The Father of India’s Space Program. Started with one Satellite on the way with 104 Satellites.

Vikram Sarabhai is called as Father of Indian Space Program. He belonged to a rich family in Gujarat who owned many mills and industries in India. He was born as one of the eight children of Ambalal and Sarla Devi in the city of Ahmedabad in Gujarat. His family was known for the social work that they did for the underprivileged people of the society.

He completed his intermediate education from Gujarat College in Ahmedabad and then moved to England to study in the University of Cambridge

He got married to Mrinalini Sarabhai, who was a famous classical dancer. However, his family members could not attend the marriage as they were a strong part of Quit India movement led by Mahatma Gandhi.

After the independence of India. Vikram Sarabhai sought a charitable trust set up by family and friends for the research work in the field of Science. This was the genesis of Physical Research Laboratory in Ahmedabad which is till date a distinguished national research institute for space and allied science.

Vikram Sarabhai convinced the Indian government to set up Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). It was soon after the launch of the Russian satellite Sputnik, and Vikram Sarabhai made it clear to the government that India can also be in the League of Nations stepping on the moon.

Dr. Homi Bhabha supported the Sarabhai in the field of nuclear research in India. Bhabha helped Sarabhai in setting up the first rocket launching station in India.

Very few people know that ,It was Vikram Sarabhai’s efforts that brought television to India. His consistent communication with NASA formed the base for Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (SITE) in 1975. This further steered the coming in of cable television in India

Vikram Sarabhai was the main person behind India’s first satellite Aryabhata.

He set up a number of institutes including:

Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), Ahmedabad

Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad

Community Science Centre, Ahmedabad

Darpan Academy for Performing Arts, Ahmedabad (along with his wife)

Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Thiruvananthapuram

Space Applications Centre, Ahmedabad (This institution came into existence after merging six institutions/centres established by Sarabhai)

 Faster Breeder Test Reactor (FBTR), Kalpakkam

 Variable Energy Cyclotron Project, Calcutta

Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL), Hyderabad

Uranium Corporation of India Limited (UCIL), Jaduguda, Bihar

    He was one of the founding members for Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad, in 1961 along with Kasturbhai Lalbhai.

 

How ISRO plans to launch 103 satellites on a single rocket

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will set a record when it launches 103 satellites in one go on a single rocket in the first week of February.

Explaining how all the satellites will be placed in orbit, Dr. K. Sivan, Director of the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), Thiruvananthapuram, said: “The satellites will be separated from the launch vehicle in different directions. The separation angle and time of separation will be such that one satellite will not collide with another.”

The satellite separated from the launch vehicle will have a relative velocity of one metre per second. So after 1,000 seconds the distance between a satellite and the rocket will be 1,000 metres. “The satellite that gets launched first will move at a relatively faster velocity than the next satellite that is launched. Due to different relative velocities, the distance between the satellites will increases continuously but the orbit will be the same,” he said.

“When the vehicle reaches the orbital condition, we will wait for the disturbances to die down before the preparation for separation begins,” Dr. Sivan explained. At an orbital altitude of around 500 km, it would take the vehicle 90 minutes to complete one orbit. “So we have sufficient time to launch all the 103 satellites,” he added.

Even one degree difference in separation angle combined with relative velocity will ensure that no two satellites would collide. “The satellites will be injected into orbit at different locations at different angles, at different times and different orientations,” Dr. Sivan said.

In June last year, ISRO launched 20 satellites in one go. It took about 26 minutes to launch all the 20 satellites. In 2008, ISRO launched 10 satellites in a single mission. The highest number of satellites launched in a single mission so far has been 37 by Russia in 2014; NASA launched 29 satellites in one go in 2013.

ISRO’s workhorse PSLV (C37) with 103 satellites will be launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh. With the exception of three satellites from India, the rest are from other countries.       

Source :http://www.thehindu.com/

100% SUCCESS PSLV C 35 SCATSAT- takes off today at 9:12 am, HERE ARE 10 THING YOU MUST KNOW

1.     The PSLV or 37th Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, carrying three satellites from India, three from Algeria, and one each from Canada and the US, lifted off from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh at 9:12 am. Around noon, ISRO said its launch was "100 per cent successful".

2.     Most countries launch satellites in a single orbit and even if multiple satellites are injected, it is in a sequence in the same orbit.

3.     What makes this mission a challenge is that the PSLV will launch its payloads in two different orbits. The twin-orbit manoeuvre was recently accomplished by European Space Agency's Vega rocket.

4.     "This is a challenging two-in-one mission which puts India in a unique league of nations having the capability to achieve two different orbits in a single mission," Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Chairman AS Kiran Kumar earlier told NDTV.

5.     India's SCATSAT, meant for ocean and weather forecasts, cyclone detection and tracking, has been placed in orbit. India shares such data with the US, which helped them track Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

6.     Pratham, a 10-kg satellite developed by students of the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay, will study the total electron count in space. The 5.25-kg PISAT made by students of Bengaluru's PES University will take pictures of earth.

7.     The mission will also test PSLV's multiple burn capability which will be utilized in the last leg and will set a new milestone for ISRO. The whole procedure was completed within 2 hours and 15 minutes - the longest mission for ISRO.

8.     The stop-start of the rocket - while travelling at a speed of more than 2660 kmph - gives PSLV an edge in the multi-billion dollar commercial launch market. "It will open up new vistas to commercialise ISRO's launch capabilities for two-orbit configurations," said Dr K Sivan, Director of the Vikram Sarabhai Space Center.

9.     In another first later this year, India hopes to launch its heaviest rocket, the Geo-Synchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle Mark III, capable of taking up to 4 tonnes of communications satellite.

10.     The three Algerian satellites are for earth observation, remote sensing and technology demonstration. The US' Pathfinder-1 is a commercial high resolution imaging micro satellite while Canada's NLS-19 is a technology demonstration nano satellite for experimentation in helping to reduce space debris and for tracking commercial aircraft.

                                       SOURCE : ndtv.com