Slashdot Mirror
Planning Phase Complete For Indian Moon Mission
alphakappa writes "According to news reports, India's low-cost moon mission -- Chandrayan -- has completed its planning phase and will be deployed in 2007-2008 as planned. The interesting aspect is that the entire mission is expected to cost only around USD 88 million. How do you think space technology will change as a result of these low cost missions, satellites and space vehicles?"
They will outsource the whole project to themselves...
Beings aspergers AND pulling chicks... I enjoy the challenge!
$88 million is only a start. As space technology improves, expect to see greater cost savings and possibly very inexpensive space travel to anyone who wants it. But first, we need to increase reliability and speed of our current space vehicles. Otherwise, the cost savings would not be worth it.
US businesses that currently accept chip and PIN/signature
Firstly the mission is not manned. So the question of loss of life doesn't arise. Secondly, the costs are low probably for the same reasons that India can do most other tech work for lower costs (low cost of labor/manufacturing/r&d). Finally, like with any technology project, you can never be sure how much it actually costed until the project has been successfully completed. Such projects have high probability of shooting over the budget.
You don't really believe that if they would not put that money into their space program, they'd build a new university or hospital with that money, do you?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
ISRO has established space systems like the:
ISRO has also developed the satellite launch vehicles PSLV and GSLV to place these satellites in the required orbits.
Here's the complete list of ISRO's geostationary satellite system
http://efil.blogspot.com/
Why?
India was denied cryogenic engine technology(for the heavy satellites it launches(which is currently done by Ariane x) in 1992/3 by Russia because of the dual use potential.
So India started developing its own cryogenic technology. It was supposed to be ready by 1999. Now, 12 years later, it is still not completely ready. Its gotten there 60-70 % but there is still a ways to go.
Unless you see an actual launch in 2007 of this moon mission I would be skeptical.(Forget moon mission, sending a man into orbit itself will be a big deal for India, moon mission is a far off dream(pun intended.))
China took a long while to send a man into orbit. India is going to take an even longer time to achieve that. 2007 isn't even that far away when talking about time frames for space programs.
And finally, when the heck were space programs within on close to their budget? 88 million? More like 500-900 million $.
Until then its speculation, speculation and more speculation. Geddit?
Lost cost space;
Some Indian engineer will confuse grams for Tola's and the thing will auger into the moon at 68.0e4 kph.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
6 comments and already half of them are whining about why can't India spend money on education and hospitals. So the USA and Europe have no poor people, no uneducated people, no sick people who can't afford healthcare? News to me. Any number of recent stories on slashdot have talked about spinoffs from India's space programme that have helped, and are helping, the Indian people (satellite education, improved weather forecasting and cyclone alerts, remote sensing and crop monitoring, etc...) And has it occurred to you that the moon project could be a money winner in the long run, if India can do it cheaper and better than others? India is already getting a non-negligible share of the satellite launch business, as well as saving a lot of money by doing its own launches instead of depending on Ariane and others. But no, next time an India story comes, it will be another "oh look at all those poor illiterate people, why are they running a space programme" flood of comments, mainly from Americans who're hardly literate in their native language, judging by the writing samples on display.
If you have walked or driven past some of the streets of south side Chicago, you would be asking yourself the same question about a different country.
I'm not making excuses for the lack of govt focus on infrastructure, I'm just pointing out that every country has problems related to poverty, bad/old infrastructure and corruption.
Yeah, its the obvious reply, that I could not help but make.
Short term maybe, but for the long term you need more to sustain this comfort level. One way to sustain is by making sure you have a sufficient knowledge level and spread it.
(e.g. the edusat part of their space program)
Jeroen
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
I fail to see how this is substantially different from the US, other than by scale. There are a lot of people living in appalling conditions in the US as well (not *quite* as many, of course). For example, the $350 billion a year of military spending might have bought the country quite a lot of educational institutions, hospitals or whatever. Instead, it's blown through the chimney in a massive dick-waving contest.
