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India has launched a miniature space shuttle called the Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV-TD). The purpose of the launch was to collect data about hypersonic flight and autonomous landing. The 1.75-ton model craft cost just $14 million to build:
India has launched an unmanned model space shuttle, joining the race to develop reusable spacecraft. The 7m-scale model took off from Andhra Pradesh and was expected to fly about 70km (43 miles) into the atmosphere before coming down at sea. Since Nasa stopped its Space Shuttle programme in 2011, there has been strong international competition to design alternative reusable spacecraft. Such vehicles could significantly cut the cost of space exploration.
India has been putting substantial research and resources into its space programme. A Mars orbiter launched in 2013 is its most high-profile space venture to date. It hopes to launch a full-scale reusable shuttle within a decade.
At The Space Review:
The experience and knowledge gained by the SRE-1 and CARE missions will be used for the human spaceflight program. While the RLV-TD flight has nothing to do with human missions, the experiment has great utility and hence the landing tests would add to competencies of ISRO. Nonetheless, the landing experiments (LEX) phase is yet to follow. Quite clearly, what is planned for May is but the first small step in a series of tests. One needs to be cognizant of the challenges inherent in the endeavor before prematurely raising expectations to the same levels as the American Space Shuttle.
(Score: 2) by b0ru on Friday May 27 2016, @07:18AM
I'm not sure whether it was technically feasible, but putting a non-infrared camera in it to keep it going after the cooling wears off would have made it a true Hubble successor.
Yes, indeed. The timing of the Herschel mission ending (running out of Helium coolant) was well into the project, so it was a bit late for them to learn that lesson the hard way. Whilst the mirrors were primed to provide peak reflectance for NIR and IR, I think a visual spectrum instrument with narrowband filters (HST-lite, as it were), would have been a great idea. The JWST is fairly massive, however, and it may have been a weight requirement which precluded it.