ISRO’s Reusable Launch Vehicle has successfully landed during trail

NASA is not the only space agency conducting back to back missions. The Indian Space Research Organisation, popularly called ISRO is also in the race. Now, ahead of its upcoming missions including Chandrayaan-3 (June 2023), Gaganyaan 1 (mid-2023), Gaganyaan 2 (early 2024) and NISAR (January 2024); it is all set with its brand-new, state-of-the-art launch vehicle called Reusable Launch Vehicle.  

Recently, ISRO even conducted its landing experiment called Reusable Launch Vehicle Technology Demonstration or RLV-TD programme at the Aeronautical Test Range in Karnataka’s Chitradurga region.  

A Chinook helicopter from Indian Air Force was used to drop the vehicle (carrying a minimal load) from an altitude of 4.5 kilometres once the predetermined parameters were attained as per the RLV-TD’s Mission Management and Computer Command. Following this, the landing experiment was executed as per plan.  

The best news however is that the experiment of the landing was autonomous as the RLV-TD performed both the approach and landing manoeuvres using its own installed Integrated Navigation, Guidance and Control System. In doing so, the trial run was finished in less than 30 minutes.  

Interestingly, this landing experiment was one of a kind as it was the world’s first spacecraft that was carried to an altitude of 4.5 kilometres and then released for autonomous landing.  

For those unaware, RLV-TD was successfully flight tested back in May 2016 from Sriharikota that checked many critical technologies including autonomous navigation, guidance and control, reusable thermal protection system and re-entry mission management. The purpose of RLV-TD is to attain cost effective access to outer space.  

RLV-TD comprises of a fuselage exterior, a nose cap, double delta wings, and twin vertical tails. It also features symmetrically placed active control surfaces called Elevons and Rudder. What most people don’t know is that the launch vehicle has been configured to act as a flying test platform to examine many other technologies such as hypersonic flight, autonomous landing and powered cruise flight. In fact, experts believe that it can soon be modified into the country’s first uncrewed reusable two-stage orbital launch vehicle.