FROM EIR DAILY ALERT

India Opens Manned Space Flight Center for 2021 Mission

Feb. 6, 2019 (EIRNS)—The India Space Research Organization has inaugurated a Human Space Flight Center, to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s goal of a manned space flight by 2022. The mission would make India the fourth nation able to launch a crew into low Earth orbit, after Russia, the U.S., and China. The center, which will be responsible for planning the mission, developing the systems for life support, and selecting and training the crew, is in Bangalore. It was launched on Jan. 31, reported India Times.

The plan is to carry two unmanned tests of the spacecraft in December 2020 and July 2021, and then the first crewed mission in December 2021, just days short of Modi’s 2022 goal, to have a crew in space when India celebrates 75 years of independence.