ISRO: India's Mars Orbiter successfully inserted into orbit around MARS

TV Screens show Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi greeting Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) scientists and other officials after the success of Mars Orbiter Mission at their Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network complex in Bangalore, India, Wednesday, Sept. 24, 2014. 

India triumphed in its first interplanetary mission, placing a satellite into orbit around Mars on Wednesday morning and catapulting the country into an elite club of deep-space explorers. 

Credit: AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi

India triumphed in its first interplanetary mission, placing a satellite into orbit around Mars on Wednesday morning and catapulting the country into an elite club of deep-space explorers.

Scientists broke into wild cheers as the orbiter's engines completed 24 minutes of burn time to maneuver the spacecraft into its designated place around the red planet.

"We have gone beyond the boundaries of human enterprise and innovation," Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, standing alongside scientists with the Indian Space and Research Organisation (ISRO) at the command center in the southern tech hub of Bangalore.

"We have navigated our craft through a route known to very few," Modi said, congratulating the scientists and "all my fellow Indians on this historic occasion."

Scientists described the final stages of the Mars Orbiter Mission, affectionately nicknamed MOM, as flawless.

The success marks a milestone for the space program in demonstrating that it can conduct complex missions and act as a global launch pad for commercial, navigational and research satellites.

It's also a major feat for the developing country of 1.2 billion people, most of whom are poor.

At the same time, India has a robust scientific and technical educational system that has produced millions of software programmers, engineers and doctors, propelling many into the middle class.

Getting a spaceship successfully into orbit around Mars is no easy task. More than half the world's previous attempts, 23 out of 41 missions, have failed, including the Beagle-2 from the UK and Nozomi by Japan in 1999.

Indian Space Research Organization scientists and other officials cheer as they celebrate the success of Mars Orbiter Mission at their Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network complex in Bangalore, India, Wednesday, Sept. 24, 2014. 

Credit: AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi

The United States had its first success with a 1964 flyby by a spacecraft called Mariner 4, returning 21 images of the surface of the planet.

The former Soviet Union MARS-3 reached the planet in 1971, and the European Space Agency Mars Express in 2003, still operating successfully around Mars.

The U.S. space agency NASA congratulated India in a Twitter message welcoming MOM to studying the red planet.

On Sunday, NASA achieved its own success in placing its Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution mission (Maven), in position.

The U.S. has two more satellites circling the planet at the moment, as well as two rovers rolling across the rocky Martian surface.

The ESA's Mars Express, launched over a decade ago, is still operating as well.

India was particularly proud that MOM was developed with homegrown technology and for a bargain price of about $75 million, a cost that Modi quipped was lower than many Hollywood film budgets.

By comparison, NASA's much larger Maven mission cost nearly 10 times as much at $671 million.

The real test of these missions will come when the scientific data is gathered and returned for examination.

In this Sept. 11, 2013, file photo, Indian engineers work on the Mars orbiter spacecraft at the satellite center of Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) in Bangalore, India.

Credit: AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi, File

Indian scientists "designed the trajectory aspects and the interplanetary aspects," said Vipparthi Adimurthy of the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology, who headed the team that crafted the first feasibility studies on whether India could reach Mars.

Dr Adimurthy

"Today not only has a dream come true, but we have created history for India, for ISRO, and for the world," he said.

The 1,350-kilogram (nearly 3,000-pound) orbiter will now circle the planet for at least six months, with five solar-powered instruments gathering scientific data that may shed light on Martian weather systems as well as what happened to the water that is believed to have existed once on Mars in large quantities.

The 15 kgs payloads on the Mars Orbiter Mission include:

Lyman Alpha Photometer (LAP), an absorption cell photometer that measures relative abundance of deuterium and hydrogen from Lyman-alpha emission in the Martian upper atmosphere.

Methane Sensor for Mars (MSM), designed to measure methane in the Martian atmosphere with PPB accuracy and map its sources.

Mars Exospheric Neutral Composition Analyser (MENCA), a quadruple mass spectrometer capable of analysing the neutral composition in the range of 1 to 300 amu with unit mass resolution.

Mars Colour Camera (MCC), a tri-colour camera that gives images and information about the surface features and composition of Martian surface.

Thermal Infrared Imaging Spectrometer (TIS) to measure the thermal emissions and, because it is not using visible light, this instrument can be operated both during th day and night.

Temperature and emissivity are two basic physical parameters estimated from thermal emission measurement.

ESA Ariane 5 Rocket Launches Measat 3b and Optus 10 Satellites Into Orbit

Arianespace successfully launched two telecommunications satellites, Boeing's MEASAT-3b and SSL's OPTUS 10 on Sept. 11, 2014, from Kourou, French Guiana.

Credit: Arianespace

Stacked inside the shroud of an Ariane 5 rocket, two commercial television broadcasting satellites for Malaysian and Australian telecommunications companies blasted off from French Guiana on Thursday.

Boeing's MEASAT-3b

The MEASAT-3b and OPTUS 10 spacecraft rocketed away from a launch pad in Kourou, French Guiana, at 2205 GMT (6:05 p.m. EDT), riding on top of an 18-story Ariane 5 booster to begin 15-year missions to broadcast television programming to millions of customers in the Asia-Pacific.

Liftoff of the Ariane 5 rocket was delayed 44 minutes after a status board at the European-run Guiana Space Center displayed a "red" condition, signaling a problem.