This is applicable to money spent on space, too. Or what about the military uses originally intended for the Shuttle project? Was any of the money ever put to use at all, let alone for a purpose?
As a state gets corrupt, its laws multiply; the most corrupt states have the most numerous laws. (Tacitus, Annales 3:27)
It is a bit of international dick waving. On the other hand, with a country of over a billion people, it's like spending 8 cents per person on a huge national pride campaign. That's really cheap. The spinoffs could be huge... maybe it will inspire more people to get an education and boost India's GNP in technology-related businesses.
Besides, what was so crucial about the US's mission to the moon? Was it really crucial back then to know the composition of moon rock? Hardly. Your complaints are better aimed at the billions per month spent in Iraq rather than how a foreign nation decides to spend its money.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
I think it'll get cheaper.
--
What short sigs we have -
One hundred and twenty chars!
Too short for haiku.
Spacecraft have always been custom built for the task. While this may have its advantages, it also means that you are constantly reinventing the wheel - a costly and often unreliable process (Witness the Genesis and Beagle 2 probes).
I have always believed that the way to reign in costs of space missions is to use standardised components - you use the same delivery/landing system until you have something thta's proven to be better.
That means that companies can make thousands of the same components cheaper because they don't have to spend money redesigning them or resetting their production machines. The problems with each component are also well understood and can be planned for because of the extra experience with them, meaning a higher chance of success with each mission.
Still. But this 80 million dolar project will help in training Indian engineers an scientests for other future projects not to say that it will help to keep them in (and their knowlege) in India and not imigrate.
http://ebgp.net/ccc/
maybe it will inspire more people to get an education and boost India's GNP in technology-related businesses.
Inspiring people in India to get an education isn't a problem,inspiring themto want to stay in/return to India once they have that education is another matter. Unless the spin-offs include a lot of well paid high prestige jobs in India, this isn't really a factor.
This article here has a little more info about the lunar mission, and a small backgrounder on the EDUSAT, which was covered on Slashdot last week.
Well, atleast it's being used on something substantial like space travel, rather than on military funding some of the other countries.
Or, are you too blinded by your own prejudice to notice that development is development, no matter what? People need to be motivated, and this is just a means of doing it.
I guess you would rather spend it on conquering some poor nation for it's oil and natural resources, and brand it progress, rather than have a developing nation take steps to not merely enhance the quality of living of its people, but also it's science. FYI -- any progress is progress. NASA isn't going to give the blueprints of its flights to India tomorrow, and the only way that they are going to progress is to do it on their own.
Do you have any suggestions? Or would you rather suggest that until all of the billion people are given television sets and fat burgers so that they can sit on their couches, there should be no progress at all? They're trying to catch up with the rest of the world, give them a break and give credit where it's due.
But what is the point?
Space technology is important to improve the veritable sea of people is living in appaling conditions. Going to the Moon may not have any direct impact, it will definitely payoff when the technology learnt from the exercise can be used for good.
I think the point is that in the near future space will be controlled by the countries that got there first. And everyone else will essentially have to go through them. One day, space will be where the majority of our economies will be maintained with a large percentage of industries moving out there.
Any country that doesn't get a strong foot hold out there by themselves will have to rely heavily on those that did; and those that did, will eventually be able to tur na huge profit out of their advances.
At no point do I think the money spent now will help the current, or even the next few generations, but it will make a difference in the future.
If you believe that all the powers in space will be altruistic in the future, then maybe putting 88 million (or 500 if you look at their total space budget) into feeding everyone one will have more benifits. But then again, 500million dollers ends up being what, 50 cents per indian citizen, or maybe it could educate their citizens (though rough calculations put the percentage in the 0.00's)?
The knowledge gained from this should and will outstrip that 50c benifit in no time.
East Coast Brewers
Maybe NASA needs to closely follow this development. Political consideration aside that is, if they want to consider methods for cost-effective of exploring the Final Frontier.
