Aditya L1 spacecraft nearing its final phase: ISRO chief S Somanath

The ISRO chief while speaking to the media on the sidelines of an event said that the maneuvers to enter the L1 point are expected to be completed by January 7, 2024.

Thiruvananthapuram: Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), S Somanath has said that Aditya L1 spacecraft, India's first space-based mission to study the Sun, is nearing its final phase, and maneuvers to enter the L1 point are expected to be completed by January 7, 2024. "Aditya is on the way. I think it has reached almost its final phase.

The last preparation for entering into the LI point is going on now," the ISRO chief told the media on the sidelines of an event organised at VSSC to commemorate the 60th year of the First Sounding Rocket Launch. The ISRO chief said that the last preparations for the spacecraft's entry into the L1 point are currently underway incrementally.

"Possibly by January 7th, the final maneuvers will be done for entering into the L1 point," Somanath added. Aditya L1 was successfully launched on September 2 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) in Sriharikota. The spacecraft, after traveling about 1.5 million km from Earth over 125 days, is expected to be placed in a Halo orbit around the Lagrangian point L1, considered closest to the Sun.

Among other tasks, it will capture and transmit pictures of the Sun for scientific experiments. Over the 60th anniversary of First Sounding Rocket Launch, Somanath said, “60 years is a great journey of rocketry. Yatumba was identified by Vikram Sarabhai for the purpose of experimenting on sounding of the upper atmosphere. For that sounding rockets were designed realised and done.

The 60th anniversary is to commemorate the starting of the ISRO and the whole journey along”. The ISRO chief said that ISRO has released a document over the historical aspects of the rocketry in India and the changes at ISRO. He said that ISRO now boasts of an in-house manufacturing of world class propellants unlike past when they had to rely on facctories.

“This is a world class propellant not just an explosive. Designing a rocket which took years to master can now be done in a week,” the ISRO chief said.

(With inputs from PTI)