India's first interplanetary probe, Mars Orbiter Spacecraft Mangalyan successfully completed 100 days in space on February 12, 2014,...
India's first interplanetary probe, Mars Orbiter Spacecraft Mangalyan successfully completed 100 days in space on February 12, 2014, in its voyage to planet Mars. The probe, was launched by PSLV-C25 launch vehicle on November 5, 2013 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota.
Six orbit raising manoeuvres around the Earth following the launch, and the Trans Mars Injection(TMI) Manoeuvre on December 01, 2013 imparted the necessary speed to the spacecraft to escape from Earth and to initiate the journey towards Mars, in a helio-centric Orbit. Mangalyan has so far completed 190 million km of the 680 million km, it has to traverse to reach Mars.
The First Trajectory Correction Manoeuvre (TCM) was conducted on December 11, 2013. Three more TCM operations are planned around April 2014, August 2014 and September 2014. ISRO is continuously monitoring the spacecraft through the ground station of ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC), located at Byalalu, near Bangalore.
Except for a 40 minute break in the Telemetry data received from the spacecraft to the ground station, data has been continuously available for all the 100 days. The propulsion system of the spacecraft is configured for TCMs and the Mars Orbit Insertion (MOI) Operation. On February 6, 2014, all the five payloads on Mars Orbiter spacecraft were switched 'ON' to check their health.
The health parameters of all the payloads are normal. Presently, the spacecraft is at a radio distance of 16 million km causing a one way communication delay of approximately 55 seconds. After travelling the remaining distance of about 490 million km over the next 210 days, the spacecraft would be inserted into the Martian Orbit on September 24, 2014.
The 1,337 kg spacecraft (dry mass 500 kg) has a 15 kg (33 lb) scientific payload consisting five instruments, Lyman-Alpha Photometer, Methane Sensor For Mars, Mars Exospheric Neutral Composition Analyser, Thermal Infrared Imaging Spectrometer and Mars Colour Camera.
