Travelling nearly 10 lakh km a day, MOM becomes farthest object sent into space by India.
India’s Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) spacecraft which has embarked on a 680 million km journey to Planet Mars on Monday crossed the distance of Moon’s orbit.
Isro said that spacecraft which crossed the distance of Moon’s orbit on Monday morning is now the farthest object sent in to space by India.
In the early hours of Sunday the spacecraft was placed in the Mars Transfer Trajectory. After a 10 month long journey the spacecraft is expected to enter to enter Mars orbit on September 24, 2014.
“The Mars Orbiter spacecraft has crossed the Moon orbit.
So technically after crossing our Chandrayaan’s orbit, it is now travelling beyond the Moon. It is crossing around 10,00,000 km per day,” Isro sources told PTI.
Isro’s Mars Orbiter mission had ventured out of Earth’s sphere of influence on Sunday, beginning its 300-day journey to the Red planet, marking a major milestone in India’s space history.
Isro performed the trans-Mars injection, a “crucial event” intended to hurl its Mars Orbiter spacecraft into the planned orbit around the sun at around 00.49 hours on Sunday.
It has planned four mid-course corrections in case of any deviation along its path to the Martian orbit before its expected arrival in the orbit of the Red planet in September 2014.
It had performed five orbit-raising manoeuvres on its Mars Orbiter, raising the Apogee (farthest point from Earth) of the spacecraft to over 1.92 lakh km before it performed the “mother of all slingshots.”
The spacecraft is being continuously monitored from the Spacecraft Control Centre at ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) in Bangalore with support from Indian Deep Space Network (IDSN) antennae at Byalalu here.
Isro’s PSLV C 25 injected the 1,350-kg ‘Mangalyaan’ Orbiter into the orbit around Earth about 44 minutes after launch at 2.38 PM from Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota on November 5, marking the successful completion of the first stage of the Rs 450-crore mission.
With inputs from agencies
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