India’s maiden mars mission successfully launched

Sriharikota (AP): India’s mission to Mars was successfully launched on Tuesday with its polar rocket placing the Mars spacecraft precisely into an intended Earth orbit in its first-ever historic inter-planetary odyssey in a bid to join a select band of nations.

Entering a new frontier in space technology, Indian Space Research Organisation(ISRO)’s mission is aimed at establishing India’s capability to reach the Red Planet and would focus on looking for presence of methane, an indicator of life there.

“The PSLV C25 vehicle has placed the Mars Orbiter spacecraft very precisely into an elliptical orbit around Earth,” ISRO chief K Radhakrishnan said after the launch.

It is expected to reach the Red Planet’s orbit by September 24 next and go around in an elliptical orbit (periapsis of 366 km and apo-apsis of 80,000 km).

“I am happy to say the spacecraft is in good health. It has done a task what had to be done,” a visibly relieved and happy Radhakrishnan told reporters.

The rocket injected the satellite into Earth’s orbit over South America, which was captured by ISRO’s sea-borne terminals on board Shipping Corporation of India’s vessels SCI Nalanda and SCI Yamuna in the South Pacific Ocean.

There was a data break of over 10 minutes as expected after burn-out of the third stage and the Mission Control Centre got signals on ignition of the fourth stage.

“The biggest challenge will be precisely navigating the spacecraft to Mars,” said Radhakrishnan, adding, “We will know if we pass our examination on Sept. 24, 2014.”