Bharat Rakshak

perfect guidance....did this flight have a Vikram processor on it?

Yes this was first PSLV launch with indigenous microprocessor.

Vikram (the "chetana": subtle consciousness) carrying the "Vetaal" (the "sthool": material / rocket mass) to a riveting gaatha of Chandra-ma. Wah wah !!!

IIRC the Vikram based avionics was flight qualified on 2 earlier missions atop PSLV(secondary/reduendent avionics for qualification) and GSLV(primary system).

Chandrayaan-1 successfully launched.

From "AIAA News Update"

The New York Times (10/22, Sengupta) reports, "India launched its first unmanned spacecraft to orbit the moon early Wednesday, part of an effort to assert its power in space and claim some of the business opportunities there." According to the Times, "Talk of a space race with China could not be contained, even as Manmohan Singh, the Indian prime minister, was due to visit Beijing later in the week." (THAT'S WHAT DECIDED THE SCHEDULE!! NOW IT BECOMES CLEAR!! )

While the article does note that Chandrayaan-1 "can potentially yield commercial gains for India's space program," the mission "is not without domestic critics. Bharat Karnad, a strategic affairs analyst who frequently finds fault with the Congress Party-led coalition government, called the mission a 'grandiloquent' effort designed to catch up with a far more advanced Chinese space program." Karnad also criticized it for the financial cost.

IOW, because China has launched a few rockets, Indians should sit around scratching their musharrafs and saying "Bhavitavyam Bhavedeva!" ... and , of course, test a few megaton nukes. These "experts" make me

The AP (10/22, Rabinowitz, Borenstein) adds, "As India's economy has boomed in recent years, it has sought to convert its new found wealth...into political and military clout and stake a claim as a world leader. It is hoping that a moon mission -- coming just months after it finalized a deal with the United States that recognizes India as a nuclear power -- will further enhance that status." The mission, along with the upcoming Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), will make the "most comprehensive maps" since the Apollo era, according to Scott Pace, director of space policy at George Washington University. Pace also said, "We need better maps," if NASA is to eventually place a lunar base in the southern polar region.

(Oh, no we don't, Mr. Karnad can buy them cheaper from the Chinese if we set off a few new clear bums).

AFP (10/22) notes, "Officials said the lift-off...was a 'great success', with the rocket placing the craft into a transfer orbit around the globe." It will reach lunar orbit in 15 days. India "is hoping the mission will boost its space program into the same league as regional powerhouses Japan and China." The launch itself was "carried live on most Indian television channels." (er... does that happen with Chinese launches?)

Bloomberg News (10/22, Shankar) reports, "Today's launch and the two-year orbit is preparation for landing a craft on the moon, said [Debasish] Ghose, who works at the [Indian Institute of Science's] Department of Aerospace and Engineering." That mission would be in conjunction with Russia, "India's main partner in space programs." Russia "has provided manufacturing and design technology. Most of India's space programs are developed by its own scientists."

Should India take part in space race?

one word: jealousy!~.
regarding the negatives: accept it, and move forward to wards making it positive. take it constructive.

While the article does note that Chandrayaan-1 "can potentially yield commercial gains for India's space program," the mission "is not without domestic critics. Bharat Karnad, a strategic affairs analyst who frequently finds fault with the Congress Party-led coalition government, called the mission a 'grandiloquent' effort designed to catch up with a far more advanced Chinese space program." Karnad also criticized it for the financial cost

http://broadband.indiatimes.com/toishowvideo/3626540.cms

So.. after lift off, vertical, and then you see when it clears the clouds, it almost veers off at around 50* angle. Just checking if this is the normal angle that we send or have taken extra few tangential to place it a highly eliptical orbit?

?

So.. after lift off, vertical, and then you see when it clears the clouds, it almost veers off at around 50* angle. Just checking if this is the normal angle that we send or have taken extra few tangential to place it a highly eliptical orbit?

i really appreciated the homespun nature of the launch and the control centre - none of this slick-must impress goras-stunts of the Chinese

ISRO scientists visited temples to seek the blessings of Hindu gods before the launch, and afterwards some expressed relief that rain had held off until the rocket was in space. "The rain gods have been kind to us," Madhavan said.

Pallava Bagla
Wednesday, October 22, 2008 9:43 PM (Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh)

The scientists at Indian Space Research Organisation are making the country proud. But just who are these men responsible for this blazing success?