No details of the issue were released during the launch's official webcast.

The countdown was paused twice, including a hold 27 seconds before liftoff before the launch team reset the clock to the 7-minute mark.

Officials said ground teams needed more time to configure a downrange tracking station in Kenya.

SSL's OPTUS 10

Once the problem was cleared, the countdown resumed under a computer-controlled synchronised sequence.

The Ariane 5 pressurised its propellant tanks and ignited its Vulcain 2 main engine when the countdown reached zero.

Seven seconds later, after passing an automated health check, the rocket fired its two solid-fueled boosters and blasted off on top of a column of hot orange exhaust.

The Ariane 5's hydrogen-fueled core engine and twin solid rocket boosters pushed the launcher into a clear sky, passing the speed of sound in 41 seconds as it pitched east over the Atlantic Ocean.

The two boosters burned their pre-packed powder propellant in a little over 2 minutes and fell away from the Ariane 5 rocket to plummet back into the sea 41 miles below.

The Ariane 5's main stage continued firing as it released a nose shroud to expose the mission's dual-payload composite once the rocket flew into the outer reaches of Earth's atmosphere.

The Vulcain 2 main engine gave way to the launcher's upper stage engine 9 minutes after liftoff.

On cue, the rocket's HM7B second stage powerplant switched off after a 16-minute burn to put the MEASAT-3b and OPTUS 10 satellites into an on-target geostationary transfer orbit, an egg-shaped path around Earth used as a waypoint to the craft's final operating positions.

In a three-step deployment procedure, the Ariane 5's upper stage released MEASAT-3b, then ejected a Sylda dual-payload adapter covering OPTUS 10.

Then the rocket separated Optus 10 about at 2239 GMT (6:39 p.m. EDT), prompting smiles and applause to break the tension inside the control room in Kourou.

"Arianespace has just received confirmation from our on-board telemetry systems that MEASAT-3b and Optus 10 were separated as planned," said Stephane Israel, chairman and CEO of Arianespace, the French company which manages Ariane 5 launch operations and sales.

Thursday's flight notched the Ariane 5's 61st consecutive successful launch.

For engineers working on the mission's payloads, the launch was just the beginning.

"It's only the start because the operations are just starting," said Arnaud de Rosnay, executive vice president for telecommunications satellites at EADS Airbus Defence and Space, the manufacturer of MEASAT-3b for the Malaysian telecom company Measat.

"I've just had confirmation that we've received telemetry from the control center in Toulouse, and the early operations of the stellite are working fine."

The 13,000-pound (5,897-kilogram) MEASAT-3b satellite will fire its orbit-raising propulsion system four times in the next five-to-six days to reach a circular orbit approximately 22,300 miles over the equator.

Once there, the spacecraft will extend its power-generating solar panels and antennas to prepare to enter service.

At that altitude, known as geostationary orbit, the satellite will hover over the same location on Earth.

MEASAT-3b should enter service by mid-October parked over the equator at 91.5 degrees east, according to Measat.

"MEASAT's successful procurement and launch of the MEASAT-3b satellite is a great achievement for Measat, for Malaysia's ICT (Information and Communications Technology) infrastructure, and for the Malaysian space industry," said YB Dato' Jailani Johari, Malaysia's deputy minister of communication and multimedia, in a press release.

"We trust that Measat will continue to push the boundaries of both business and technology as they look to become the world's leading emerging market satellite operator."

Sprite Kicksat Mini satellites launch into orbit aboard SpaceX Falcon9 rocket

"Sprite" mini femtosatellites that are now in orbit. Credit: Zac Manchester

After years of planning and several last-minute delays, about 100 Cornell-developed mini femtosatellites demonstrating space flight at its simplest have launched into orbit and are now circling Earth.

With just a laptop, antenna and a few other basics, space flight enthusiasts can listen for signals sent by the cracker-sized "sprites" that launched April 18 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket as part of NASA's CRS-3 mission.

Still inside their mothership craft, the sprites are scheduled to deploy on May 4 to become the smallest free-flying spacecraft.

Zac Manchester

The project is called KickSat and has been led by Zac Manchester '09, now a graduate student in aerospace engineering, since he was an undergraduate doing research with Mason Peck, associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Cornell University.

Sprites are mini satellites stripped down to their most basic components: a microcontroller, transceiver and solar cells for power.

Manchester took the project to Kickstarter in 2011 to see if amateur space enthusiasts would help fund the venture.

More than 300 people sponsored KickSat and were allowed to transmit whatever signal they wanted from it – for example, their initials or a message to a loved one.

The KickSat housing is engraved with the sponsors' names.

The sprites are housed inside a 3U CubeSat, which is a small satellite frequently used in space research.

The 3U CubeSat is aboard a capsule that separates from the shuttle, which continues to the International Space Station.

The KickSat 3U CubeSat is second in line to deploy.

The big event – when the sprites leave the spacecraft and begin transmitting signals – will be the afternoon of May 4 (subject to change). Manchester has been updating his Kickstarter blog with mission information.

"After a beautiful launch at 3:25 this afternoon [April 18], KickSat was deployed in low Earth orbit. We at Cornell and several amateur radio operators around the world have made contact with the spacecraft, and it is alive and well. I can't thank all of you enough for your tremendous support over the past two years. Thank you for believing in KickSat!"