Space shuttle, India style

In many ways, the successful flight of India's first reusable space launch vehicle is a tribute to the vision of A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, the late former president of India and top rocket scientist. Way back in 1973, when Kalam took over as the project director of India's first satellite launch vehicle, SLV-3, he dreamt of doing what the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) eventually accomplished on May 23, 2016. While developing SLV-3, Kalam would watch the restless sea at Thumba in Kerala, the headquarters of ISRO's rocketry. Kalam told me it was then that he visualised building a rocket launcher that could be reused after it ejected a satellite into orbit. He explained that instead of letting the launcher tumble uselessly into the ocean as junk, if it could be guided back and reused, the cost of launching a satellite could be cut to a tenth. He even worked out the dimensions and trajectory of such a launcher and circulated it to ISRO scientists.

For ISRO, which was then taking baby steps into space, Kalam's plan was way ahead of its time. The organisation was just conceiving its first launch vehicle and was keen on proving its ability to put something into space-however small the object. So, naturally, the plan for a reusable launcher was kept on hold. Also, the US Space Shuttle programme, though conceived in the mid-1960s, was still on the drawing board and its first four orbital tests flight would happen only in 1981. Considered state-of-the-art in reusable technology, the Space Shuttle would fly a total of 135 missions before it was retired in 2011 by NASA because of spiralling costs and far safer means of launching satellites now available.