Gaganyaan: ISRO to launch first development flight of test vehicle on Oct 21

New Delhi: The vehicle for the unmanned test flight for the Gaganyaan— human spaceflight— mission will be launched between 7 am and 9 am on October 21, the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) announced on Monday.

The test vehicle will be launched from Sriharikota spaceport to demonstrate the performance of the crew escape system, added the space agency.

“Mission Gaganyaan: The TV-D1 test flight is scheduled for October 21, 2023 between 7 am and 9 am from SDSC-SHAR, Sriharikota. #Gaganyaan,” wrote Isro on the micro-blogging site X (formerly twitter) on Monday.

Union minister of science and technology and space Jitendra Singh confirmed the October 21 launch last week.

Speaking at an event organised by a private news channel, Singh said, “Isro will also test the efficacy of the crew escape system, which is the crucial part of Gaganyaan mission, resulting in unmanned and manned missions to outer space by 2024. The test is to be conducted at Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota. Crew module will carry the astronauts during the Gaganyaan mission to outer space.”

He added that the test involves launching a crew module to outer space and bringing it back to earth and recovering it after touchdown in the Bay of Bengal.

Also Read: ‘Women scientists chose Chandrayaan-3 moon landing spot’

“Indian Navy personnel have already started mock operations to recover the module. The success of this test will set the stage for the first unmanned Gaganyaan mission and ultimately manned mission to outer space in low earth orbit. Before the ultimate manned Gaganyaan mission, there will be a test flight next year, which will carry Vyommitra, the female robot astronaut,” he said.

The Gaganyaan project envisages demonstration of human spaceflight capability by launching a crew of three members to an orbit of 400km for a three-day mission and bringing them back safely.

According to people familiar with the matter, the mission also plans to demonstrate technology preparedness levels before carrying out the final human space flight mission. These demonstrator missions include integrated air drop test (IADT), pad abort test (PAT) and test vehicle (TV) flights. Safety and reliability of all systems will be proven in unmanned missions preceding the manned one.

Earlier, in an update, Isro said that the first development flight, TV-D1, was in the final stages of preparation. The test vehicle is a single-stage liquid propellant rocket developed for this abort mission. The payloads consist of the Crew Module (CM) and Crew Escape Systems (CES) with their fast-acting solid motors, along with CM fairing (CMF) and Interface Adapters.