Make-In-India, For Gaganyaan: Agra Lab To Manufacture Parachutes To Be Used By Astronauts During Touchdown

The parachutes that will be used by the three Indian astronauts for their return to Earth in 2022 will be made at a laboratory in Agra, reports Deccan Herald.

The crew of the first Indian manned space mission, dubbed ‘Gaganyaan’ will be brought back to Earth by a pair of parachutes that are high strength, specially made by Aerial Delivery Research and Development Establishment (ADRDE), an Indian-based lab under the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

As of now, ADRDE has supplied 10 of the parachutes to Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for trials in the Gaganyaan programme with more to be provided during the operational phase.

The parachutes were used by ISRO earlier - to bring back crew module in the Bay of Bengal in December 2014 and the successful pad abort test in July 2018. Each parachute is capable of carrying four tonnes of weight.

“While one parachute is good enough for the crew module, two of these recovery systems are used in the human spaceflight project for redundancy,” said an anonymous ADRDE official.

On their return, the Indian astronauts will lower the Gaganyaan to 120 km orbit, where the separation of crew module will take place, after which it takes 36 minutes to descend.

The parachutes will reduce the speed of the crew module from 216 mts per second to 11 mts per second on splash down near the Gujarat coast in the Arabian Sea.

The lab has also come out with an advanced tactical level aerostat, (ballon mounted surveillance) to keep on eye on the Chinese border developments.