India’s
spacecraft to Mars has bid adieu to its Earth-bound orbit and is cruising in
its sun-centric orbit. In a remarkably successful execution of a complex
manoeuvre, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) fired the propulsion
system on board the spacecraft for a prolonged duration of 23 minutes from 0049
hours on Sunday.
In space parlance, the manoeuvre is called Trans-Mars Injection
(TMI). ISRO called it “the mother of all slingshots.” Celebrations
broke out at the control centre of the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command
Network (ISTRAC) at Bangalore from where the spacecraft specialists gave
commands for the orbiter’s 440 Newton engine to begin firing.
ISRO
Chairman K. Radhakrishnan told from ISTRAC, “Everything went off well. We took
stock of the spacecraft’s health and everything is normal. We just had a
meeting with all the ground controllers and mission directors who briefed us on
the spacecraft’s systems and all are working well.”
M.
Annadurai, Programme Director, Indian Remotesensing Satellites and Small
Satellites, ISRO, said “everything was normal during the firing, which went on
as per the planned timeline.” He added that there was jubilation in the ISTRAC
control room with scientists distributing sweets.
“We
had exciting moments and a satisfying day,” said S. Arunan, Project Director,
Mars Orbiter. “The sun-centric phase has started and the Canberra station has
started acquiring the spacecraft for tracking it.” Deviprasad Karnik, ISRO
spokesman, said the spacecrafts propulsion system produced a textbook
performance.
Four mid-course
corrections are planned; in case of any deviation along its path to the Martian
orbit before its expected arrival in the orbit of the Red planet in September
2014.
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