INDIA IN SPACE (PART-1)

INDIAN ROCKETS AND SATELLITES :

ARYABHATTA

                   * ON APRIL 19,1975 INDIA'S FIRST SATELLITE "ARYABHATTA"   ( THE NAME OF A  FAMOUS ANCIENT ASTRONOMER IN INDIA ) WAS LAUNCHED USING A RUSSIAN ROCKET NAMED "KOSMOS 3M", AT KAPUSTIN YAR LAUNCH SITE IN RUSSIA.
ABOUT ARYABHATTA SATELLITE : 
                         MASS - 360 Kg

                        ORBITAL PERIOD - 96 MINUTES

                        APOGEE - 619 Km

                        PERIGEE - 563 Km

SLV-3

INCLINED AT 50.7 DEGREE                   

DIAMETER - 1.4 m

KOSMOS-3M

ARYABHATTA SATELLITE

* IT WAS BUILT BY "ISRO" TO CONDUCT EXPERIMENTS IN X-RAY ASTRONOMY,AERONOMICS AND SOLAR PHYSICS.

* THE SATELLITE WAS 26-SIDED POLYGON.ALL FACES ( EXCEPT TOP AND BOTTOM ) WERE COVERED WITH SOLAR CELLS.

* THE SATELLITE'S IMAGE APPEARED ON THE REVERSE OF INDIAN 2 RUPEE BANK NOTES BETWEEN 1975 AND 1997.

        

ROHINI

ROHINI

ON JULY 18,1980 INDIA'S "ROHINI 1B" SATELLITE WAS LAUNCHED USING INDIAN ROCKET NAMED "SLV-3".ARYABHATTA'S MASS WAS 360 Kg BUT ROHINI 1B'S MASS WAS ONLY 35 Kg.

ASLV

SINCE A ROCKET CAPABLE OF LIFTING A SATELLITE LIKE  ARYABHATTA (WHOSE MASS IS 10 TIMES GREATER THAN ROHINI 1B ) WAS NOT MADE BY INDIA  AT THAT TIME, ARYABHATTA WAS LAUNCHED BY RUSSIAN ROCKET.

EVENTHOUGH INDIA HAS MADE SATELLITES ON HER OWN ,IT COULD NOT MAKE HI-TECH ROCKETS ON HER OWN.THE REASON FOR THIS IS,SO MANY NATIONS REFUSED TO HELP INDIA IN THIS REGARD.SO INDIA TRIED TO MAKE ROCKETS ON HER OWN.

INDIA'S 1ST ROCKET WAS SLV-3 (SATELLITE LAUNCHING VEHICLE).FIRST SLV WAS LAUNCHED  TO SPACE ON AUGUST 10TH,1979,AT SRIHARIKOTTA SATELLITE LAUNCH CENTRE, IN ANDRA PRADESH.

BUT IT HAS FAILED TO PLACE ROHINI 1A INTO CORRECT ORBITAL PATH.NEXT YEAR THIS FAILURE WAS COMPENSATED BY SUCCESSFUL TWO LAUNCHES. IN THE NEXT FOUR YEARS INDIA STEPPED INTO NEXT STAGE.TWO SMALL ROCKETS WERE PLACED ON THE SIDES OF SLV. THIS ROCKET WHICH HAD EXTRA CAPACITY IS NAMED AS "ASLV" ( AUGMENTED SATELLITE LAUNCH VEHICLE )