Top 10 Facts About ISRO
#10: It Started With One Small Step
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ISRO formed on August 15th, 1969, less than a month after the Apollo 11 moon landing. While NASA was capturing headlines all over the world, ISRO was setting out its stall. The scientist and astronomer Vikram Sarabhai is remembered as the Father of Indian Space Travel. He’s widely credited as the driving force during the organization’s earliest moments, having previously campaigned for (and fronted) an earlier setup, the Indian National Committee for Space Research. Although Sarabhai unfortunately died early on, in 1971, he’d built the foundations… and ISRO’s first success came via satellite. India (in partnership with the Soviet Union) launched its first satellite, Aryabhata, in 1975. Fast forward to today, and ISRO runs one of the strongest satellite fleets in the world.
#9: Small Budget, Big Goals
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In 2022, ISRO funding was just short of two billion US dollars. Which sounds a lot until you compare it to NASA, which received twenty-four billion dollars in the same year. China’s CNSA receives around twelve billion dollars; the European Space Agency has around eight billion. ISRO never gets even close to the expenditure of its rivals, and yet it still ranks as one of the most successful and influential space agencies on the planet. Today, that’s partly thanks to a modern approach to partnering with private enterprises, with the Indian government running a dedicated branch to directly link ISRO to the private sector. But ISRO performing beyond its means is also baked into its ethos. During a speech in 1968, Vikram Sarabhai conceded that ISRO didn’t have the “fantasy of competing” with wealthier nations. But he also pledged that it would play a “meaningful role… in the application of advanced technologies to man and society”.
#8: Trouble on the Moon
For every international space agency, a journey to the moon is something of a rite of passage. But, for ISRO, that journey has been far from plain sailing. The Chandrayaan programme is India’s primary lunar initiative. It was announced in 2003, and Chandrayaan-1 was launched in 2008. It was a lunar orbiter designed to move around the moon, equipped with one Moon Impact Probe (which was successfully deployed). However, the orbiter suffered a number of technical difficulties, and although the mission had been planned for two years, it was ended after just 312 days. Next came Chandrayaan-2, which included another orbiter and a rover, ready to land and move on the surface. Launched in 2019, the orbiter worked fine… but the rover irredeemably crashed following a reported software failure.
#7: Lunar Redemption
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After the first and second launches, there may have been some anxiety surrounding Chandrayaan-3. But ultimately there was no need to worry. Launched in July 2023, it made a lunar orbital insertion on August 5th of that year. It again carried a probe made for the surface, but this time was able to deploy it successfully. The Pragyan rover (which translates as the wisdom rover) successfully landed at the lunar south pole on August 23rd. It marked the first time that anyone had made a soft landing in this particular region of the moon… and was then tasked with conducting a wide range of experiments to learn more about its new home. Notably, and in honor of ISRO’s founding father, Sarabhai, the vehicle that ferried the rover for both Chandrayaans 2 and 3 was named Vikram.
#6: Mars in One
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For all the issues that ISRO may have had with the moon, there have been no such problems with Mars. In the twenty-first century it seems like everyone wants to go to Mars, but ISRO is one of a tiny few that have actually managed it. The Mars Orbiter Mission (otherwise known as Mangalyaan) was launched in November 2013, and began busily circling the Red planet after orbital insertion on September 24th, 2014. When it arrived, it made ISRO just the fourth space agency to reach Martian orbit, after Russia’s Roscosmos, NASA, and the European Space Agency. What’s particularly impressive, however, is that ISRO is the only one so far to achieve it on the first attempt. While everyone else has a history pitted with failed Mars missions, ISRO has a one hundred percent success rate.
#5: ISRO Stares at the Sun
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The year 2023 will go down as a pretty important one in the annals of ISRO. First, Chandrayaan-3, and then Aditya-L1. Aditya-L1 is a solar observatory. If the mission continues as planned, after launch in September 2023, then it will position itself at a location in space - known as the L1 Lagrange Point - and intricately monitor the sun from there. The L1 Lagrange Point is an area where the gravitational influences of the sun and Earth reach an equilibrium, allowing for controlled and reliable positioning. It’s almost one million miles away from our planet, though. The probe itself will primarily study space weather, solar flares and coronal mass ejections. Although the sun is some ninety-three million miles away from us, these phenomena can have a major impact on Earth.
#4: ISRO is Fixing Fuel
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No matter what, rocket fuel has been a constant puzzle for any space mission throughout history. In short, to get a spaceship off the ground, you need a lot of fuel. But to carry all that fuel, you need more fuel, and so on. Which is why it traditionally takes huge machines to get even a tiny payload into the sky. All space agencies are hoping to change that. In ISRO’s case, the answer could lie with “ISROsene”, which the Indian authorities describe as “a rocket grade version of kerosene [and] an alternative to conventional hydrazine rocket fuel”. It’s hoped that ISROsene will be much more efficient than past iterations. Meanwhile, India is experimenting with electric propulsion systems - with hopes that it will soon be sending up fully electric satellites, at least.
#3: ISRO Will Travel to Hell
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In the world of space travel, the road to hell is paved with… anything that can get you to Venus. The second-closest planet to the sun is also widely dubbed Earth’s evil twin, on account of how toxic and deadly it is. Venus is hot - really hot! With surface temperatures around 900 degrees Fahrenheit (475 Celsius) largely thanks to a dramatically runaway greenhouse effect. And yet, India wants to pay it a visit. The Venus Orbiter Mission (otherwise known as Shukrayaan) is a planned four-year exploration, set to launch in late 2024 at the earliest. Through it, ISRO will study the Venusian atmosphere and the specific composition of this scorching, rocky world. Other agencies have been to Venus before, and many have failed… so could ISRO buck the trend again?
#2: ISRO is Building Its Own Space Base
The International Space Station is perhaps one of humankind’s greatest ever achievements. But, with rumors that the ISS could soon be decommissioned, the landscape in near-Earth orbit is changing. ISRO actually isn’t involved with the ISS programme, and there has never been an Indian astronaut on board. But there are plans for ISRO to build its own station, starting in the 2030s. A brief outline was announced in 2019 by the then-ISRO Chair, K. Sivan. If plans go ahead, then India’s space station will weigh around twenty tonnes to start with, and will be able to host up to three people for up to twenty days at a time. With reports that we’re also on the brink of private space stations, too, it really is all change up there!
#1: The Vyomanauts are Coming
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Of course, before that space base dream can be realized, ISRO needs a human presence in space. All of its great successes so far have been uncrewed, remotely controlled probes and landers. But that will change with Gaganyaan - the key vehicle in the Indian Human Spaceflight Programme. While the schedule was initially delayed due to the pandemic, ISRO does have a clear pathway to getting people into orbit. Gaganyaan-1, in 2024, will be an uncrewed test flight. Gaganyaan-2, again in 2024, will carry a humanoid robot. Gaganyaan-3, tabled for 2025, will carry three crew members. It will be the first time that ISRO has ever sent humans into space. And those pioneers will be known as vyomanauts - not astronauts - with “vyoma” being the Sanskrit word for sky.
