Indian Mars probe directed toward Mars

Another November 5 was launched Indian Mars probe "Mangalyan» (Mangalyaan). Under the plan, all this time the probe is orbiting the Earth, and only now headed toward Mars. At a certain stage in the unit have difficulties - the engine has not completed the necessary time, giving only 27% of the required momentum. However, the next day the Indians had reclosing, to rectify the situation. At this time, the engine worked according to plan, and the probe left Earth's orbit. Delay due to said failure was 1 day, so we can assume that everything went smoothly.

It is worth noting that if "Mangalyan" gets to Mars (and this has all the prerequisites), then India will be the third one country that could send a spacecraft to the planet. First, only Russia and the United States carried out similar missions.

Indians chose an interesting way to run "Mangalyana" breaking flight unit into several stages, so that the device increased the maximum height of the orbit to 215 thousand kilometers. This maneuver allowed to save a considerable amount of fuel. Total flight to Mars should take about 10 months. Arriving at scheduled September 24, 2014.



Mangalyaan will not descend to the surface of Mars, and will circle around the planet on a stationary orbit. The device will conduct mapping of the surface of Mars, study the characteristics of the climate of this planet, as well as search for traces of methane. By itself, Mangalyaan also is a kind of application from India for a place in the study of Mars.



Via ndtv

P.S. Thank Zelenyikot for error detection.

Source: habrahabr.ru/post/204326/