India's Mangalyaan Successfully Enters Mars
Orbit

Cheers erupted early this morning as India
became the second nation in just two days to
successfully slip a satellite into orbit around the
Red Planet. The probe, unofficially nicknamed
Mangalyaan (for Mars craft), is the fifth craft to
join the Mars party which currently includes
NASA’s newly arrived MAVEN and three other
orbiters: Mars Odyssey, Mars Reconnaissance
and the ESA’s Mars Express. Two NASA rovers,
Opportunity and Curiosity, are also currently
scampering across the surface.
The Mars Orbiter Mission, or MOM for short,
began its interplanetary journey on November 5,
2013, when it was launched from the Indian
Space Research Organization’s (ISRO) Satish
Dhawan Space Center atop a Polar Satellite
Launch Vehicle . Despite launching several days
before MAVEN, it arrived shortly after the NASA
craft.
Getting to Mars is no mean feat, especially for a
developing country. Out of 51 attempts to reach
the planet so far, less than half have been
successful. What makes India’s achievement even
more impressive is that this is only the second
time that a mission has arrived at Mars on a
maiden voyage. The first group to achieve this
was the European Space Agency that reached
Mars on its first attempt back in 2003.
“Today not only has a dream come true, but we
have created history for India, for ISRO, and for
the world,” said Vipparthi Adimurthy of the Indian
Institute of Space Science and Technology.
Amazingly, India achieved all of this under a tight
budget. MAVEN came with a staggering $671
million price tag, and the ESA’s Mars Express
cost $386 million. MOM set India back a slightly
more humble $74 million, but being thrifty has
come with a few constraints. In particular, the
amount of weight that the launch vehicle could
carry was restricted, so the probe couldn’t take
as much fuel as would be desirable. This means
that the satellite has been forced to adopt an
unusually elliptical orbit as there is insufficient
fuel to tidy it up.
Mangalyaan will now spend at least six months
orbiting Mars, using five solar-powered
instruments to gather data on the planet. Three
of them are dedicated to atmospheric
observations that may shed light on the
disappearance of water and other molecules from
the atmosphere. The other two are optical and
infrared cameras that will be used to study the
Martian surface and weather. MOM will also
search for methane, a possible indicator of certain
life forms or geological processes. The team
hopes that the information gathered may help us
better understand planetary formation and the
history of Mars.
“It’s yet another source of information,” said
Roger Franzen , a technical program manager at
the Australian National University’s Research
School of Astronomy and Astrophysics. “Mars is
gradually unveiling its secrets to science and
humanity, and the Indian mission is yet another
means of unveiling this enigma that Mars
presents.”


www.iflscience.com/space/indias-mangalyaan-successfully-enters-mars-orbit-2-days-after-maven

Chei....common India don send probe go mars...my country Nigeria never fit install CCTV wey dey function well....everyday,all you get from our worthless leaders are talk of PDP vs APC,Ameachi vs Jonathan,unexplainable reason for sending $9 million to south Africa, Muslim vs Christian, and the list continue....I weep for my country.

Good News

mathmatica: Chei....common India don send probe go mars...my country Nigeria never fit install CCTV wey dey function well....everyday,all you get from our worthless leaders are talk of PDP vs APC,Ameachi vs Jonathan,unexplainable reason for sending $9 million to south Africa, Muslim vs Christian, and the list continue....I weep for my country.

smh, you called India common? India have the highest scientists in the world.