After Successful Launch, India's Mars Orbiter Is On Its Way

neo12 writes "India has successfully launched a spacecraft to the Red Planet — with the aim of becoming the fourth space agency to reach Mars." As our previous mention of the launch notes, getting to Mars by rocket is a long haul: if all goes well, it will be about 10 months until Mangalyaan reaches orbit.

Comments

0.37% of India's total budget

[Anonymous Coward]

That is the cost of India's entire space program. The Mars mission is obviously a much smaller percentage of that. So, to the inevitable critics about how poor India should not be investing on a space program, 0.37% of the total budget will not solve poverty problems. Rather, it benefits India more than being a drag on the economy.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[RaceProUK]

PR stunt that leads to being paid to launch commercial satellites at cheaper rates than the US/EU/Russian alternatives. As their market share grows, the profit increases, and that can be invested in the country itself, either directly or via tax on employees' wages.

That's one possibility anyway.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[ArcadeMan]

It puts India on the list of space-capable countries instead of a tech support jobs stealing country?

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[gstoddart]

It puts India on the list of space-capable countries instead of a tech support jobs stealing country?

India isn't stealing anything. It's your corporate overlords who are moving the jobs away to be done more cheaply.

Don't blame India for that.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[alexander_686]

Basic Science.

People have tried to quantify the benefits of basic science but have largely failed – but that does not mean it is not important. By pushing the boundaries of knowledge two things happen. One is the development of elite intuitions which tend to churn out more scientists who tend to go on and do other, different, interesting things. The other is that they stumble onto new weird things which have other applications.

People have tried to quantify the benefits of basic science but have largely failed – but that does not mean it is not important. The spillover effects are hard to measure. There tends to be a long lag time between new discoveries and everyday applications.

Now, off hand, I would think something in genetics or biology would have a bigger impact then space but that is just my 2 cents.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[_Shad0w_]

Poor India with it's 1.842 trillion USD GDP. It's a G20 member with the 9 largest economy in the world, ffs.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[MightyMartian]

If they can pull it off, it tells Pakistan, "We can land a nuke on Islamabad just as easily as we send a probe to Mars." This is exactly how the US-USSR space race played out. The Apollo and Soyuz programs were all about demonstrating the capacity of missile technology.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[gstoddart]

you could blame india for the horrendus poverty levels that enable an american corporation to pay slave like wages to india and be considered a salvation

I certainly can't blame then for wanting to fix it. And since America also has horrendous poverty levels in some places ... I wouldn't recommend falling off that moral high ground.

But I can blame corporations for what they do -- if an American corporation wants to cut American jobs so they can be done cheaply elsewhere, why would Americans keep buying from them? Loyalty? Pride? Stupidity?

Americans are fond of talking about 'the market' -- this is just that. For better or worse, this is the globalization everyone has been crowing about for years, and is pretty much exactly what we've been told to expect.

Someone is willing to do it cheaper than you are -- and the race to the bottom continues.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[MightyMartian]

Basic research is the cornerstone of pretty much all technological developments of the last two centuries. Do you seriously imagine that our materials technologies would be anywhere near where they are now without basic research into chemistry and physics?

Let me guess, you're one of those people who thinks that all development is just a series of Eureka! moments.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[gsslay]

So you're blaming India for being poorer than America, with lower wages, lower standard of living and lower costs of living? Interesting spin on things. Damn you, poor person. Just quit being poor already! Why can't you demand a bigger wage, with bigger houses, cars and TVs, like the rest of us?

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[0123456]

PR stunt that leads to being paid to launch commercial satellites at cheaper rates than the US/EU/Russian alternatives.

