India’s First Manned Space Mission to Take off by 2022
The mission will undertake two unmanned flights and one manned flight, which are developed using indigenous technology, which will help in placing the three members crew into a low earth orbit for seven days.
India is getting ready to register its victory over the space, as the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) plans to send its first indigenous project with a three-member crew to space for seven days by 2022. It is going to be India’s first manned space mission, also known as Gaganyaan.
The mission will undertake two unmanned flights and one manned flight, which are developed using indigenous technology, which will help in placing the three members crew into a low earth orbit for seven days. Russia and France are also assisting India in developing its first manned space mission.
ISRO is going to deploy its biggest rocket, the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle Mark III (GSLV MK III) to launch the spacecraft, which will be launched from the Sriharikota spaceport in Andhra Pradesh. Indian space agency ISRO is hopeful that they can launch the mission within 40 months. At present, the plan is in the demonstration phase.
At a Press Conference, ISRO Chairman K. Sivan informed, “We need to select our astronauts at the earliest as they would require at least three years for training. They could be from the air force or ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation), or even a common man. Since it’s our first mission, we would prefer a pilot. The initial training will be done at the Institute for Aerospace Medicine in Bengaluru”.
The Indian Space Research Organisation is going to collaborate extensively with various national agencies, laboratories, academia and industry to accomplish the programme objectives of Gaganyaan. Academia will also participate in crew training, human life science technology development initiatives as well as design reviews.
Union Law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said, “Gaganyaan is a great programme in pursuit of India’s space autonomy. It is designed to carry about three human beings for a maximum period of seven days in space with the support of academia, the scientific community, industry and ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation). It will be launched within 40 months after the approval”.
If India is successful in launching the Gaganyaan mission, it will join the league of the United States, Russia and China in launching indigenous missions to the space. The spaceflight in the Gaganyaan program is also one of the cheapest in the world with the entire mission, including technology development, flight hardware realization and infrastructure, estimated to cost not more than Rs 10,000 crore or $1.43 billion.