ISRO Accomplishes De-Docking Of SpaDeX Satellites, Shares ‘Spectacular’ Visuals (Screengrab) | X/ISRO
New Delhi: The India Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Thursday completed the de-docking of the Space Docking Experiment (SpaDeX) satellites. The space agency also shared spectacular visuals of SpaDex de-docking. The visuals were captured from both SDX-1 & SDX-2.
The manoeuvre has paved the way for ISRO’s future missions, including Chandrayaan-4 and Gaganyaan. “Spadex undocking captured from both SDX-1 & SDX-2! Watch the spectacular views of this successful separation in orbit. Congratulations to India on this milestone!” ISRO tweeted.
Union MoS Science and Technology Jitendra Singh congratulated ISRO and termed the accomplishment “unbelievable”.
Visuals Shared By ISRO:
“Congrats team #ISRO. And heartening for every Indian ! #SPADEX Satellites accomplished the unbelievable De-Docking… This paves the way for the smooth conduct of ambitious future missions including the Bharatiya Antriksha Station, Chandrayaan 4 & Gaganyaan. PM Sh @narendramodi’s continuous patronage keeps the spirits soaring,” Singh said in an X post.
In January this year, ISRO docked two satellites of the SpceDex mission. With the January 16 manoeuvre, India became the fourth country after the United States, Russia and China to dock satellites in space.
The space agency launched the mission on December 30. The PSLV C60 rocket, carrying two small satellites — SDX01 (Chaser) and SDX02 (Target) — along with 24 payloads, lifted off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota. About 15 minutes later, the two small spacecraft weighing about 220 kilograms each were launched into a 475-kilometre circular orbit, as intended.
The SpaDeX mission is a cost-effective technology demonstrator mission for the demonstration of in-space docking using two small spacecraft launched by PSLV.
