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It won't. When you do it for too low of a cost it will fail like Beagle 2 or Mars Polar Lander. Faster, better, cheaper doesn't work. Once they start killing people and still try to be cheap their space program will come to a halt fast.

Do you know how many satellites they have launched since inception?
ISRO is not some low quality manufacturing company and infact carry many satellites for other countries who cannot launch it on their own. Hav a look at their milestones : http://www.isro.org/mileston.htm

their space program will come to a halt fast.

Cribbling about India takes you Nowhere.

GLSV wouldn't make a very good ICBM, but if they wanted to weaponize that capability, it wouldn't take much work. However, they already have missiles with enough range to deter the other regional powers (Pakistan, China) and have no real reason to worry about the US, EU or Russia.

Developing space technology, OTOH, gives them national prestige, technical advancement, and the chance to profit from selling space services.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) calls the Moon flight project Chandrayan Pratham, which has been translated as First Journey to the Moon or Moonshot One.

..rather interesting to see the most highly-rated comments on /. are those who deride the Indian space programme and yelp about the poverty and the living conditions, and expound the wealth of their knowledge about how this 88 mil could be used towards creating more hospitals and so on.

How many of you know about India's space programmes though?

Did you know that India has been working on space programmes since the 60's?

Or that it had a comprehensive space progamme, that included a satellite system, a remote sensing satellite system, polar satellite launch vehicle and Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle ?

Or that when United States arm-twisted Russia in April 1992 and July 1993 not to sell the cryogenic technology know-how to India.

Or that India's cryogenic engine came of age on April 18, 2001 when India bustled into the exclusive GSL club?

• Geostationary Satellite System
• Earth Observation System
• Space Applications

• Geostationary Satellite System
• Earth Observation System
• Space Applications

• Geostationary Satellite System
• Earth Observation System
• Space Applications

• INSAT for telecommunication, television broadcasting and meteorological services
• Indian Remote Sensing Satellites (IRS) for resources monitoring and management

EDUSAT homepage

Pray, one does not call being elected to scientific societies a trapping. No matter how influential one is, you do not get elected to multitudes of scientific societies purely as a function of your power or position.

I think we can at the very least grant scientists across the world that much of credit.

And oh, ISRO is the Indian Space Research Organization, with quite a lot of successful space launches under it's belt. I do not think such an organization would lightly make anyone a distinguished professor, no matter what the other credentials.

I guess you would make a sad scientist, because when someone is credited with good accomplishments, all you can think of is how they might have gotten it through the wrong kind way.

Please do not be so prejudiced, especially when what you know is so completely wrong. It helps to be broad minded.

The US military is not going to outsource to ESA (they aren't Indian). So I dont see the point of Vega.

India (ISRO) has a launch vehicle in the same category as Vega called PSLV, in case US military is interested ;-).

Cost of PSLV is probably cheaper than VEGA as well.

as i posted earlier, ISRO is currently working on the same kind of space-craft.

is here.

Indias moon ambitions were said to be restricted to only firing a unmanned galileo type mission to the moon.

India is developing Chandrayan-1, its first robotic lunar mission, but has no manned program of any kind, let alone a human mission to the Moon. It's not clear what the source of the claim in the AP article is, but don't count on accuracy or detail on such issues from mass media wire services.

Also i thought GSLV - the satellite launch vehicle was totally indigenously built, Though WIRED seems to claim that the engine was Russian!

The GSLV currently uses a Russian-built cryogenic engine for its upper stage. The engine they tested Friday is indigenously developed.

Indias moon ambitions were said to be restricted to only firing a unmanned galileo type mission to the moon.

India is developing Chandrayan-1, its first robotic lunar mission, but has no manned program of any kind, let alone a human mission to the Moon. It's not clear what the source of the claim in the AP article is, but don't count on accuracy or detail on such issues from mass media wire services.

Also i thought GSLV - the satellite launch vehicle was totally indigenously built, Though WIRED seems to claim that the engine was Russian!

The GSLV currently uses a Russian-built cryogenic engine for its upper stage. The engine they tested Friday is indigenously developed.

Indias moon ambitions were said to be restricted to only firing a unmanned galileo type mission to the moon.

