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10 things you might have missed about the Mars Mission
India's first mission to Mars blasted off successfully on Tuesday, completing the first stage of an 11-month journey that could see the country's low-cost programme win Asia's race to the Red Planet. Here are 10 key facts about the mission.
India's first mission to Mars blasted off successfully on Tuesday, completing the first stage of an 11-month journey that could see the country's low-cost programme win Asia's race to the Red Planet. Here are 10 key facts about the mission:
• Mangalyaan’s Tuesday launch coincides with Mangalvaar, the day of Mars, called Mangala in Indian astronomy.
• The 1,350-kg orbiter weighs much less than an average sports utility vehicle.
• At Rs 450 crore ($73 million) India’s mission is the cheapest — Nasa’s MAVEN (launch: November 18) costs nine times as much ($679 million i.e. Rs 4,188 crore); Mars Rover cost $400 million; Curiosity, $2.5 billion.
• Mangalyaan was completed in one- and-a-half years; Nasa took five years for MAVEN.
• In Isro’s 44-year history, this is its first-ever launch outside the Earth’s sphere of influence.
• Programme director Mylswamy Annadurai, project director S Arunan, and Isro Satellite Centre director SK Shivkumar oversaw design, development of orbiter.
• A day before the mission, Isro chief K Radhakrishnan placed a scale model of the launch vehicle, the PSLV-C25, at Lord Vishnu’s feet in Tirumala.
• Mangalyaan will search for methane (marsh gas), the main component in natural gas and a possible indicator of life.
• Other objectives are atmospheric and particle environment studies and surface imaging.
• The probe is expected to arrive in Mars orbit in September 2014, approximately at the same time as MAVEN.
