ISRO completes first orbit-raising manoeuvres of Mars Orbiter
08 Nov 2013
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has successfully conducted the first orbit-raising manoeuvre of its Mars Orbiter spacecraft.
With this, the spacecraft's apogee (farthest point from Earth) has been raised to 28,825 km, while its perigee (nearest point to Earth) is at 252 km.
The Mars Orbiter spacecraft, India's first interplanetary spacecraft, was launched into an elliptical earth orbit with a perigee of 248.4 km and an apogee of 23,550 km, inclined at an angle of 19.27 deg to the equator.
The exercise was performed at 01:17 hrs (IST) early on Thursday morning when the 440 Newton liquid engine of the spacecraft was fired for 416 seconds by commanding it from Spacecraft Control Centre (SCC) at ISRO's Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) at Peenya, Bangalore.
The achieved orbit was very close to the intended one, ISRO said.
The spacecraft was launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) SHAR, Sriharikota on 5 November 2013, using the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle in its twenty fifth flight (PSLV-C25).
All systems onboard the spacecraft are functioning normally, according to ISRO.
Further orbit raising manoeuvres using the 440 Newton liquid engine are planned in the coming few days, following which the spacecraft will be put on Mars transfer trajectory on 1 December 2013.
This will enable the Mars Orbiter spacecraft to travel to the vicinity of Mars by September 2014 after a 300 day journey in deep space.
At that time, the 440 Newton liquid engine will be fired again to slow down the spacecraft to enable it to be captured by Martian gravity into an orbit around it.
