India's Mars Mission to enter planet's orbit on September 24, ISRO uploads commands

Bangalore: Indian Space Research Organisation on Sunday said that commands required by the Mars Orbiter Mission to enter the planet's orbit have been uploaded. It said that the process will take almost 13 hours to complete and the orbiter is expected to enter the Mars orbit on September 24.

Scientists will undertake a "challenging task" on September 24 when they would restart the onboard liquid engine, which has been in sleep mode for nearly ten months, for a critical manoeuvre of the spacecraft.

ISRO will hold a press conference on Monday in Bangalore to give details about the Mars mission.

On Saturday, ISRO had said that the Mars mission was in the "pink of health" and was sending vital information from a distance of 211 million km after covering 95 per cent of its journey.

"MOM keeps sending us vital information about the health of its various modules and measurements from sensors. This is called Telemetry signal. Today's telemetry confirms that MOM is in the pink of health," ISRO had said.

"MOM uses 2.2 m High Gain Antenna to send us signals from the present distance of 211 million kilometre", it said.

ISRO has said that the spacecraft has completed 95 per cent of its heliocentric journey towards Mars and was less than "four million kilometres" away from it.

The Rs 450-crore project, named Mangalyaan, was launched from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh on board the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle on November 5, 2013 with an aim to reach the red planet's atmosphere by September 24.

The project is expected to provide the scientific community better opportunities in planetary research.