Satish Dhawan Space Centre

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) is the launch centre for the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). It is located in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh, India and is also referred to as Sriharikota. The centre is at 13°47'North 80°15'East and is roughly 80 kilometres north of Chennai in South India. It was originally called Sriharikota Range (SHAR), and was sometime known as Sriharikota Launching Range. The centre was renamed to its present name 2002 after the death of ISRO's former chairman Satish Dhawan. The space centre has kept the title SHAR during these name changes.

The centre became operational in October 1971 when three Rohini rockets were launched on October 9 and October 10.

The SHAR facility now consists of two launch pads, with the second built recently. The second launch pad was used for launches beginning in 2005 and is a universal launch pad, accommodating all of the launch vehicles used by ISRO. The two launch pads will allow multiple launches in a single year, which was not possible earlier.

India's lunar orbiter Chandrayaan 1 will be launched from this launch location in 2007-2008.

[edit] External links

 This article about government in India is a stub. See the WikiProject Politics of India for article coordination. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../s/a/t/Satish_Dhawan_Space_Centre_3809.html"