ORBIT CHASERS

Sriharikota

On September 2, as the countdown neared for the GSLV F04 blast off, Marappa Annamalai (63) was among the group of anxious scientists in the control room of the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh. The mission, the third consecutive for the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in nine months, was crucial. It was ISRO’s second attempt to place the satellite, INSAT 4CR, into Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO), after the earlier GSLV F02 had burst into flames when one of the strap-on motors failed.
“It was a great success. In a matter of 13 months we achieved a perfect flight,” said an elated Annamalai, later, who as SHAR Director, held full responsibility for all the operations carried out in the launch services, campaign and stage preparation. In fact, the team under Annamalai had achieved a hat trick, having just authored two more successful launches.
So, when the system shut down just 15 seconds before the GSLV F04 take off on a slight cloudy day, Annamalai, who is also the chairman of the Launch Authorisation Board (LAB) responsible for the final authorisation of the launch, had been in despair. But, two hours later, thanks to Annamalai and his team, the problem had been rectified and the launch achieved the ‘required trajectory,’ to place the satellite in GTO.
After last July’s disaster, Annamalai and Team ISRO had to build a rocket that not only made a perfect launch but also to figure out why the GSLV F02 had failed. As chairman of LAB, it was Annamalai who had to work out what went wrong. He is also the chairman of the Flight Readiness Review Team for the total launch vehicle as well as the chairman of the Flight Readiness Review Board of the Cryogenic stage.
“Such a large vehicle (the GSLV F04) with multiple subsystems—we had to fully understand what went wrong and make the necessary corrections and then manufacture, integrate and bring it to the level of launch in just one year. Anywhere else in the world such a repeat launch would have taken a longer time,” says Annamalai, relaxing in his office at the SHAR Centre. Working parallel to the other two missions, the team was able to succeed in the GSLV launch. It was the same team that had managed all the three missions.
From his village Taramangalam near Salem in Tamil Nadu to Sriharikota, it’s been a long journey for Annamalai. His father, Marappa Mudaliar, was a weaver, struggling to look after six children. But Annamalai did his father proud, excelling in school consistently.
Hating to disappoint the only child in the family who showed promise, Marappa Mudaliar took loans to put his child through college in the famous PSG Engineering College in Coimbatore where Annamalai completed a BE and then Masters in Engineering at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore.
As he stood first in every academic year, Annamalai also won Central Government scholarships, which saw him through his higher education. His academic achievements got him a job as engineer in the propulsion department of ISRO. It has been a long 37-year-stint at the space organisation for the unassuming scientist.
“The first thing I did when I got the job was to settle my father’s debts. By the time I got married after paying back all the loans, I was 29, which was considered late those days,” said Annamalai. He quickly rose to become deputy manager and general manager, heading the design team at SHAR which took care of the launch complex system, tracking system and ground testing system. For about 11 years, he also headed the Liquid Propulsion System Centre at Mahendragiri near Kanyakumari before becoming Associate Director of SHAR in 2004 and Director the following year.
—Jaya Menon

C G PATIL
Director, Master Control Facility
Hassan
The idea of controlling an object in space for years while sitting 36,000 km away on earth mystified Karnataka University physics doctorate holder C G Patil into taking up a position in 1982 at the then brand new ISRO Master Control Facility for satellites in Hassan, about 200 km from Bangalore.
Since September 2, 2007, when the INSAT-4CR, the latest Indian communication satellite and the heaviest launched indigenously, was put in space by the GSLV-F04, Patil, now the director of the MCF, is the satellite’s chief doctor 24/7.
“We get into the picture as early as a month before the launch—checking if all ground stations are working properly, doing simulation exercises for all operations on the satellite from power to computing,” says Patil. “Once the satellite is launched it is a 24/7 operation until the satellite is declared operational which could be about a fortnight after the launch. Senior people like me keep in constant touch with the satellite’s health and functioning during this time.”
Since 1982, MCF has successfully handled 20 geostationary satellite missions launched from the USA, French Guyana and the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota.
“The challenge here is that this is the heaviest indigenous satellite launch carried out by ISRO and involves a powerful communication satellite. Operation wise the challenges are largely the same as in monitoring and maintaining any satellite in orbit,” he says.
Apart from tracking and commanding operations on the satellite through its entire life, Patil and his team at the MCF typically carry out the functions of mission analysis, operations scheduling, special and critical operations of the satellites.
—Johnson TA

