two to three years. PSLV and Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) are the two launch vehicles of the ISRO that transports and drops the spacecrafts into the space.

The spacecraft and a launcher to launch the spacecraft into the orbit depend upon the mission. These are planned well before. PSLV C-14, the launch of September which included Oceansat-2 and 6 nano satellites were pre-planned well. The nano satellites are included in the mission depending on the mission type and also on the availability of space in the satellite. Finally, PSLV C-14 was implemented as same as the initial plan.

He said that the entire mission takes four to 5 years for the realization of the mission and also for its approval.

He added that all the ISRO centers are involved in one or the other way in all the projects. For eg: PSLV is designed and manufactured at Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. The basic systems will be developed by ISRO Inertial Systems Unit in Thiruvananthapuram. The second and fourth stages of PSLV which includes liquid propulsion stages and also the reaction control systems are designed by Liquid Propolsion Systems centre which is in Thiruvananthapuram. Solid propellent motors are developed by Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota. The main lead center for all the spacecraft operations is the ISRO centre in Bangalore. Along with the ISRO centers, public and private sector companies like HAL, Godrej, L&T and WIL are involved in realization of launching the spacecraft.

Several mechanisms are adopted in order to make the launches fail-proof by ISRO. Some of them are preliminary design review, critical design review and quality checking at each and every step of the project.

“Megha Tropiques” the Indo-French joint satellite mission has been planned for the purpose of studying the atmosphere in tropical regions and climate related aspects like monsoons and cyclones. The project is in progress now and about to launch in 2010-2011.

Nair added that Oceansat-3 is going to be launched in 2012-2013 for the purpose of continuing the services which are planned under Oceansat-2. Increase of payload gain and reducing the weight of the launcher are some of the specific improvements in certain subsystems of PSLV C – 14.

Nair also revealed that India and Russia have signed a Memorandum of Understanding for the joint development of lunar mission. Chandrayaan-II is targeted to launch on GSLV during 2011-2012. The purpose of the mission is to collect the samples of lunar soil, analyzing it and to send the information regarding the composition of the moon.