Fans of Indiaβs Mars mission, keep your nerve. The nationβs fledgling Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) suffered a glitch on Monday, while moving to a higher orbit around Earth. Existing fears about the trip β a first for India β intensified, but Indiaβs space agency has now returned MOM to the correct altitude and velocity.
History shows that trips to Mars can be fraught, especially a nationβs first. The Indian Space Research Organisationβs (ISRO) launched MOM last week and then carried out a series of engine burns designed to move the probe into higher orbits around Earth.
On Monday that the fourth of these manoeuvres had failed, as the probe had only increased its speed by 35 metres per second instead of 130. This meant its orbit was only raised from about 71,000 kilometres to 78,000 kilometres, instead of to the planned 100,000 kilometres.
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Long road to Mars
Today, ISRO ended the suspense and conducted a corrective manoeuvre. βThis is not a big deal, but rather typical of a complex mission being attempted for the first time,β says , formerly of the Space Policy Institute in Washington DC. βThere are very likely to be small glitches.β
MOM, also known as Mangalyaan, is scheduled to orbit Earth several times before setting off for Mars at the end of the month. Its orbit will be raised again this week and it should reach Mars in September 2014.
In the meantime, those interested in MOM better get used to minor glitches. βThe road to Mars is a long one and a number of mission-critical manoeuvres still have to happen,β says of the Mars Institute at the NASA Ames Research Center in California. βBut this is Indiaβs first mission to Mars, and so far Mangalyaan has been performing impressively well.β
