The first technology demonstrator of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV) was flight tested on Monday morning from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota.
The vehicle was taken to the height of 70 kms and before the boosters were released for its re-entry to the earth's atmosphere. Known as the hypersonic flight experiment, it was supposed to take 10 minutes from liftoff to splashdown. After a free glide at the speed of five times of that of sound, the RLV touched down some 500 kms from Sriharikota, in Bay of Bengal.
The 6.5 metres scale model that was launched weighs about 1.75 tonne and was made at a cost of Rs 95 crores.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted congratulating ISRO on the matter.
Launch of India's first indigenous space shuttle RLV-TD is the result of the industrious efforts of our scientists. Congrats to them.
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) May 23, 2016
To meet international standards in reusable space technology, RLV will eventually be pitted against the Space X's Falcon 9 and Blue Origin's New Shepard rockets.
This being a winged shuttle would be the first in a long time in the world, since United States retired its winged models in 2011 and Russia had flown theirs only once in 1989.
