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Indian Moon Mission To Launch Next Month
Anil Kandangath writes with word that the Indian moon mission plans (mentioned earlier on Slashdot) are about to be put to the test. "While the spacecraft itself will not land on the Moon, it will act as an orbiter and land a rover on the surface. The spacecraft is being launched next month sometime between October 22 and October 26. The spacecraft payload includes 11 payloads (including one from NASA) and will perform remote sensing and studies of the lunar surface. The mission is estimated to cost Rs 386 crore (~ 84.3 million USD)." Update: 09/21 18:29 GMT by T : Thanks to reader Anil Gaddam for pointing out that this figure had been originally misstated as 7.7 million USD.
God help the US of A!
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=386+crore+inr+in+usd&btnG=Search
Not quite so good but still cheap.
Perhaps we should outsource NASA?
That's a great news
0.00129 Olympicses.
The cost will not come within an asses' roar of 7.7 million USD. India is cheap, but not THAT cheap. 77 million USD, maybe. Perhaps if you factor out the cost of scientists and administrative staff already employed by the ISRO, and maintenance costs of existing facilities, and basically count only the cost of the rocket and parts, then maybe you'll come up with a 7.7 million USD bill. Otherwise I think someone forgot a decimal point somewhere.
May the Maths Be with you!
Hmm. Summary says 386 crore, but the conversion is only for 36 crore?
386 crore Indian rupees = 84.00518 million U.S. dollars
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=386+crore+inr+in+usd&btnG=Search
Forget outsourcing, now we'll be outspacing.
rewriting history since 2109
1 US Dollar = 47 Indian Rupees
1 crore = 10 million
386 crore rupees ~ 82 million USD
Cheap, I know. But you are an order of magnitude off.
At this rate, when the first space tourists reach the moon, there'll be a Kwiki-Mart there waiting for them.
They are launching just prior to the new moon http://www.astrologyoz.com/moon/2008moonphase.htm so on arrival, we won't be able to see it particularly well or at all. Wonder what the reason for that is? I think they are in collusion with the Illuminati and have Halloween evil planned for all of Earth. They didn't name their lander Kali by chance did they?
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This is nice to see a nation like India, who got quite a few brilliant people, enters into the space race "as a major player".
And each of those includes another 11 payloads?
Very clever, young man. But it's payloads all the way down.
Maybe
and now this. Going to the moon for 25,000,000,000 rupees. We're in big trouble.
Secret mission details: Apparently invloves 240,000 Miles of rope and a very loud flute.
The more countries (and private groups) we have performing these types of missions, the better.
We can't expect the U.S. to do it alone, given all the poor and homeless people in the U.S., the recent financial system meltdown, and the large number of people in the penal system in the U.S.
The U.S. has other worries. Let Europe, India and China inherit the moon.
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
from the ISRO site,go look it up yourselves
The budgetary estimate for realising the proposed Indian lunar mission Chandrayaan-1 stands at Rs. 386.00 crores (about $76 million). This includes Rs. 53.00 crores (about $11 million) for Payload development, Rs. 83.00 crores (about $17 million) for Spacecraft Bus, Rs. 100.00 crores ($20 million) towards establishment of Deep Space Network, Rs. 100.00 crores ($20 million) for PSLV launch vehicle and Rs. 50.00 crores ($10 million) for scientific data centre, external network support and programme management expenses.
Indians use a different system of counting. After the thousand, they have a name for every second power of ten (unlike the western system of naming every third power). The system goes like this: 1000: 1e3: Thousand 100 thousands: 1e5 : Lakh 100 lakhs : 1e7 : Crore So 386 crores at about 46 INR a dollar is about 86 million USD.
It has been reported that Vindaloo sauce is being used as a cheap replacement for rocket fuel- careful! that is very very HOT!
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
On behalf of the Intergalactic Whaling Commission I wish to protest!
NEXT!
"While the spacecraft itself will not land on the Moon, it will act as an orbiter and land a rover on the surface." So it's going to act as a land rover on the moon, but not land on the moon???? good luck with that.
Sorry to be the PC police here, but "Indian" is a derogatory term for Native Americans.
-- Boycott Shell
the national Academies Press released a report: "Managing Space Radiation Risk in the New Era of Space Exploration" (2008)
my brief reading if this was that they are actually closing down research facilities needed to do the reserach which is still largely undone that would reduce the mission risk as far as radiation is concerned to make a mission feasible.
The technolo9gy required for economically feasible craft design incorporating an acceptable level of radiation protection to the two prevalent radiation risks.
Don't take my word for it read it yourself at:
http://books.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12045
Facebook is a woodpecker tapping on the skull of Humanity, Forever.
The Chandrayaan-2 mission will be the first rover mission and is scheduled for 2011.
Great info about the mission here
It's still pretty cheap compared to normal "NASA" missions... It'll either blow up on launch or be a huge ground-breaking success. And knowing the Indians, they'll kick US butt just to show them that there's more they can do cheaply than take their jobs away.
...who thought of "That's one small step for man" in Apu's accent.
386 crores is 70.7 million $.
I wish them luck
There are 2 NASA payloads selected for the Chandrayaan I, not one.
if you don't like the replies, okay?
Oh, Spock and Kirk are Jews too.
1 A shuttle mission costs about $450M. If India can get to the moon for $7.7M we should outsource the whole space program 2 Question: It India rigged this for sub-orbital flight would in be able to carry a nuclear payload? Do we need to be (re)starting the cold war on THREE fronts? Russia, China (also launching) and now India.
moon mission next month: 400 bollywood musicals about romance on the moon to follow.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Correct. This mission will carry a tiny impactor equipped with a radar altimeter, a video camera (who says science can't be fun?), and a mass spectrometer. Actually, even calling it an impactor isn't quite right, because the purpose isn't the impact, but the data it gets on the way in.
I would be pretty impressed if they land a rover in 2011. It sounds like they currently haven't nailed down an overall architecture, and landing a rover is fairly tough business. I'd give them another 2-3 years to fill in all the details.
Are they planning to open a casino there, too? Darn those cagey Native Americans and their forward-thinking ways!
That is all.
...because it will constantly be contacting Earth to ask for help :-)
just about enough Estes rocket engines!
... I haven't read or found any reports progress on trials any major milestone out of the blues :P it cant happen :)
what a gibberish comment...