GSLV MkIII-D1/GSAT-19 mission: Why it's significant for India

Image credit: ISRO

New Delhi: The Indian space agency on Monday evening successfully launched its latest communication satellite GSAT-19 with its brand new and heaviest rocket - the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle-Mark III (GSLV-Mk III).

Here are 10 things to know about the GSLV MkIII-D1/GSAT-19 mission:

• The 43-metre (140-foot) GSLV MkIII-D1 rocket lifted off at 5:28 p.m on Monday, June 5, 2017, from the Second Launch Pad at SDSC SHAR, Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.
• Dubbed 'Monster Rocket' by scientists, it is India`s most powerful homegrown rocket to date to be launched from our own soil, and weighs as much as 200 fully grown elephants or five fully-loaded Boeing Jumbo Jets.
• The GSLV Mk III D1 is capable of lifting payloads of up to 4,000 kg into the Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) and 10,000 kg into the Low Earth Orbit.
• Powered by an indigenous cryogenic engine that uses liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen as propellants, the rocket carries 3,136-kilogram weighing GSAT-19 communication satellite. GSAT-19 satellite is the heaviest satellite made and launched from India.
• For the first time, GSAT-19 is going to be powered with indigenously-made Lithium-ion batteries.
• Besides Ka/Ku-band high throughput communication transponders, GSAT-19 carries a Geostationary Radiation Spectrometer (GRASP) payload to monitor and study the nature of charged particles and the influence of space radiation on satellites and their electronic components.
• GSAT-19 also features certain advanced spacecraft technologies including miniaturised heat pipe, fibre optic gyro, Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) accelerometer, Ku-band TTC transponder.
• According to former ISRO Chairman Dr K Kasturirangan, the man who conceived the GSLV Mk III, the success of today's mission means it will usher a new era of our self- reliance in the context of launching our own four ton class of satellites for geosynchronous missions.
• Till date, India had to depend on foreign launchers for communication satellites weighing more than 2,300 kg.
• With today's successful launch of the 640-tonne rocket, ISRO, who put a record 104 satellites in orbit from a single rocket, surpassing Russia which launched 39 satellites in one mission in June 2014, added another feather to its cap.
• Scientists say the rocket, powered by cryogenic engine and developed over 15 years at a cost of Rs 300 crore, may ferry Indians into space some day – in over 7 years.

Meanwhile, the premiere space agency has already developed critical technologies for a human space mission. The space suit is ready and a crew module was tested in 2014.

It is said that the Indian space agency has asked Rs 12,500 crore from the Centre for its mission to place humans in space.