I mean, they've outsourced all sorts of IT and Tech-related jobs to India, why not also the various NASA Space Programs, at least the small but expensive components.
Will sys-admin for food
Or is this solely a demonstration of power? A sort of an international dick-waving contest?
[[I could be wrong about my history here, but I believe the reason the US-Soviet space race was so important was to show the other side that they could send nukes across the globe without launching a manned bomber.]]
Think about it, NASA was largely developed by Wernher von Braun. The same man who brought us the V2 rocket. It is now said he built that rocket with the ideas of someday going to the moon. Either way, it is has been said that Hitler could have ruled the world with nukes and V2s.
Point: India has nukes. If they want to hold the world hostage or become a true nuclear power they need to be able to send rockets/missles around the globe.
At first it sounded good, but now it's somewhat scary. Dirty bombs don't scare me much, ICBMs... that is another story.
Get your Unix fortune now!
1) Go to space
2) Land on the Moon
3) Go back to Earth
There, I finished planning-phase of my personal lunar-mission. Really, it's not that hard.
I wonder that is the fourth step "Profit!"?
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
You could get one of the following for 88 mill:
2904 full size 4WD pickup trucks
8800-1760 houses (depending on where you live, of course)
176000 TV's
17600 snowmobiles
4400000 music CD's
3520 university educations (in the US. In some countries uni.educations is free, then the money would be used for beer.)
44 Lear Jet airplane
88088 Rubber ducks (Now on sale)
1 Bush-for-president campaign...
Nahhh...I think I still whould go for the Moon...
Well, it is a great achievement for India. It is of great Indian pride. and I fully support it. As someone pointed out, calculate the cost per person and it comes out to 8 cents per person. Thats so cheap.
Most of the responses here are "why? what's the need? first take care of poverty.... blah blah" But many people just see india as place to outsource projects. Well, this is mission is just to prove India's ability to the world what it can do even if other nations don't give some technolgy to India. It is matter of self esteem and national pride to see an indegenious mission. Also, it is not the space where only U-S-A can work. It is about equal opportunities for everyone instead of keeping power with the few.
And poverty? Do you think they are just sleeping and doing nothing? Well, eliminating poverty in country over 1 billion population is going to take time. So, why can't these two missions go hand in hand? definitely yes!
Maybe, maybe not. Consistent with the primary objective of using space technology for societal benefits, Department of Science (DOS) has implemented the satellite sytems systems that form important elements of the national infrastructure today for providing vital services in the areas of telecommunication, television broadcasting, meteorology, disaster warning and resources survey and management. The progress made in the application of space technology during the year is highlighted in the following sections. If you want to know what those application are, take a look here
Secondly, such space missions may not directly affect the country's economy or the well-being of the people directly, but the knowledge gained is then applied to other areas. Such low-cost missions also enable the country to be self reliant so that they dont have to be dependent upon fickle, external, happy-to-go-war-for-oil powers who refused India cryogenic technology for ill-founded fearsM, which incidentally, had no long-term consequences excepting for some delays in India launching its indigenous rockets.
> Or is this solely a demonstration of power?
If that's what you think. We believe it is a step towards self-reliance.
> A sort of an international dick-waving contest?
That is the most pompous, ignorant, half-assed comment as any that I've heard. So developing countries should not try to break free from the shackles of poverty, by using technology? Or do you think such technology has just one direct application and no transferable by-products? Or that such technology is the domain of only the rich? What rubbish!
> You are not grown up until you send some expensive junk to the moon or something?
Just so you dont growel in your own ignorance that this is the only Indian space programme, here is the complete list to relieve you of your pain:
- Geostationary Satellite System
- Earth Observation System
- Space Applications
There are others. But I'm too tired to respond in far more detail. Oh, and just so you understand how old Indian space programme is, have a look here> Those eighty million might have bought the country one more university or one more hospital - which, I believe, have a better chance of saving / educating a person which makes an important scientific discovery than that pile of junk has of making a good return on its moon trip
Hospitals? You gotta be out of your mind. Just google about healthcare in India and the healthcare "tourists" that India attracts every year.
