The Indian Vikram-S rocket, built by the startup Skyroot Aerospace, reached an altitude of 95 km. This is only 5 km less than the Karman line. It is the next line for the formation of the Indian private space industry.
Indian Private Rocket
On November 18, the Vikram-S rocket, built by the Indian startup Skyroot Aerospace, made a successful flight in the upper atmosphere. According to the country’s space agency ISRO, which tracked the flight, it lasted 6 minutes. The carrier reached an altitude of 95 km above sea level and successfully landed in the ocean.
This is only 5 km below the Karman line at an altitude of 100 km, which by international standards is the limit of space. Thus, private space companies in India are only two steps away from putting cargo into orbit exclusively on their own.
Vikram-S is a single-stage solid-fuel rocket built to test a number of technologies. It is known that some parts were made using 3D printing technology.
Indian Space Ambitions
Recently, India, which for another 20 years no one perceived as a space state, has been showing significant success. When its Mangalyaan probe entered Mars orbit in 2014, it became the first Asian country to reach the red planet.
Since then, India has been trying to become a “space superpower”. Now its share in the global launch services market is 2%, but the country is working to increase it. In October of this year, a heavy rocket created by ISRO put 36 broadband satellites into orbit at once.
It seems that ISRO, as well as the space agencies of other countries, realized that the best way to accelerate the development of the industry is to promote the creation of a private sector that will take on some of the risks and ensure the effectiveness of development.
According to phys.org
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