'India to launch manned moon mission by 2015'

By siliconindia   |   Friday, 24 October 2008, 23:54 IST   |    12 Comments
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Sriharikota: Soon after India became the sixth nation in the world who sent spacecrafts to the moon, with the successful launch of Chandrayaan-1, Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) revealed that India would launch its proposed manned mission to the moon by 2015. ISRO said that it would gear up for the complex and challenging task of the manned mission. U.s., former Soviet Union, European Space Agency, China and Japan have sent spacecrafts to the moon before India. G Madhavan Nair, ISRO Chairman said, "Now we have a little bit of breathing time (after today's launch), we are looking how we can design a capsule, which can carry two astronauts onboard a GSLV rocket." "This is a very complex and challenging task, first of all to conceive a module, which can predict the condition of human life in space. It is a big challenge in terms of technology and realization," he added. He further pointed out that selecting the astronauts and training them for the space flight and improving the reliability of the launching system are also complex issues. "Considering all these, we have prepared a project report and this had been cleared by the Space Commission and is awaiting the government approval. Based on this, we will have the first man mission from Indian soil before 2015," Nair mentioned. "ISRO would try to handle the proposed mission without any help from countries that had prior experience in manned missions. It will be completely driven by us. However, if there is any scope for meaningful collaboration, we will consider it," he said.