Sure, despite all this, I know it's a poor land. But to trample all over it, because you have a self-formed belief that it should focus only on hospitals, is being clueless
http://efil.blogspot.com/
Hooray for 'deft' but I have been posting here for a while longer...... I've seen way to many cooler things than just another rambling on this website.
Are you seriously sugesting they should refrain from advancing themselves because the US (which is well known for sharing wit the rest of the world) has done it before?
Jeroen
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
India already have a significant stream of Indians moving back to the country as the number of "high paid" (by local standards) technology jobs have been rapidly increasing.
And a project like this could easily include a lot of well paid high prestige jobs - if it boosts India's reputation as a reliable partner for satellite launches, and local firms are prioritized for purchases for the project wherever possible, the return could easily be many times the investment.
This is actually a program secretly funded by the evil Indian Software companies to quickly get Indian developers flown cheap to US companies like Google setting up offshore research centers on the moon. :-P
- cnb
We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.
Kennedy 1962
His vision was not exclusive to the US. A national effort, borne of indigenous ability and resources, will do more for India and others like India then all the social programs and government bureaucracies you will ever imagine in your wildest nanny state dreams.
India, go forth. Take your $88 million and show us how it's done. Best wishes.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
Dude, everyone knows the moon is made of panir!
..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?
http://efil.blogspot.com/
So it is amoral and shortsighted to invest in developing local technology so that local industry thrive and help catch a pie of the multi-billion dollar satellite launch market by proving their capabilities, so they get foreign business, creating thousands of jobs in the process, and bringing in billions of foreign capital to grow their economy?
So it is amoral and shortsighted to invest in communications systems to help boost education levels in poor rural areas?
A space program isn't a pissing contest - all countries depend on space technology in one way or another. For a country with more than a sixth of the worlds population it would be lunacy to depend on other countries for things like military surveillance, communications, weather monitoring, etc. It would also be lunacy to let other nations cement their technical superiority and hold onto their grip on a market that is growing extremely rapidly, and will be a vital revenue source in a few decades.
And I think the hundreds of billions the US spends on maintaining a military and illegally invading other countries could be much better spent, especially in a country like the US where a lot of people don't even have access to basic modern comfort.
Is that so shocking ?. That's just the point. In the Cold War, the US of A and USSR were in an even uglier deadlock - Mutually Assured Destruction. Here at least India has a No First Use agreement .
Also there's the relgion angle .. Ever heard about Moksha ?. Think about a terrorist who believes in COMING BACK after death.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
Yes, I can. Teflon was invented in 1938 by Roy Plunkett at DuPont, trademarked and first marketed in 1945. Google for "teflon invented".
I don't know how often I've heard the urban legend that Teflon was somehow related to space research. Doesn't make it right, though.
As a state gets corrupt, its laws multiply; the most corrupt states have the most numerous laws. (Tacitus, Annales 3:27)
I am suggesting to change the project name from chandrayan to search for US flag.
By turns, I'm tired, frustrated, disgusted and amused by this argument that since India is not a "developed" nation, we should spend less (or nothing) on advanced technology and space missions. Lets consider hunger, shall we? The USA has approximately 25 million people requiring hunger relief (10% of the population?), while India has approximately 250 million (25% of the population). The USA's annual space budget is USD 12.5 billion, whereas India's is USD 500 million. So while the USA has 2.5 times less hungry people by ratio (and 10 times less by actual numbers), it spends 25 times more money than India on space research. Lets talk about uses. The moon mission is not an end in itself, and certainly its purpose is not to collect and analyze moon rocks. Think of the future. While space colonies may be far off, commercialization of space ventures (mining, materials, tourism, research) certainly isn't. Real-estate laws and rights are already under discussion and even sale. So, a mission to the moon is not so much a waste as an investment. India may be under-developed, but we know that being completely uncompetitive in major future opportunities is not exactly the way out. Besides, the space programme employs 16000 people, and provides inspiration to countless students, donors and citizens throughout the nation. I say its well worth it.
