On Monday (23rd of May), ISRO successfully flight tested India’s first winged body aerospace vehicle operating in hypersonic flight regime.
In this experimental mission, the HS9 solid rocket booster carrying RLV-TD lifted off from the First Launch Pad at Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota at 07:00 hr IST.
After a successful flight of 91.1 second, HS9 burn out occurred, following which both HS9 and RLV-TD mounted on its top coasted to a height of about 56 km.
At that height, RLV-TD separated from HS9 booster and further ascended to a height of about 65 km.
From that peak altitude of 65 km, RLV-TD began its descent followed by atmospheric re-entry at around Mach 5 (five times the speed of sound).
The vehicle’s Navigation, Guidance and Control system accurately steered the vehicle during this phase for safe descent. After successfully surviving a high temperatures of re-entry with the help of its Thermal Protection System (TPS), RLV-TD successfully glided down to the defined landing spot over Bay of Bengal, at a distance of about 450 km from Sriharikota, thereby fulfilling its mission objectives.
The vehicle was successfully tracked during its flight from ground stations at Sriharikota and a shipborne terminal. Total flight duration from launch to landing of this mission of the delta winged RLV-TD, lasted for about 770 seconds.
In this flight, critical technologies such as Autonomous navigation, guidance & control, reusable thermal protection system and re-entry mission management have been successfully validated.
ISRO acknowledges the support of Indian Coast Guard and National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT) for the mid-sea wind measurement and shipborne telemetry respectively in this mission.
