Hyderabad: NASA and private rocket company SpaceX on Thursday launched four astronauts into orbit, sending a veteran spacewalker, two younger crewmates chosen for future lunar missions — one an Indian-born and a German materials scientist to the International Space Station (ISS).
Raja Jon Vurputoor Chari (43), is an Indian-origin astronaut who is part NASA’s SpaceX Crew-3 mission that was successfully launched at 7.33 am from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida.
Raja Chari, the Mission Commander, is a graduate of the US Air Force Academy, MIT, and US Naval Test Pilot School, and has over 2,000 flying hours, which includes F-35, F-15, F-16, and F-18 flights.
The Elon Musk owned company-built launch vehicle, consisting of a Crew Dragon capsule and a two-stage Falcon 9 rocket, lit off the Florida sky with a reddish fireball as its nine Merlin engines roared to life.
The liftoff of the Dragon spacecraft, named Endurance by the crew, was aired live from Cape Canaveral on NASA TV, punctuated by the sound of cheers and applause from mission controllers.
Intermittent rain and clouds over the Cape earlier in the day had cast doubt on launch prospects, but the weather cleared by flight time, NASA said.
In July 2017, Raja Chari was selected from over 18,300 applicants to be among 12 members group called “NASA Astronaut Group 22” and underwent two years astronaut training from August 2017.
This is first flight of Raja Chari to space, although the US Air Force Colonel has extensive flight experience of 2,000 hours.
Before reporting to NASA, he has flown combat missions in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and also deployed at overseas in support of the Korean peninsula.
This is third crew rotation flight of the “Crew Dragon spacecraft” which was launched using Falcon 9 rocket. They just missed Crew2, who returned to Earth this week.
This mission carried four astronauts of Crew-3 Mission to the International Space Station (ISS), PSI’s Raghunandan Kumar told UNI.
In around 12 Minutes after Liftoff, the Crew-3 Launch Mission, consisting of a Crew Dragon capsule perched atop a two-stage Falcon 9 rocket built by Elon Musk’s SpaceX Company, climbed into the night sky as its nine Merlin engines roared to life.
Thus four member international group of Astronauts called “Crew 3” reached Space i.e. Earth’s Orbit.
This mission consists of NASA astronauts Raja Chari, mission commander, Tom Marshburn, pilot, and Kayla Barron, mission specialist and ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Matthias Maurer, who also will serve as a mission specialist, to the International Space Station.
After 22 hours Journey, the Crew Dragon Spacecraft with four astronauts is expected to reach and dock to International Space Station (ISS) at 5.40 a.m on Friday.
It was Raja Chari’s father, Sreenivas Chari, who moved to America for further studies five decades ago. Sreenivas had an engineering degree from Osmania University in Telangana. He breathed his last in 2010.
Raja Chari’s grandfather, a native of Mahabubnagar, was a Mathematics professor at Osmania University, and died very early in 1955. Raja Chari, a first generation Indian American, visited Hyderabad thrice, where many of his close relatives still stay.
Planetary Society of India (PSI) Director N Sri Raghunandan said on December 9, 2020, US government had announced an initial team consisting of 18 astronauts (nine male and nine female) for ‘Artemis’ programme.
After a long gap of five decades in Apollo Mission from (1968-72), NASA through Artemis programme wanted the Astronauts to Return to Surface of Moon by 2025.
Indian Origin Astronaut Raja Chari was selected to be part of this ‘Artemis’ team of astronauts who will pave way for the next lunar missions under the Artemis programme. PSI hopes Raja Chari one day lands on Moon.
Earlier this mission was postponed four times, due to bad weather on October 31, November 3, November 9. Whereas on November 7 it was a minor medical condition in one of the astronaut which led to postponement, the PSI Director said.
The SpaceX Crew-3 mission launched will spend approximately six months aboard the space station conducting new and exciting scientific research in areas such as materials science, health technologies, and plant science to prepare for human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit and to benefit life on Earth.
The NASA SpaceX Crew-3 mission will to return to earth in April 2022.
The International Space Station (ISS) is a modular space station (habitable artificial satellite) in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies — NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA (Japan), ESA (Europe), and CSA (Canada).
The space station weighing 460-Ton is approximately the size of a football field and orbits earth 400 km above.The crew members of this permanently crewed platform station are replaced on regular intervals whereas supplies are sent using unmanned flights Missions.
Flying at 28,800 km/hr around Earth its takes 92 minutes for this Space Borne Laboratory to make one complete circuit of Earth.
As of December 2020 in over two decades, ISS completed 1,31,440 orbits around Earth @15.49 orbits per day, Kumar added.
