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Mangalyaan Successfully Put Into Mars Orbit
knwny writes: India's Mars satellite Mangalyaan was successfully placed into orbit around Mars early on Wednesday following a 10-month journey from Earth. India thus joins the U.S., the European Space Agency and the former Soviet Union in having successfully completed a Mars mission. It is, however, the only one to have done so on the first attempt. Headed by the Indian space agency ISRO, Mangalyaan was made in 15 months at a cost of just around 74 million USD — the cheapest inter-planetary mission ever to be undertaken.
May I add that the CIA was actively involved in sabotaging ISRO projects like the cryogenic engine and the careers of its best scientist.
http://www.niticentral.com/2014/01/07/isros-lost-chance-from-19-years-ago-part-1-176383.html
I suspect that the "true cost" is somewhat higher than the quoted 74M. For instance, how many spares from Chandrayaan did they use? One should always be suspicious of major spaceflight operations that claim unusually low cost or unusually fast times, because most of the time they are leveraging pre-existing assets. For instance, most flight hardware components (computers, radios, antennas) have 2-3 year manufacturing lead times: it takes that amount of time to go through the design review process, acquire the appropriate components, assemble the widget, run it through the shake and bake environmental tests, etc.
If you're doing a first mission that needs, say, 2 radios, and you buy 2 plus a couple spares, and you make it through the qualification program and none fell out, you now have two perfectly good radios sitting on the shelf ready to go. But it's not really fair to claim those as being cost free, nor not contributing the schedule.
However, in general, well done to the Indian team.
Nice of the PM to visit and sit in on the last stage of the journey, putting science and scientists in the spotlight. Over here (NL) we hardly ever celebrate scientific successes, and accomplished scientists receive less attention and recognition from politicians than sports heroes.
Indeed, the Indian PM also tried to put this into perspective vis-a-vis sports wins with the following quote:
"This achievement is far greater than a cricket win"
(Source: http://www.thehindu.com/sci-te...)
India has the tenth largest economy on the planet FFS!
Yet the number of Indians without electricity or plumbing is still greater than the entire population of the US.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.