To begin with, these scientists are all made in India with no fancy foreign degrees and often from small villages.

Today they are the world's leading scientists, but one of them didn't even see an electric bulb for the longest time.

Project director of Chandrayaan-1, M Annadurai rarely appears on television and not many of us know about him. He is the man in-charge of India's first satellite to study the moon.

Annadurai, the son of a school teacher, is a first generation engineer and comes from a small village in Tamil Nadu.{Arun_S: Ramana / Acharya you are way ahead and correct in your assessment, Indian interest will be carried on shoulders of son of the soil, and not social elites who sell at the drop of the hat}

He doesn't have a foreign degree and spent the first few years of his life without seeing what a streetlight looks like.

"I think I was born and brought up in a small village called Kodavadi near Coimbatore, until the age of seven. I did not see street lights even in my village," said M Annadurai.

"But I had the fortune of seeing the moon, which was like a natural planetarium," he added.

On being asked about his education, M Annadurai said, "Unfortunately I was not destined (to study abroad) but I don't have a regret of not being there. I think until I completed my post graduation in Engineering, I did not go beyond my district."

"Even for educational tour I did not go out. Until completion of post graduation, I was almost confined within my district," he said.

S K Shivkumar is the man who set up the entire communication network, the father of India's deep space network.

He too is home bred, studied in a regional engineering college but comes from the place where the first rockets originated.

Shivkumar hails from Mysore, the place where history tells us, rockets and miisile were used first by Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan.

These top scientists have made India proud. Yet, they are earning about a lakh rupees per month, which is way less than salaries in the private sector.

But ask them and they say it is the love of their job and not the money that keeps them going.

Launch Video

Good One

..... Assisted shrilly and loudly by the Energizer Bunny propagandoos:

By SOMINI SENGUPTA
Published: October 21, 2008

NEW DELHI — India launched its first unmanned spacecraft to orbit the moon early Wednesday, part of an effort to assert its power in space and claim some of the business opportunities there. {Arun_S: Hawking Snake Oil. Anyone there?}

The Indian mission is scheduled to last two years, prepare a three-dimensional atlas of the moon and prospect the lunar surface for natural resources, including uranium, a coveted fuel for nuclear power plants, according to the Indian Space Research Organization.

The spacecraft will not land on the moon, though it is supposed to send a small “impactor” probe to the surface.

The launching of Chandrayaan-1, as the vehicle is called — roughly translated as Moon Craft-1 — comes about a year after China’s first moon mission.

Talk of a space race with China could not be contained, even as Manmohan Singh, the Indian prime minister, was due to visit Beijing later in the week.

“China has gone earlier, but today we are trying to catch them, catch that gap, bridge the gap,” Bhaskar Narayan, a director at the Indian space agency, was quoted by Reuters as having said.

The first Indian lunar voyage is carrying two devices from NASA. One, the Moon Mineralogy Mapper, or M3, will assess mineral composition of the moon from orbit. The other, the Mini-SAR, will look for ice deposits in the moon’s polar regions.

Chandrayaan-1 was launched from a research station in Sriharikota, a barrier island off the coast of the southern state of Andhra Pradesh.

The moon mission, in addition to demonstrating technological capacity, can potentially yield commercial gains for India’s space program. India’s ability to put satellites into orbit has already resulted in lucrative deals; for example, Israel has sent up a satellite by means of an Indian launcher.

“It is proof of India’s technical capability in an advanced area of science,” said Dipankar Banerjee, a retired army general who is the director of the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies here. “India wants to be counted as one of the emerging players in Asia. Space is, of course, an important part of power projection.”

The mission is not without domestic critics. Bharat Karnad, a strategic affairs analyst who frequently finds fault with the Congress Party-led coalition government, called the mission a “grandiloquent” effort designed to catch up with a far more advanced Chinese space program. “It is kind of a prestige project the government has gotten into,” Mr. Karnad said. “This is misuse of resources that this country can ill afford at this point.”

Surely we could fire a rocket with rain inhibitors to ensure that the mother of all Rockets went up without worry of rain.

I think towards the end we can see the stage separation. I can be wrong.

Thats what i also thought, Thats the reason i posted this video

The Chandrayaan mission costs $80 million compared to China's $187 million lunar probe launched last year, and Japan's $480 million Kayuga mission.