Chennai, Oct 4 : After an extended eight year performance
that exceeded beyond expectations, ISRO’s Mangalyaan/Mars
Orbiter Mission has gone into oblivion due to lack of fuel and
drained out battery.
In an update on the Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) at a National Meet
organised by ISRO recently on completion of its eight years in the
Martian orbit, it was discussed that despite being designed for a life
span of six months as a technology demonstrator, the MOM has lived
for about eight years in the Martian orbit with a gamut of significant
scientific results on Mars as well as on the Solar corona, before losing
communication with the ground station, as a result of a long eclipse in
April 2022.
During the national meet, ISRO deliberated that the propellant
must have been exhausted and therefore, the desired attitude
pointing could not be achieved for sustained power generation.
“It was declared that the spacecraft is non-recoverable and
attained its end-of-life”, ISRO said today.
The mission will be ever-regarded as a remarkable technological
and scientific feat in the history of planetary exploration, it
added.
At the meeting, Shantanu Bhatwadekar, Scientific Secretary, ISRO,
in his prelude address, said the MOM was launched on November 5,
2013, and after completing 300 days of interplanetary journey, it was
inserted into the Martian orbit on September 24, 2014.
Equipped with a suit of five scientific payloads onboard, during
these eight years, the mission has gifted significant scientific
understanding on the Martian surface features, morphology, as
well as the Martian atmosphere and exosphere.