India is developing Chandrayan-1, its first robotic lunar mission, but has no manned program of any kind, let alone a human mission to the Moon. It's not clear what the source of the claim in the AP article is, but don't count on accuracy or detail on such issues from mass media wire services.

Also i thought GSLV - the satellite launch vehicle was totally indigenously built, Though WIRED seems to claim that the engine was Russian!

The GSLV currently uses a Russian-built cryogenic engine for its upper stage. The engine they tested Friday is indigenously developed.

http://www.isro.org/mileston.htm

Sorry chum, you're wrong. The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) are *very* competent. Incidentally, and possibly unfortunately, they're not in charge of food distribution.

The issue is indeed that they (the governement) don't care. Or that the only thing they care about is themselves. But that's a different set of people. The people at ISRO are quite motivated and independent of the rot that call itself the government. Okay that's too much of a blanket statement. There are some good people in government, but the rest of the filth makes sure these guys don't do anything untoward, like actually govern.

The main resource that space missions use up is money. Of course this money would be much better spent on education, health and infrastructure.

But it also uses up a lot of manpower which India has plenty. Without the space programme some of the brightest minds would leave for US anyways. Also, the Indian space programme plans to bring in money from other countries (like the European Space Agency). Already ISRO has launched quite a few satellites for other countries. India is developing its space program at a fraction of the cost US is investing in it. So India is in a position to provide such services to other countries at lower rates.

http://www.isro.org/programmes.htm>
http://www.isro.org/mileston.htm
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2132831,00. html
http://www.cdacindia.com/html/param.asp

http://www.isro.org/programmes.htm>
http://www.isro.org/mileston.htm
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2132831,00. html
http://www.cdacindia.com/html/param.asp

That the failures are not repeated. I am from India and the first 4-5 attempts by my country to put a so-called 'whistler rocket' failed. But ISRO learnt from the mistakes and successfully launched multiple rockets and are now into commercial launch of satellites. The moral? Never give up, and if you commit mistkaes, find the reasons and learn from them.

For christ's sake they as a nation are freaking out because of the monkey man! [strangemag.com] attacking people.

That's no measure of anything. Last time I heard, many people in the United States were getting freaked out by a couple of baseball fields and tennis courts. (The pun here is that the picture of Area 51 is from a satellite. Not Indian, though.)

As for Indian techies, I'm sure you haven't heard the fact that the Cartosat 2 will have a panchromatic resolution of 1m; same as that of the current leader Ikonos.

Here's a gentle hint:- Science is peer-reviewable in scientific terms. Not racial.

(disclaimer: I'm an Indian)

About 10 years back while I was still in Engineering college we had a great "scandal" about Russia being arm twisted by the USA to not provide India with cryogenic rocket engine technology to launch remote sensing satellites. It was feared that India would develop missile technology and perhaps ICBMs.

So the problem is this. No engine. No rocket. No satelite aka no space program. And on top of that no Crays to model simulations etc. The man who said "screw this" was Dr. Kalam. The man that threw caution to wind and aligned the bureaucratic/lazy govt agencies to do this.

- Develop an indigenous super computer

- Develop a liquid fuel rocket

- Put a satelite in orbit

Some years later CDAC developed PARAM supercomputer followed by ANUPAM. These inexpensive machines were put to task to solve whole bunch of vibration related problems that used to send test rockets crashing into Bay of Bengal. Quote from a news item "Likewise, the PSLV too failed on its first ever launch on September 20, 1993. The then ISRO chairman, Dr U R Rao, said this was because of a software error in the pitch control loop of the on-board guidance and control processor." There were still more problems with the re-entry stage etc.

The supercomputers enabled some new materials research and first success was almost 10 years later
PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle). India then proceeded to deploy remote sensing satellites in orbit without depending on the French Ariane program at 1/7th the cost.

Out of this came the four Indian missiles long-range Agni (fire), medium range Akash (sky), surface-to-surface Prithvi (earth) and anti-tank Nag (cobra) and the now infamous nukes.

The satellite deployment capability bothers EU and Australia because it is clearly the loss of some "easy money". India has not yet offered satellite launching services, but for those prices even Jamaica can put a bird in the sky. At the moment ISRO toils at the GSLV (Geo Synchronous Launch Vehicle). So far they have not had any success.

