Largest rocket LVM3 places 36 satellites in orbit, augments confidence for Gaganyaan: ISRO chairman

Announcing the successful launch of India's heaviest rocket LVM3 in its second commercial mission, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said that all 36 satellites belonging to OneWeb were injected into the intended orbit.

In his post-launch address, ISRO Chairman Dr S Somanath said that ISRO is gearing up for impending launches of its PSLV, GSLV Mk2 and LVM3 rockets in the coming months.

Acknowledging that the LVM3 vehicle did extremely well in its 9 am launch mission on Sunday, Somanath said that the satellites were placed in orbit with minimal disturbance.

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As per the plan, the rocket deployed 16 satellites in orbit initially and 20 satellites were deployed thereafter. ISRO initially confirmed the successful placement of 16 satellites in orbit and said that they would update regarding the deployment of the 20 remaining satellites when they receive tracking information about the same.

When satellites are deployed in space, often they are not immediately visible to ground-based tracking stations or even ship-borne tracking stations. It takes some time before satellites make the orbit and are visible in the range of the tracking stations.

D Radhakrishnan, Chairman of NSIL, the commercial arm of ISRO, said that this was an extremely momentous day. Just as was done in the October 2022 launch, the 'C25' cryogenic stage was used to perform a series of complex manoeuvres to inject the OneWeb satellites in nine batches of four each. He also reassured the customer OneWeb that ISRO-NSIL would be happy to provide more launch solutions as required.

S Mohana Kumar, the Mission Director of the LVM3-M3 mission said that the LVM3 rocket had shown its might and ruggedness in carrying heavy payloads to the required orbit. He also acknowledged team ISRO for having completed the launch campaign (the entire process of integrating, stacking, assembling and launching the rocket) of India's largest rocket in a record time of 72 days.

"We have done the rocket assembly in the 2nd vehicle assembly building and the entire vehicle integration was carried out under a single roof,” he said. He also thanked ISRO's numerous industry partners for supplying thousands of components and hardware to execute the launch successfully.

Referring to the steady and swift progress towards India's high-profile 'Gaganyaan' astronaut mission, chairman Somanath said that the first stage 'S200' twin boosters used on the LVM3-M3 mission was designed with higher margins and features geared towards Gaganyaan, he stated that progress towards Gaganyaan is happening incrementally.

As part of Gaganyaan, the Indian space agency is human-rating the LVM3 rocket (modifying it to be suitable, safe and reliable for ferrying humans to space). In recent years, ISRO has been developing hardware and conducting a host of tests of various systems and sub-systems in preparation for the Gaganyaan Mission.

OneWeb had signed a pact with NSIL and ISRO for placing a total of 72 satellites in orbit (in batches of 36). This deal has raked in more than Rs 10 billion in revenue for the Indian government-run space agency. It also provides an opportunity for ISRO to demonstrate the capability and reliability of their largest rocket for offering commercial launch services.

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Until October 2022, (the maiden commercial mission of LVM3), ISRO's LVM3 or GSLV Mk3 rocket was being used only for fulfilling India's national missions such as Chandrayaan-2 and launching heavy satellites. Notably, the LVM3 has performed successful launches in all its six missions (including that of March 26).

OneWeb has been utilising the launch services of SpaceX, Arianespace and ISRO to place all its 1st generation constellation satellites in orbit and OneWeb satellites have flown 17times to date, ISRO has carried and delivered the 18th set, thus enabling OneWeb to roll out commercial services. OneWeb aims to offer high-speed, low-latency internet connectivity from space via its constellation of satellites in Low Earth Orbit.

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