Chandrayaan 2 - a landing that was not to be and Prime minister Modi’s epochal address

A compilation of my posts from Friday, September 6, 2019 and Saturday, September 7, 2019.

It was lunchtime in California and I was streaming the anticipated Chandrayaan-2 landing live on YouTube at my workplace and listening to audio from “Tiranga Yatra” in a loop in Hindi, Telugu, Kannada and Tamil - fired up with nationalistic pride at the historic occasion.

I was rooting for India’s lander to plant our national flag and engrave the Ashoka Chakra on the Moon’s surface. 

I admit that I was shamelessly crying in my office - when it became known later 

that communication had been lost with the lander. Luckily, it was late Friday afternoon in California and presence of people around me was thin.

Following is what I wrote later:

“It's been a heady and emotional day for all Indians - even those of us who are sitting thousands of miles away from home.

Shri. Narendra Modi's address today to ISRO scientists is surely one of the finest motivational speeches ever by a Prime Minister of India. His personal gesture of
hugging and consoling an inconsolable Director of ISRO was 
unprecedented.

It is not just the ISRO scientists, but all of India that was feeling a bit demoralized.

This is truly exemplary leadership at its finest. He made many brilliant points about India's intrinsic civilizational strength and indomitable spirit in the face of grave challenges. 

Prime Minister Modi did not have to spell it out - but hinted at it - We have been a “wounded 

civilization” in the eloquent description of 

V.S Naipaul and have endured many great calamities, including:

- The Mohammedan conquest of India, which was described by Will Durant, the American historian as “The bloodiest chapter in the history of mankind”, including many mortal blows such as the conquest of Sindh by Mohammed Bin Qasim, the multiple demolitions of Somnath Mandir by Mahmoud Ghaznavi, Malik Kafur’s conquest of the Deccan and reaching all the way up to Rameswaram, the fall of the great Vijayanagara empire, genocidal foreign rule for 1300 years, the demolition of thousands of our most sacred Temples and forcible conversion into Masjids and forced conversion of the masses, millions of Hindus enslaved and marched to the slave markets of

Baghdad, Damascus, Cairo, Central Asia etc; 

Hundreds of thousands perishing on the way - so much so that an entire mountain range in Afghanistan was named the “Hindu Kush” (meaning “slaughter of the Hindus”)

- 300 years of European Christist colonialism

that saw the Portuguese Christist inquisition in Goa, the starvation genocide of millions by the British and many, many unspeakable atrocities and genocides that culminated in

the vivisection of Mother India in 1947 to create a permanent dagger embedded in her flesh called “Paakistan”.

- Humiliation by Communist China’s perfidy   in the 1962 war.

- To add insult to injury, 70 years of suffocating Nehruvian Stalinist rule.

Didn’t we endure it all and yet, survive to rise again? Didn’t we rise up again after absorbing each and every grievous wound inflicted on Mother India which would have otherwise comprised a mortal, terminal blow?

The Prime Minister's brilliant, inspired and inspiring oratory and touching gesture is analogous to Lord Shri Krishna's motivational speech (aka the Gita) to a demoralized Arjuna on the battlefield of Kurukshetra! 

Narendra Modi, spoke not just as the Prime Minister of India, but as the torchbearer of the proud Hindu civilization that is rising again from the ashes.

I proudly declare that I'm a born Hindu nationalist and a "BHAKT" ONLY of Hindutva and Bharat - NOT of any individual, party or organization! 

Why? Because, ONLY Hindutva and Bharat are permanent and immortal!

But, this is indeed worthy of "BHAKTI"!

Even arch ideological foes such as some otherwise obnoxious NDTV anchors are praising P.M Modi's inspirational leadership today!

The Director of ISRO, Dr. Sivan also apparently hails from a very humble background. His journey is very similar to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s own story. 

My sympathy is always with the underdog - Narendra Modi is the underdog, Dr. Sivan is the underdog, ISRO is the underdog and, there is no greater underdog than India itself!”

Iran sends a monkey into space

ISRO needs to be more aggressive. We cannot afford to be left behind by anyone in space, nuclear, missile technology - leave alone countries in our extended neighbourhood, irrespective of the state of relations with them.

