ISRO's throwback from carrying rocket parts on bicycle to putting India on the Moon

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) etched its name in history on Wednesday (August 23) by becoming world’s first country to soft land on lunar South Pole, which is considered to be extremely complex and difficult by space agencies across world. communication link between Lander and Mission operations centre in Bengaluru was established after soft landing on Moon. Later, lander imager camera also beamed pictures of surface around Moon’s landing area. It’s important to recollect that 40 per cent of Moon missions in last 60 years have failed.      

ISRO has repeatedly proved its calibre, ever since its foundation over five deces ago, for big-ticket missions beyond low-Earth orbit and to Moon and Mars, humanity's next frontier. With launch of Chandrayaan-3 mission from Satish Dhawan Space Center in Andhra Presh's Sriharikota, on July 14, and n successfully landing lander and rover on lunar surface on Wednesday (August 23) agency proved it yet again. ISRO might not have an overwhelmingly large budget like NASA or European Space Agency (ESA), but it has delivered significant results despite operating on a shoestring budget right from beginning.

Humble beginnings - Using bicycle, bullock cart for transporting rocket parts

establishment of Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station (TERLS) in Thiruvananthapuram in 1963 marked beginning of India's space journey. ISRO launched Nike Apache rocket, first on Indian soil, in same year. This rocket weighing 715 kg and built by NASA took off with a 30-kg paylo to an altitude of 207 km. Notably, this happened when NASA's Apollo program, which went on to land 12 men on Moon, h alrey begun in 1961. 

launch of India's first indigenously-me satellite, 'Aryabhatta' was next major event that followed, thanks to Russian space agency, Roscosmos. It launched satellite on April 19, 1975, using its Soviet Kosmos-3M rocket from Kapustin Yar. 

Parallely India also launched indigenously designed 'Rohini' satellite RS-1, aboard Satellite Launch Vehicle-3 (SLV-3E2) on July 18, 1980. After a dece of hard work by team led by 'Missile Man of India', APJ Abdul Kalam, this was India's first successful launch of an experimental rocket. Weighing 35 kg, satellite lasted a little over a year. 

You might have come across picture above that shows scientists using a bicycle for carrying individual parts of rocket for assembly. It is from time when ISRO was preparing for launch of its first-ever launch vehicle, SLV-3 which was a 22-meter-long, all-solid, four-stage vehicle weighing 17 tonnes. Anor famous picture that reminds us of agency's humble days is use of bullock carts for transporting satellites. 

(Scientists at ISRO transporting APPLE satellite on a bullock cart)

picture above showing ISRO scientists carrying a satellite on a bullock cart dates back to 1981. This was when ISRO developed its first indigenous and experimental communication satellite named Ariane Passenger Paylo Experiment (APPLE). With a mass of 670 kg, satellite was launched using Ariane Space's Ariane-1 rocket from Kourou on June 19, 1981. It lasted for two years allowing ISRO to conduct a range of experiments.