This new announcement of moon shot is exciting and a cause of concern. While India has put enough weather satellites it still is ransomed by abnormal weather patterns drought, floods et al Nonetheless it's a matter of pride or rather amazement for me to witness any govt dept doing anything straight over there. Dr. Kalam is now the president of India. President of India is as we call a ceremonious office quite like the Queen of England. So I am sure the Hindu fanatic party leading the govt now is not any progressive but I am optimistic that a secular govt will be elected soon and our rocket man is in the right place trying to crack a tougher cookie. Maybe it's time for the land of zero, decimal and exponent to earn some Karma.

Granted, the real motivation is to demonstrate to Pakistan and China that they have missi^H^H^H^H^H launch vehicles capable of reaching escape velocity, and thus, any targe^H^H^H^H^Hlocation on the planet.

India already has demonstrated the capability to launch polar and geostationary satellites. That's pretty much all you need (apart from the guidance system) to do what you are suggesting - unless you want to attack Pakistans moon base.

"Should we expect to see more US companies building launch facilities in SE Asia after this report has been out a while?"

Not the least bit likely. India has it's own launching agency, Indian Space Research Organisation. They currently launch satellites using Polar Satellite Launch Vehicles, and have actually launched a Geosynchronous Satellite using an indigenously designed Launch Vehicle. They're close to breakthrough on indigenous cryogenic engines for the GSLV which they had to develope from scratch because of the US of A feeling threatened by the transfer of technology from Russia. (The launch used Russian engines).

The fact is, the Indian government is a launching agency, and getting permission to set up a private launch facility is not possible.

Besides, ISRO are said to provide the cheapest (money wise) launches compaired to Airaine and NASA.

From Yahoo: A key aspect of the GSLV is its Russian engine that uses liquid oxygen as a fuel that helps place the satellite in orbit as high as 36,000 km in space.

It's hydrogen. Oxygen is oxidizer. Hydrogen is fuel.

GSLV uses hodgepodge of technologies: the L40 strap-ons and second stage L37.5 are from Ariane heritage, first solid stage S125 is Indian, the third stage C12 "cryo-12" is Russian KRB 12 "Kryogenic Rocket Block, 12 ton".

The vehicle has interesting flight profile: the core first stage burns out first at 100 seconds, and strap-ons are going until 160 sec., hauling an empty steel cylinger for a whole minute before stage separation.

From ISRO press release the problem was in the liquid strapon boosters, which where developed in India, not russia. The russian component was the cryogenic upper stage. It was never given a chance to prove itself...

TastesLikeHerringFlavoredChicken

Take a look at the Puppy

"Tomorrow, India will launch its first GSLV satellite using the Russian launchers.

GSLV is not a satellite. It is a launch vehicle - Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle.

Its an amazing feat since they have built the satellite from scratch.

India had been building satellites for two decades now. This is not her first indegenious satellite. In fact, the one on GSLV-D1 is an experimental satellite with few useful payloads that are not very critical to indian communication infrastructure.

If the launch is successful, India will become the sixth nation (US, Russia, China, Japan and the European Space Agency being the others) to build and launch a GSLV class satellite.

GSLV satellites? I guess he means the geosynchronous satellites. ISRO's previous launch vehicle series, PSLV was used for launching satellites in a polar orbit. The latest Indian Remote-sensing Satellites (IRS series) had been launched using PSLV rockets.
The GSLV rockets currently use some Russian cryogenic engines. It is still a major stepping stone for indian space industry.

They do have a lot of other satellites. The INSAT program and the PSLV satellites are comparable to the ones created US and Russia and even better in some aspects. You can get more info about the Indian Space Research Organization at ISRO's website.

They do have a lot of other satellites. The INSAT program and the PSLV satellites are comparable to the ones created US and Russia and even better in some aspects. You can get more info about the Indian Space Research Organization at ISRO's website.

Can I help with that link?

Not a chance. Atleast if ISRO and the Indian Govt. are honest to Vikram Sarabhai's statement.

The GSLV has been delayed for a very long time esp. dues to the unavailability of the cryogenic engines. And it's still only a test. For what it's worth - good luck to the folks at ISRO. Here's ISRO's page for the GSLV.

The GSLV has been delayed for a very long time esp. dues to the unavailability of the cryogenic engines. And it's still only a test. For what it's worth - good luck to the folks at ISRO. Here's ISRO's page for the GSLV.