India has no dearth of apes to send on one way space missions - Digvijay Singh, Suhail Qamar Al Hinde et al are prime candidates for the space voyage.

After all, President Obama, in his first term - altered NASA's mandate from research to "Islamic outreach" and highlighting Arab "contributions" to science. (sic)

http://www.sfgate.com/business/technology/article/Iran-says-it-successfully-sent-a-monkey-into-space-4228462.php

"TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — A gray-tufted monkey strapped in a pod resembling an infant's car seat rode an Iranian rocket into space and returned safely, officials said Monday in what was described as a step toward Tehran's goal of a manned space flight... Deleted
"

ISRO to Privatize PSLV & Satellite Production

ISRO is looking to spin off the production of PSLV rockets and satellites to private sector partners:

http://zeenews.india.com/news/space/isro-mulling-hiving-off-satellite-production-to-industry_783612.html

New Delhi: As it prepares for Moon and Mars missions, ISRO is planning to hive off production of communication satellites and polar satellite launch vehicles (PSLV) to the industry.

The space agency is keen to focus on unique science projects, develop remote sensing satellites and do more R&D instead of engaging in the repetitive exercise of building communication satellites and launch vehicles.

"We want to explore the possibility of 'producing' PSLV and communication satellites through the industry," K Radhakrishnan, Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) told PTI in an interview here.

The ISRO and its commercial arm Antrix Corporation have called for a meeting with the industry in September in Bangalore for a dialogue on the proposal and identify different work models.

"We want to find out what models could work out and evolve a plan. There is lot of repetition in building communication satellites," he said.
...

If satellite and PSLV production can be spun off to private sector partners, then conceivably likewise so could launch operations. We could have our own Indian private sector launch companies, like United Launch Alliance, SpaceX and Orbital Sciences in the United States. I think that following the great success of SpaceX's COTS2 mission to the International Space Station, ISRO has now seen the handwriting on the wall, and realized that privatization could bring in new cost efficiencies and better leverage Indian skills in space technology to market them to the rest of the world. This will result in a faster evolution of Indian space capabilities, and faster gains in Indian access to space.

As a Japanese expert has pointed out in recent comments, one of the limitations for other countries in imitating the US move to privatize space launch services, is in having a domestic demand for space launch services strong enough to support a commercial space launch industry. Hopefully, India's fast-growing space sector will be enough to provide a sustainable market.

Chandrayaan the Movie

A movie is being made on the Chandrayaan-1 lunar mission:



I think it's important for us to build upon the Chandrayaan legacy, to burnish our technological credentials and firmly point our aspirations towards the future.

Remember:
There are nations which put the Moon on their flag - and then there are nations which put their flag on the Moon.
The future belongs to the latter, rather than the former.

PSLV-C16 Launched Successfully

ISRO has successfully launched PSLV-C16, deploying 3 satellite payloads with perfect precision. Hopefully, this will get ISRO back on track to successfully flying the GSLV, the GSLV Mk-III, the Chandrayaan-2 mission, as well as the first indigenous manned spaceflight.



Scenes of the PSLV-C16 before its launch:



Here's also a little video I found, produced by GOI on Chandrayaan:

GSLV-F06 Launch Fails, Vehicle Explodes

The GSLV-F06 mission has failed, with the launch vehicle exploding about roughly 55 seconds into the flight, at about an altitude of 13km. It was carrying the GSAT-5P communications satellite.



The plan was to use GSLV to launch the Chandrayaan-2 mission. Now that schedule would have to set back by today's failure. That's too bad, because Chandrayaan-2 was scheduled to be the nearest moon launch by anyone, which would have made it the first mission to follow up on the discovery of water on the Moon.

China's 2nd lunar probe set for launch this year

The Chinese are jealous that India touched the Moon's surface ahead of them, so now they need to launch a whole extra mission just to get a lunar impactor on the surface ASAP. Note that this mission wasn't planned before, and has only recently been added to their mission itinerary.