I don't want to read
Note that argument by moral equivalence is perfectly OK as long as moral equivalence is an adequate description category for the problem domain in question (i.e. the discussion is on a moral topic) and as long as participants share the same basic moral frame of reference on the subject, which is probably the case in this discussion (we both disapprove of countries wasting money needed for education of the poor etc.). For reference (note that the debate is about morality already when I make my point):
[Story] $COUNTRY is spending $MONEY on space research.
Also note that my main point is not even argument by moral equivalence, it's argument by equivalence in substance (the money is actually being spent). It certainly does have a moral implication at this point of the discussion, though.
As a state gets corrupt, its laws multiply; the most corrupt states have the most numerous laws. (Tacitus, Annales 3:27)
I guess you would rather spend it on conquering some poor nation for it's oil and natural resources, and brand it progress, rather than have a developing nation take steps to not merely enhance the quality of living of its people, but also it's science. FYI -- any progress is progress.
You guess wrong, actually, and you are trying to pin opinions on me which are not mine. Also, I disagree re: progress is progress. Things have been labelled "progress" wrongly before; hell, one could argue that the entire western world is currently not progressing, as we are wasting our limited energy resources without a clear idea of what to do when they run out. We are progressing like a hypothetical man who is trying to master chess while falling from a building - he would be better off trying to invent a parachute.
For those who couldn't modprobe funny
paneer means..
No Sig for you.!
Well done, India, that's what I say.
I've seen a lot of the other comments, which are all along the lines of general - and stupid - derision, asking 'why, oh why'. Yes, India has many problems with poverty etc, but so has USA, Russia and China; in fact Europe are the ones that have the best record on those issues, so perhaps only Europe should ever send things into space, don't you agree?
No I think all these objections are more to do with the fact that India is not America and most Americans hate the fact that others are able to do these things and rely on themselves rather than the scraps the US allow them. There was the same sort of sentiment when the European equivalent of GPS was launched: 'Why, oh why'.
Well I'll tell you why:
1. It's not American - people in the world often prefer to do things independently of America, often because they don't trust the benevolence of America.
2. In the case of India's space program - China and India are rivals in many areas, they are both on the verge to take the place at the top economically in the world. China has put a man in space and annouced plans to put one on the moon, and India feel they have to demonstrate that they can do it too.
" Britain used WWI to do exactly the same thing"
I knew WW1 to be an evil imperialist plot created by Britain somehow, organised by the King contacting his cousins the Kaiser and the Tsar, no doubtl
I'm not sure you're all that aware of the kind of country India is these days. Their education system is clearly excellent. They already have an excellent health care system (hell, they provide a large fraction of the doctors here (UK) too), a good education system and vast numbers of university graduates.
What they need to do is develop their economy, local expertise and provide jobs for all those graduates beyond call centres. A decent space programme is a good way to do that.
It is still an impressive development. However, the cryogenic engine that they are using is a Russian import. The Indians build their own fuel tank and pumping system... Quote from the article "India is using the (Russian) engine as a component in the GSLV, but without a technology transfer." "It is a technology which has never been used by India before," Narasimha (Director of Indian National Institute of Advanced Studies) said.
The fact that one country has more people suffering than another does not make the suffering of those affected any different.
If it is wrong for India to use money on large projects when they have people suffering, then it is also wrong for the US (or any other country).
The thing is, if you focus exclusively on addressing poverty through short term measures, your country will stagnate and fall behind and your economy will collapse, and you will end up worse off than when you started - innovative projects that push technology is a necessity. Yes, it needs to be balanced against other needs, but 88 million is hardly much considering that the US for instance spends hundreds of billions on it's military per year, and about half a billion per shuttle launch.
