Pradeep's Space Newsletter #60
Aditya-L1 Instruments SUIT and VELC turned on and operational
ISRO launched Aditya-L1 on 2 September 2023 to study the Sun. The spacecraft got into a halo orbit around Lagrange Point 1 (L1) on 6 January 2024. The spacecraft carries instruments that study the Sun from the L1 orbit and instruments that study the solar material that the Sun throws outward and that passes the spacecraft in situ.
ISRO announced on 10 June 2024 that two of the remote sensing instruments that study the Sun from orbit, the Solar Ultra Violet Imaging Telescope (SUIT) and the Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC) started working on on 14 May 2024. They were being tested, calibrated, and getting ready to operate.
Read more about the science results on the ISRO website.
RLV-LEX-03 happening soon
Reusability is the mantra popular in launch vehicle development today. ISRO is building a reusable launch vehicle as a way to bring back a satellite deployer to Earth after deploying a satellite. Landing is the hardest part of such a mission. This is what ISRO is testing at the Aeronautical Testing Range, Chellakere in Chitradurga, Karnataka.
Two landing tests were successful. For these tests, ISRO collaborated with the Indian Air Force. The RLV was deployed from an IAF Chinook helicopter. For the first Landing Experiment (LEX), the RLV was lined up with the runway and released. RLV then landed and came to a stop. For the second LEX, the RLV was launched a bit to the side of the runway. The RLV then lined up with the runway and landed. For the third LEX, RLV will be deployed from a point farther away from the runway. RLV has to now line up with the runway and then land.
RLV-LEX-03 is now delayed because of the weather.
Dr. S Unnikrishnan, Director, VSSC revealed in an interview with Asianet’s Arun Raj that for the orbital return flight experiment (OREX), ISRO will use the GSLV after replacing the cryogenic stage with a PSLV fourth stage.
Read the translation on the ISRO sub-Reddit to get the gist of the interview.
LVM3 M3 Upper Stage re-enters near the southern Indian Ocean
ISRO had launched 36 OneWeb satellites on the LVM3 M3 mission on 26 March 2023. After the satellites were deployed into orbit, the upper stage of the launch vehicle was moved to a 450 km orbit. The upper stage contains liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen fuel which were emptied. This is to avoid the risk of an explosion.
The upper stage re-entered Earth’s atmosphere on 14 June 2024 between 14:35 UTC to 15:05 UTC. ISRO expects some parts of the upper stage like gas bottles, nozzle, and tanks which were built to resist atmospheric heating to survive. ISRO predicts that the upper stage impacted the southern Indian Ocean at 14:55 UTC.
ISRO has committed to debris-free space missions (DFSM) by 2030. It has been getting satellites and upper stages back to Earth over the last few years to comply with its own as well as international guidelines.
More details are on the ISRO page.
GSAT-N2/GSAT-20 mission page
GSAT-N2 is the second demand-driven mission to be launched by the Department of Space’s commercial arm NewSpace India Ltd. (NSIL). The page does not mention the customer for whom NSIL has ordered this satellite.
It is reported that the satellite will be loaded on an IAF C-17 Globemaster III Strategic airlifter and sent to the US where it will be launched on SpaceX’s Falcon 9. The satellite which weighs 4700 kg exceeds LVM3’s present capacity of about 4 tons. Ariane 5, which ISRO traditionally relied on for launching India’s geostationary satellites is out of service. Ariane 6 is waiting for its first operational flight. This seems to be the reason ISRO has gone with SpaceX.
The last time an Indian satellite flew from Cape Canaveral was the INSAT-4D on 12 June 1990 on board a Delta 4000 series launch vehicle. A return after almost 24 years.
You can read more about GSAT-N2 here.