INDIA’S MISSION TO MARS CROSSES HALF-WAY MARK
BANGALORE: India’s maiden mission to Mars is on course, with its spacecraft Orbiter crossing the halfway mark on its voyage to the red planet, four months after it left Earth Dec 1.
“The spacecraft Wednesday at 9.50 am crossed the halfway mark of its journey to Mars along the designated helio (sun)-centric trajectory in the solar orbit,” the staterun Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said in a statement here.
As the fourth planet from the sun, Mars is the second smallest celestial body in the solar system, at a distance of 400 million km (250 million miles) from Earth.
“In terms of radio distance, the 1,337 kg Orbiter is cruising at 39 million km away from earth, travelling at 1.55 km per second in the sun’s orbit,” the space agency said.
As a signal from Earth to the spacecraft and back takes four minutes and 15 seconds, the high gain antennal onboard the spacecraft will be activated for handling communications with the ground stations.