“India has been very successful in space sector in last 20 yrs”: Former NASA astronaut

Ernakulam (Kerala) [India], July 13 (ANI): Heaping praise on India over its achievements in the space sector, Steve Lee Smith, former NASA astronaut, said that in the history of the world, India just did something no one has ever done.

Smith told ANI, “India has been very successful in space (sector) in the last 20 years, very well respected around the world. Mission Over Mars to circle Mars, it was the first time a country had ever done that. India landed on the moon last year. In the world history, they just did something no one has ever done.”

“And just months later, India is preparing its own capsule to send humans to space and they have name their astronauts also. Hopefully, Indian Astronauts on an India’s spaceship will go into space,” he expressed his desire.

Meanwhile, NASA will have a hand in training two Indian astronauts, one of whom will fly to the International Space Station (ISS) late this year. ISRO chairman S Somanath had earlier said that ISRO will likely select four astronauts for training.

Notably, India’s planned space station is called the Bharatiya Antariksha Station. It will be built by India and operated by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). The station is expected to be completed by 2035. NASA plans to decommission the ISS by 2031.

The Indian space station will be smaller than the International Space Station (ISS). It will have a mass of 20 tonnes (ISS – 450 tonnes and Chinese Tiangong Space Station – 100 tonnes) and will be used for microgravity experiments. It will orbit Earth at an altitude of around 400km.

Notably, India’s first solar mission Aditya-L1 spacecraft completed its first halo orbit around the Sun-Earth L1 point on July 3, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said in a statement.

The Aditya-L1 mission is an Indian solar observatory at Lagrangian point L1, launched on September 2 last year and was inserted in its targeted halo orbit on January 6.

Aditya-L1 spacecraft in the Halo orbit takes 178 days to complete a revolution around the L1 point.