India plans to have own space station by 2030
14 Jun 2019
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India plans to follow up its manned space mission, planned for 2022, with another ambitious project - launching its own space station - K Sivan, chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro), said on Thursday.
India plans to launch a 20 tonne space station, most likely by 2030, which will be used to conduct microgravity experiments, Sivan said. He said the preliminary plan for the space station is to accommodate astronauts for up to 15-20 days in space, adding that specific details of the plan will be finalised after the maiden manned mission, Gaganyaan.
The space station project will be an extension of the Gangayaan mission. "We have to sustain the Gaganyaan programme after the launch of (the) human space mission. In this context, India is planning to have its own space station," Sivan told reporters in New Delhi.
The government has approved a Rs10,000 crore budget for the Gaganyaan mission. Under the mission, Isro will carry out two flights from its launch pad at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh - first without any crew followed by the maiden flight with crew sometime in 2022.
Isro's is currently focused on its second mission to the Moon, Chandrayaan-2, that will take off on 15 July, and will attempt to land near the South Pole of the Moon, an uncharted territory so far.
A space station is a spacecraft capable of supporting crewmembers, designed to remain in space for an extended period of time and for other spacecraft to dock, the most commonly known being the International Space Station.
Isro says it will go solo on this project and there will be no collaboration with any country.
At present the US, Russia, China and a consortium of nations have their own space stations.
