)
The Indian Space and Research Organisation is on the cusp of a historic breakthrough. Isro has already started crucial operations to insert the Mars Orbiter Mission into orbit.
The spacecraft has now entered the shadow of the Red Planet, which will cause a temporary communication blackout. Also, the final liquid burn has started, Isro has confirmed.
Mangalyaan is currently being tracked by four deep space network, including Madrid (Spain), Goldstone (USA), Canberra (Australia) and, of course, Bangalore.
Isro scientists estimate that the spacecraft is currently 223.93 million km from earth.
The spacecraft has already started the Forward Rotation, which is essential in order to the make the direction of the firing of the engine opposite to the direction of movement. This enables slowing down of the spacecraft.
Controlling the velocity is critical t the mission. It is currently 20.1 km per second, but needs to be brought down to 4.4 kms. If it is not controlled to the expected limit, then the spacecraft will not go into the Orbit. If it is lower than the limit, Mangalyaan will simply crash and burn on the Martian surface.
In the wee hours, it successfully fired the liquid engine that had been idle for the past 300-odd days.
A little while later, the medium antenna successfully took over guidance of the spacecraft as part of the attempt to rotate it towards its intended orbit.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is at the control room in Bangalore with Isro scientists to watch the historic occasion.
On Monday, Isro said in a statement that the 440 Newton Liquid Apogee Motor (LAM) of India’s Mars Orbiter Spacecraft was successfully fired for 3.968 seconds. The operation was also used for the spacecraft’s trajectory correction and changed its velocity by 2.18 metre/second.
Once inserted in the orbit around Mars, Mangalyaan will complete one rotation around Mars in 3.2 Earth days and will be active for about six to ten months. The duration will vary depending upon various factors including the quantity of fuel stock.
Here’s the final schedule of operations planned for today which, if successful, will make India the first nation ever to launch a satellite into Martian orbit on its maiden attempt.
04.17 a.m: Critical operations to insert MOM into Mars Orbit will start. The three antennas of the spacecraft for transmission between the Earth and the Mars will be activated at that time.
06.56 a.m.: The spacecraft will be rotated towards Mars. Because of the Mars-Sun-Earth geometry, the MOM's insertion into Mars orbit is destined to happen while MOM is in the eclipse (MOM will be behind Mars and there will be sunlight on the spacecraft as it would be blocked by the planet).
07:17 a.m.: The liquid engine will be fired and the insertion will happen when the spacecraft is on the other side of Mars, away from Earth's sight, Unfortunately, this will result in a communication blackout since the signals cannot be transmitted from the spacecraft to the Ground station.
07:12 a.m.: The liquid engine burn will start.The total burn duration is expected to be 24.14 minutes, consuming 249.5 kg of liquid propellant.
07.37 a.m.: The 'eclipse' will end, while the Mars Occult will continue.
07.41 a.m.: The liquid engine burn ends.
07:47 a.m.: Earth will receive the first information about total burn performance.
07.42 a.m. to 8.04 a.m.: The reverse manoeuvre will take place to reorient the Antenna
07.54 a.m: Isro will confirm the insertion of the spacecraft into Martian orbit.
08.15 a.m.: Scientists at Isro expect that they will be able to confirm the success of the mission. Later in the day, Mangalyaan’s camera will be activated and the first picture from the spacecraft is expected to reach the space agency later on the day.
WATCH THE PROCEEDINGS LIVE HERE
