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Prime Minister Narendra Modi has already announced a powerful mission of sending Indian astronauts to space by 2022. And now the Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), K Sivan has addressed the same on Tuesday. The name of this mission is “Gaganyaan”, which is India’s first manned space flight. Consequently, after this, India will rank fourth after the USA, Russia, and China to send humans to space.

Three Indian astronauts will reach space within 16 minutes of the launch. Then they will spend five to seven days in earth’s orbit. Possibly while coming back, the crew will land in the Arabian Sea of Gujarat coast or Bay of Bengal or on the land. As expected ISRO will launch Gaganyaan by the year 2022 said Sivan. 

Jitendra Singh, Minister of state for atomic energy and space also stated detailed information. “A crew module carrying three Indians will be attached with a service module. Together, these two modules will comprise the orbital module that will be integrated with an advanced version of GSLV Mk III rocket.”

He further added, “The rocket when launched from Sriharikota will take the crew to the low-earth orbit. Which is some 300-400 km from the Earth, within 16 minutes. The crew in the module will spend around five to seven days in space. Where they will do several micro-gravity and scientific experiments.”

In explanation, Sivan added that the orbital module will re-orient itself and change direction. Also, the crew module and service module will separate at the altitude of 120 km. The crew will apply aerobrakes, and parachutes will open to land in the Arabian Sea near the Gujarat coast. The return journey from space to earth will take almost 36 minutes.

However, for technical problems, crew module has a landing backup of Bay of Bengal. But it is recoverable within 20 minutes of the splashdown. “The crew module will have a 3.5-meter diameter and will be the size of a small cubicle. The total mass of the module will be 7 tonnes,” he said.

Future:
In further details, the ISRO chief added that they will conduct an unmanned mission in 30 months. The second test will be in 36 months. And finally, the human flight will take off in 40 months. Also, necessary technologies such as crew escape system or pad-abort and crew module are ready and going through tests. The spacesuits for the crew are ready too.
Minister Jitendra Singh said “We are not sending robots or animals to space first. The reason being there are several advantages to sending humans to space. They can do several experiments in space and experience the changes in human behavior, including psychological and biological changes.”
For the budget, less than Rs.10,000 crore will be assigned for the mission. This is actually a cost-effective budget compared to other countries. This is in addition to the annual value of Rs.6,000 crore earmarked for ISRO. We hope to see this ambitious dream turning into reality soon.