[citation needed]

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[alexander_686]

I am confused by your comment – where did you get the idea that I was against basic research? “Hard to quantify” does not mean “Not Important”. What it means is that one has a very hard time picking one’s way from George Heilmeier work in 1964 through all of the intermediate steps (and dead ends) to my computer monitor.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[Immerman]

Are you disingenuous on purpose? 1.8 trillion isn't exactly a huge GDP, much less for a nation the size of India. Let's look at a few examples

___GDP (USD)...population...per-capita GDP
US.......15.68T......313M.....$49,965
UK.........2.44T.......63M.....$38,514
China.....8.23T...1,351M.......$6,091
Nigeria....262b......168M......$1,555
India......1.82T...1,237M......$1,489

So basically India has an economy the size of Brasil, spread across 6x as many people, or alternately a population the size of China, but with 4x less money. I'd call that pretty poor unless you're using Africa as your measuring stick.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[petes_PoV]

if an American corporation wants to cut American jobs so they can be done cheaply elsewhere, why would Americans keep buying from them? Loyalty? Pride? Stupidity?

No, none of the above (although that doesn't preclude people from having those qualities). Americans buy from companies that offshore (american) jobs because those companies have lower prices as a result.

You must realise that patriotism comes in a very poor second when the alternative is 5 cents off.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[petes_PoV]

it tells Pakistan

You don't need a Mars misson for that. All of India's (and China's, too) neighbours are very well aware that the space-faring nations already have the abillity to drop anything they please on them.

No, this mission is an advertising campaign to promote India's already successful space launch industries. The fact that this mission is so much cheaper (if not yet successful: a major factor in the cost of american missions is employing all those 1,000's of staff at western rates of pay. And if the mission does make it to Mars, and continues to run to well past it's planned failure date then the mission just costs more) is part of the "we can launch your satellites AND we have much lower costs" message that the world will hear and take note of.

It might even do some science, too.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

First of all, American poverty doesn't compare to Indian poverty. Anyone would give an important body part to be upgraded from Indian poverty to American Poverty.

Second of All, consumers usually act in their own immediate self interest when making a purchasing decision. Where a product was made does not usually factor into that.

Beleive it or not, its not a zero sum game. There are winners and losers, and the profits of the winners seem to be rather concentrated.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[Anonymous Coward]

That's true; immigration fraud is not the same thing as stealing.

Right. Greedy douchebag corporation skirts around rules to act like greedy douchebag corporation ... following the template well established by greedy douchebag American corporations. Film at 11.

Sorry, but America perfected this particular kind of capitalism. That they're now victim to is is neither surprising, nor sympathy inducing.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[amicusNYCL]

How does one cite a hypothetical?

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[RaceProUK]

Hypothetically :-)

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[cusco]

Maybe to the politicians and generals, but not to anyone else. Sergey Korolev told a Soviet general, "What we are doing is much more important than your bombs." The Saturn V was useless as a weapon, nothing about the Apollo launches was useful militarily except the spinoff technology, and the general public in both countries didn't cower in fear. Historical revisionism is fun and entertaining, though not always all that accurate.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[Anonymous Coward]

Mars is perfect for what? It's an unimaginably distant dead rock with nothing on it. Antarctica is a billion times more hospitable.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[rickb928]

India has used satellites to improve weather and crop forecasting, fisheries management, and just plain ol' land use data gathering and other metrics. Their space program largely serves their people by making government and commerce more productive and efficient.

This mission will further develop their technical capabilities, and if it leads to more commercial paid-for launches, they will probably piggyback their own birds on these, saving more money and letting India further exploit space technology to their benefit.

There may be more examples. I just hit the easy ones.

Re:0.37% of India's total budget

[K. S. Kyosuke]

People have tried to quantify the benefits of basic science but have largely failed – but that does not mean it is not important.

1900: "Electrons? Quantum physics? Can you eat that?"

1948: The transistor.

2013: Hell, look around yourself...

Allow me to be the first to say ...

[gstoddart]

Jai Hind!!

Awesome work guys. Hopefully in 10 months we'll be seeing stories about how it's entered orbit, and not stories about something going wrong.

Re:Allow me to be the first to say ...

[somersault]

What makes you think that it's lack of money causing the poor sanitation? Or that the money for this particular program was the only money that could have been diverted? Or that you shouldn't congratulate the engineers who worked towards this pretty awesome achievement, even if their government/religious leaders are idiots?