The president of the country is a missile scientist and has been involved in many of the most significant adavances in the Indian missile/nuclear field. http://www.geocities.com/siafdu/kalam.html Although, in the Indian system, the president has few executive responsibilities and powers (the prime minister is the head of government), the amount of respect bestowed upon the man is a sign that scientific accomplishment is held in high regard in the country. Little wonder that this mission and other high technology endeavors do get their well deserved allotment of resources. -mp-
-mp-
You are one more reason Pentagon and its cronies are able to sell the idea of Missile Shield to the american people. The threat of a dirty bomb is far more greater than that of "axis-of-evil" lobbing a few nukes your way.
Seriously, we are going back to the cold war era, when everyone lived in perpertual fear of the commies nuking the heck out of us. Later we realized that Russians love their kids too, but now we just cant be sure about the terrorists (do they have kids too?).
Soon we will start looking in fear at the shadows, look with suspicion at our fellow human beings, believe everything our Govt tells us and close our mind to everything else. I wish we cease to exist by then, it would be a shame to live on like that..
Rapid Nirvana
You might have asked how the Yugo's low cost would change the cars we drive.
Let's see if it works, first.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Disclaimer : the following anecdote was not verified by me first hand, but given what I know, it sounds very reasonable.
Circa 1978, the Morvi dam in the state of Gujarat burst. The flooding and the resultant loss of life and property was huge. The event made front-page headlines in India. One of the more curious aspects of this incident was apparently that the Indian government was clueless about the occurrence of this disaster, but the US spy satellites in orbit detected the event. The Indian government was informed by the US about the disaster.
At that time, ISRO (the Indian space agency) had been in existence for many many years - but their funding was more of an afterthought. This incident opened the eyes of many to the strategic value of a space presence. As a result, circa 1982, India put its first satellite into space.
People in the US may not appreciate the usefulness of a space presence. The following information was gleaned from a documentary funded by the UN :
India went onto launch many more satellites - a lot of of them for weather forecasting. The neighbouring country of Bangladesh is located in the delta of two major rivers. Flooding is a perpetual annual problem. Subsequent to the Indian weather satellites being available, the UN sponsored the use of the weather forecasting data that was available to provide an early warning system for flooding due to cyclones (known as hurricanes in the US). The first year this was done, the loss of life was 150,000. The previous year it had been 300,000. And no, I am not making these numbers up.
There is no such thing as luck. Luck is nothing but an absence of bad luck.
All these whiny messages miss an important point.
It's not as if India is sending a piece of metal worth $80MM to the Moon. The actual cost of the hardware is a minute part of that. In the meantime, building that hardware is:
1. providing local employment that otherwise might not have been provided, thus reducing poverty.
2. providing demand for local business and engineering
3. gaining engineering skill and experience, something that will be very useful for gaining inward investment from other nations
There's no point having universities if the people educated there just bugger off to the United States because there's no future for educated people at home. Projects such as this provide employment in the short term and in the long term they provide technical expertise that can be used to further business. It is arguable the long term effects of performing this mission in terms of what Indian engineers and scientists will learn is better than spending the money on a new university whose graduates will just leave India to work abroad because of a lack of opportunities like this one.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
Should'nt they be fighting over slaves, and rushing to dig gold, and claim land, like US did, 50 years after the independnce?
Cultural generalizations aside (not that I don't agree with the basis -- it's the conclusion that falls a little on the racist side), I'm guessing a primary factor in this "low cost" number is the differences in salary between American and Indian engineers and scientists. Around here, we typically get 2 to 3 Indians for the price of one American.
Then factor in costs associated with regulation (or non-regulation) of manufacturing processes. For example, it probably costs less to deal with hazardous waste products in India because of less-stringent regulation on air, water, and ground pollution (anyone remember what CocaCola did?).
Dollar-to-dollar comparisons of manufacturing between the US and a third world nations don't compute. It's different cost basis across the spectrum. Like comparing apples to fighter jets.