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India Successfully Test Fires Its Heaviest Rocket
vasanth (908280) writes India on Thursday moved forward in rocket technology with the successful flight testing of its heaviest next generation rocket and the crew module . The 630-tonne three-stage rocket, Geo-Synchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle Mark III, carried active solid boosters, liquid core stage and a passive cryo stage and a crew module to test its re-entry characteristics. This rocket is capable of doubling the capacity of payloads India can carry into space and it can deposit up to four tonne class of communication satellites into space. India also plans to use this rocket for ferrying Indian astronauts into space. For India, ISRO (the Indian space agency) perfecting the cryogenic engine technology is crucial as India can save precious foreign exchange by launching heavy duty communication satellites by itself.
The demise of the Apollo program was probably the worst thing that ever happened to American space technology. We are just now regaining knowledge and capability we had in the 70s.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
They still haven't build the presumably rather expensive (deeply cryogenic) third stage, so don't count on the final version being so cheap. Plus the improving standards of living in India will inevitably push the price upwards, whereas Falcon development is definitely going to either push the price down or at least stabilize it at a rather low level, if at least one of 1) reusability or 2) increased launch frequency pans out. (The latter is almost certain.) And finally, the advertised Falcon 9 price tag is a market price (with profit margins included), whereas this is presumably just the total sum of expenses for this test (and without the third stage, it will be only a fraction of the launch expenses for the real thing).
Ezekiel 23:20