Re:Allow me to be the first to say ...

[gstoddart]

So, what have you to say for yourselves, space cowboys of India?

India has a population of over 1.2 billion people. There will always be other things to spend money on. This gives India both technology, future industry, and hopefully something to make the next generation of Indian rocket scientists happen.

You can't stagnate a country until you've mopped up everything else -- because you'd never be done. This was done for something like under $75 million dollars -- it's not like that would have completely alleviated the problems. It likely wouldn't even put a dent in them.

Find me one single country which has solved all of their problems before also focusing on other things. The reality is, you can't, and all countries need to do more than one thing.

Re:Allow me to be the first to say ...

[KingMotley]

And I would like to know why the US does anything it does when I have a road not a mile from my house that has a pot hole in it. OMG, we should stop funding everything until that is fixed!

Re:Getting to Mars by rocket is a long haul...

[rubycodez]

yes, a continuously powered non-ballistic trajectory. possible with alternative technologies to chemical fuel rockets

Re:As Usual

[The Grim Reefer]

This will exactly meat the requested specifications,

As long as it's not beef.

Re:The other three space agencies?

[nharmon]

Soviet Space Program, NASA, and the European Space Agency.

Just because they Indians they cant do it right?

[Anonymous Coward]

The amount of racism in some of these posts disgust me.

Re:No brainer

[Kwyj1b0]

If I lived in India I'd take the first rocket to anywhere. Sign me up. It can't be much worse than the rest of their transportation options.

Actually, India has a very capable transportation network. Their railways are pretty good. Sure, you have the cheap seats that are not clean, but I've traveled a lot on their higher-class compartments, and they were clean and comfortable (air-conditioned sleepers).

The US has one of the worst PUBLIC transportation systems for a western country. Even air transport is horrible for an economy passenger. Frankly, the railway and bus network of India puts the US' public transport network to shame.

Good Lord!

[kaatochacha]

Can't anyone just say "Good Job India, well done, best of luck on your launch and let's hope everything goes OK, welcome to the club"?
Slashdot is the last place I'd expect huge amounts of "Well, if we can't fix all our problem on Earth, we should never go into space".
Because YOU WILL NEVER SOLVE ALL YOUR PROBLEMS ON EARTH.
Sigh.

Mod racist parent down

[fiannaFailMan]

Stop modding up racist comments.

Re:Good Job, But...

[fiannaFailMan]

Because most of the "real firsts" were done by Russia and the U.S. a long time ago. And you've got to start somewhere.

Most of the firsts were done by the Soviets.

First artificial satellite.
First living thing in space.
First astronaut.
First man to orbit the earth.
First space walk.
First woman in space.
First space station.
Plenty of broken records for long duration in space too.

Mod racist parent down.

[fiannaFailMan]

Stop modding up racist comments. They are not funny.

Mod racist parent down.

[fiannaFailMan]

There's only one answer to that question. Fuck you, you racist piece of shit.

Re:Good Job, But...

[interkin3tic]

Read the article: they're looking for methane, which has not been done before and could indicate life on mars. Moreover, half the benefits of a space program seem to be developing it. They're developing aerospace capabilities which will translate into other fields. They're developing high expertise jobs to retain skilled engineers and scientists. Looking at the budget cuts, they're doing it at a great time too: while the US seems bound and determined to send all it's scientists away. Because low taxes or something.

Re:Good Job, But...

[fiannaFailMan]

Whoosh!

Jesus H Christ do I have to spell it out?

Most of the firsts were not achieved by the US.

Got it?

It cost only $83 millions ?

[Taco Cowboy]

According to the various articles I got online, it is claimed that the cost for India's Mars expedition program is around $83 millions.

http://www.indiatvnews.com/news/india/india-to-launch-orbiter-to-mars-next-week--29838.html

http://www.firstpost.com/india/will-isro-mars-mission-start-an-indo-china-space-race-1211933.html

How can it be so cheap ?

Re:It cost only $83 millions ?

[amicusNYCL]

How can it be so cheap ?

Outsourcing.