K N Shankara

Director, ISRO Satellite Centre
Bangalore
When the 2,168 kg, INSAT-4C crashed into the Bay of Bengal on July 10, 2006, the ISRO Satellite Centre in Bangalore and its director Dr K N Shankara encountered a race against time to recreate a new satellite. Against a normal time frame of two years for putting together a communication satellite of the calibre of the INSAT series, Shankara and his team had to put together within a year a new satellite to enable ISRO to make a fresh attempt at the heaviest indigenous satellite launch ever.
On September 2, 2007, when the 2,130 kg, INSAT 4CR, a recreation of the crashed satellite, was put in its preliminary position in space, Shankara and his team were smiling.
“I have been associated with communication satellites since I joined ISRO in 1971. To me the really exceptional achievement in the launch of INSAT 4CR is the remarkably quick time we were able to produce the satellite after the set back of last year,” says Shankara, one of India’s communication satellite and space science pioneers.
“Normally, it would take about 24 months to build a satellite from scratch. This time we had a lead time of around six to eight months since much of the engineering drawings and configurations from the INSAT 4C was already stored with us,” he says.
The INSAT 4CR is designed to provide direct to home television services, digital satellite news gathering and to serve VSAT users. “When I joined ISRO in 1971 with a doctorate in electrical communication engineering from the Indian Institute of Science, satellite technology was just emerging. There was a lot of excitement since we were at the start of India’s satellite programme. Every successful launch has been special,” says the 62-year-old director of ISRO’s satellite centre.
In his early days at ISRO’s Space Application Centre, Shankara carried out pioneering work in the design and development of the communication transponders that are used in INSAT series of satellites. He has served as director of the Satellite Communications Programme Office and programme director, INSAT in-charge of the overall planning and direction of ISRO’s communication satellite programme.
— Johnson TA

G RAVEENDRANATH

Project Director, GSLV
Vikram Sarabhai Centre, Thiruvanantapuram
“I didn’t feel too elated about it because we were only correcting our failings of last year. Not even relief because we had worked very hard and taken care of every possible thing, and the launch just had to succeed,” says G Raveendranath, project director of GSLV and the man who led the GSLV’s operationalising.
After getting first rank in his Master’s in engineering from the University of Kerala, he had joined ISRO as an engineer in the SLV-3 programme of 1973, helping to develop its checkout system, and later that of the ASLV in 1983, before moving on ISRO’s Launch Vehicle Integration Group, working on the cryo stage.
Raveendranath had bagged the NRDC Invention Award of 1985 for developing the crucial real time system for use in checkout applications, and is a life member of the Aeronautical Society of India, Astronomical Society of India and the Society for Aerospace Manufacture.
—Rajeev PI

PS VEERARAGHAVAN

Director, Inertial Systems Unit
Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Thiruvanantapuram
PS Veeraraghavan was almost beside himself with anxiety until everything finally appeared to work the way it was supposed to and the tension gave way to pure elation. “We were tense, absolutely tense. We had to stop the countdown to launch midway after there was a wrong indication of a valve’s closure. This led to a couple of hours delay. And then, when it took off, the link to the monitoring station in Brunei went off and for some very worrying moments, the GSLV was not on our screens.”
A 1971-batch MTech from IIT Chennai, Veeraraghavan was involved in designing and developing the computerised checkout system for SLV-3 and PSLV, besides the design, development, integration, checkout and testing of all ISRO’s Launch Vehicles.
Beginning his career at ISRO in APJ Abdul Kalam’s SLV-3 team, he was earlier Group Director, Electrical Integration & Checkout Group and Deputy Director, Mechanisms and Vehicle Integration & Testing, at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre. He now head the IIS unit that delivered Inertial Navigation Systems & Rate Gyro Packages for PSLV, GSLV & SRE projects. The quality of his unit’s inertial navigation systems has been recognised as at par with those produced by other space-faring nations in Europe and the U.S.A, underlined by the precise injection of Italy’s Agile spacecraft by PSLV-C8 recently.
But for Veeraraghavan, the moment still belongs to the launch. “We knew it was perfect, but I was so overjoyed when finally everything fell into place, worked beautifully,” he says.

MKG NAIR

Director, Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre
Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Thiruvanantapuram
For MKG Nair, Director, Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre, it was an almost tangible relief when the GSLV succeeded. “It really was an immense relief. All the more, after our miserable failure last July.”
Nair’s unit provided the five stages for the launch vehicle, the satellite propulsion system and 16 crucial engines for the satellite’s altitude and orbit correction.
After his Master’s in Mechanical Engineering from the College of Engineering in Thiruvananthapuram, Nair was trained at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre Training Schoolin 1968-69, which he passed out with the Homi Bhabha Prize. He was earlier Associate Project Director (Liquid Propulsion Systems) for GSLV and then the Group Director, Liquid Propulsion Stages, LPSC. Nair was deputed to France from 1974 to 78 to work in the ARIANE Programme. He has also worked on developing the VIKAS Liquid Engine and had designed and developed many Liquid Stages—PS2/PS4, GS2 and L40—which were successfully flown in the PSLV & GSLV. He is currently engaged in research and development of the Cryo Upper Stage. “Our success this time really made up for what happened last year,” feels Nair.
—Rajeev PI