India rewrites history after 41 years; second Indian in space after Rakesh Sharma
NEW DELHI, June 25: Astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla was on Wednesday headed to the International Space Station (ISS) on a historic odyssey marking India’s return to human spaceflight after a gap of 41 years following a successful launch of the Axiom Space mission in the US with a four-member multi-country crew.
After multiple delays, Elon Musk’s SpaceX launch vehicle with Crew Dragon spacecraft atop a Falcon-9 rocket blasted off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 12:01 pm(IST) carrying mission pilot Shukla, a Group Captain in the Indian Air Force (IAF), former NASA astronaut Commander Peggy Whitson and mission specialists Tibor Kapu of Hungary and Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski of Poland.
Family members, scores of well wishers and space enthusiasts gathered at watch parties across India, Poland, Hungary and the US burst into cheers as the rocket soared into the Florida sky from the same spot from where American astronaut Neil Armstrong, who was the first person to set foot on the moon, took off on the Apollo-11 mission in July 1969.
“Kamaal ki ride thi (It was an amazing ride),” Shukla said 10 minutes after the Dragon spacecraft was placed in orbit around the Earth at an altitude of 200 km. The spacecraft is expected to dock at the ISS at 4:30 pm on Thursday, capping a 28-hour journey.
The footage beamed by cameras from inside the crew capsule showed the four astronauts strapped into their cabin, seated side-by-side in helmeted white-and-black flight suits.
Shukla became only the second Indian astronaut to undertake a space flight, 41 years after his icon Rakesh Sharma’s eight-day space odyssey on board the then Soviet Union’s Salyut-7 space station in 1984.
“We are orbiting the earth at a speed of 7.5 km per second… This is not just the beginning of my journey to the International Space Station, but the beginning of India’s human space programme and it is my desire that all the countrymen become a part of this journey,” Shukla said in Hindi.
Congratulations poured in from all quarters as the Ax-4 mission astronauts entered the earth’s orbit. President Droupadi Murmu, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Science and Technology Minister Jitendra Singh and cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar among others hailed the space mission.
The Union Cabinet, at a meeting chaired by Modi, adopted a resolution wishing Shukla all the success in his space mission.
“Greetings from India. Wishing you all the very best. To the crew — Godspeed and spend as much time as possible looking out of the window. Have a fun time guys,” said Rakesh Sharma, the first Indian astronaut to travel to space, in a video message.
Shukla was selected to be part of India’s astronaut corps in 2019 along with fellow test pilots Prasanth Balkrishnan Nair, Angad Pratap and Ajit Krishnan for the Gaganyaan mission, India’s maiden human spaceflight, which is likely to be launched in 2027.
Born on October 10, 1985, in Lucknow, a year after his hero icon Rakesh Sharma’s historic spaceflight, Shukla did his schooling from City Montessori School (CMS) before joining the National Defence Academy.
He was commissioned into the Indian Air Force in 2006, and has over 2,000 hours of flying time on a wide range of aircraft including the Su-30 MKI, MiG-29, Jaguar, and Dornier-228.
He holds an MTech in Aerospace Engineering from the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru.
Shukla and the three other Gaganyaan astronaut designates underwent extensive training at Russia’s Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre and ISRO’s Astronaut Training Facility in Bengaluru.
The crew shared their launch day playlist.
Shukla’s song was Yun Hi Chala Chal, an ode to life road song about travel and more that he has taken to space. It is from Swades, the Shah Rukh Khan starrer quite coincidentally about a NASA scientist.
During the 14-day stay at the ISS, the Ax-4 crew is expected to interact with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, school students, and space industry leaders, among others.
Shukla is set to conduct exclusive food and nutrition-related experiments developed under a collaboration between the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Department of Biotechnology (DBT), with support from NASA.
ISRO has lined up a set of seven experiments for Shukla, who will also participate in five joint studies planned by NASA for its human research programme.
It has drawn up plans to focus on India-centric food for carrying out experiments on the ISS, including sprouting methi (fenugreek) and moong (green gram) in microgravity conditions. (PTI)
