The agency says that it may open avenues for the in-house capability to send manned mission, too, into space.
The Indian Space and Research Organization (ISRO) is launching a new satellite into space on June 5. The satellite, Gsat-19, which would boost the Internet speed and connectivity in the country, will be carried by India’s smallest, yet heaviest, rocket – Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle March III (GSLV Mk III). According to ISRO officials, this event could also open possibilities of India’s manned missions into space. At the moment, only three countries — US, Russia and China — are capable of launching manned missions.
GSLV Mk III, alias fat boy, weighs nearly 640 tons – that is equal to the weight of 200 adult elephants, thus the name. Length-wise, it is 43 meters long.
“After over 200 tests have been done on different components of this heavy-lift rocket, we are targeting to launch this new vehicle on June 5,” said ISRO chairman Kiran Kumar.
The new and advanced indigenous cryogenic engine used in the space vehicle uses liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen as propellants to lift it off to the geostationary orbit. ISRO’s scientists took over 15 years to master the technology of this engine and tested it on a fully functional rocket, according to the agency’s news media statement.
Kumar said that the agency is working on using the capabilities of GSLV Mk III to explore options to send manned missions into space. “GSLV Mk III could in principle be used for manned mission,” he said.
He said, currently, ISRO’s focus is to increase the launch capabilities of its space vehicles. However, if the government approves, the agency could venture into manned missions, too. “Until we get the final approval from the government, ISRO won’t work on the manned mission. Our key priority is to meet the national demand of providing more number of satellites into orbits in the field of communication, remote sensing and navigation. Therefore, we are focusing on increasing our launch capacities both in lower and geostationary orbits and to make our launches cost-effective,” he said.
“Till now, GSLV Mk II can put a 2.2-tonne satellite into the geostationary orbit. But GSLV Mk III can put a 4-tonne satellite into the geo orbit and even an 8-tonne satellite into the low earth orbit (LEO).”
Tapan Misra of Ahmedabad-based Space Application Centre, said, “GSLV Mk III will have one of the world’s heaviest sold motor engines and will have two strap-ons. This rocket is much more manoeuvrable than other rockets launched earlier and this feature will help us change its position in space.”
The “fat boy”, GSLV Mk III was under the making process since early 2000s, and its first launch was planned for 2009-2010. Several factors delayed the event, including the April 15, 2010, failure of the ISRO-developed cryogenic upper stage test on the GSLV Mk II. A suborbital flight test of the GSLV Mk III launcher, with a passive cryogenic third stage, was successfully carried out on December 18, 2014, and was used to test a crew module on a suborbital trajectory.