New Delhi: Creating history in space, India on Wednesday (September 24) successfully placed its Mangalyaan into the Martian orbit in a record time of mere three hours.
Thus, India has become the first Asian country to reach Mars and the first in the world to enter Martian orbit in its maiden attempt.
With the success of MOM, India has joined the United States, European Space Agency and the former Soviet Union in the elite club of Martian explorers.
According to ISRO, the Mars spacecraft was successfully inserted into the Martian orbit at 515 km away from the red planet’s surface and 215 million km away from the earth in radio distance.
The challenging task of the Mars orbit insertion began at 4:17 am when the spacecraft switched over to the medium gain antenna for emitting and receiving radio signals.
During the crucial operation, when an eclipse occurred on Mars from 7:12 am, the 440 Newton liquid apogee motor (LAM) of the main engine started burning at 7:30 am and lasted for 24 minutes till 7:54 am for inserting the spacecraft into the Martian orbit.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi was there to witness the historical event and congratulated scientists for their hard work terming it as a proud moment for the country.