Indian HLV for Lunar Return Mission

Here is a design concept for an Indian Heavy Lift Vehicle (HLV), to be used in a proposed lunar return mission:

Click to enlarge
This proposed configuration would be composed of 4 semi-cryogenic engines of 460 tonnes each, surrounding an 800-tonne semi-cryo core first stage, with a 460-tonne semi-cryo stage above that, and finally a 100-tonne cryogenic stage on top.

This design configuration would be capable of lofting 100 tonnes of payload to LEO, or 20 tonnes to Lunar Orbit. Shown on the left for comparison is India's upcoming GSLV-Mk3 medium lift vehicle, which would be used to demonstrate preliminary capabilities like orbital rendezvous, docking and extra-vehicular activities (EVA).

Human SpaceFlight in 7 Years - ISRO Chief

The head of ISRO says that India is about to announce the start of its Human SpaceFlight program, which will put Indians in space in 7 years:

AW&ST: India is a Spacefaring Nation

AviationWeek has a nice story on how India is a spacefaring nation. There's a video embedded in the article, and also a 4th page to the article which you can get to by clicking 'next' while on the 3rd page.

Of the interesting information offered, there was a nice tidbit on the upcoming Chandrayaan-2 rover mission:

The 15-kg. (33-lb.), 10-watt, solar-powered rover will include a laser ablation tool for spectral analysis of rocks and soil, and video cameras for navigation.

If true, that's an amazingly clever tool for analysis at a distance. NASA's own upcoming Mars Science Laboratory rover mission will make use of such an instrument, called ChemCam:

Avatar अवतार: Two-Stage-to-Orbit Vehicle

India is moving closer to its plans to build a Two-Stage-to-Orbit launch system called AVATAR (Aerobic Vehicle for Hypersonic Aerospace Transportation)



So the developmental path involves testing a hypersonic upper stage boosted to hypersonic speed by a rocket. That's to test the basic principles and gain the necessary data for further development.

But the ultimate goal is to develop a TSTO as shown above, where the lower stage uses hypersonic propulsion, and the upper/forward stage is rocket-powered for final ascent to orbit. Presumably the stage separation would occur just beyond the upper atmosphere, with a mating section (shown in red) being discarded, allowing a more streamlined nose for the hypersonic stage to now glide back to earth.

Will India Send Men to the Moon?

An ISRO presentation indicates study of a further phase beyond the orbital missions of the Human Spaceflight program
(click on image to enlarge):


Looking at the right side of the slide, we can see a possible configuration for a manned Indian lunar mission. The GSLV has given way to a Unified Modular Launch Vehicle architecture, which is then configured to look a lot like the Ares-V and Ares-I rockets of NASA's just-canceled Constellation program. Look at the lift-off weights listed - these rockets would be as large as the Saturn-V launch vehicles used for the Apollo Moon-landings. That's pretty big thinking indeed.

ISRO Science Papers on Lunar Water Rejected

ISRO scientists had tried to get their papers on the discovery of lunar water published in prestigious science journals like Nature but were turned down , says a scientist-blogger.

600 Million Tonnes of Water Found on the Moon

A team of NASA scientists have announced that the data from the mini-SAR instrument aboard the Chandrayaan-1 lunar probe has revealed large quantities of frozen water in at least 40 major craters at the Moon's north pole - an amount estimated at ~600 million tons.

If true, then this would be the find of the millenium, and could become an inflection point for humanity in helping us to establish a foothold to expand our presence to the rest of the solar system. Chandrayaan may be the most valuable space mission ever done by Man.

Obama's Climbdown from the Moon

A Financial Times column points out that Obama's climbdown from the moon race is a step backwards for his country, and a sign of American decline.

ISRO Buoyed by Moon Water Find

ISRO is now soaring higher than ever, reports Time Magazine, after the Chandrayaan-1 mission's discovery of water on the Moon.

As a result of this historic revelation, ISRO will now be making changes to the upcoming Chandrayaan-2 mission in order to follow up on mystery of lunar water and to further investigate it.

India will now be including its own smaller indigenously-made lunar rover on the mission, alongside the Russian rover that was planned. Abdul Kalam, who conceived of the Moon Impact Probe that brought India's flag down onto the Moon, also has further ideas about searching for water underground.