The Mars Orbiter must have taken a long and hard look at planet earth on Nov 30, 2013. Exactly 49 minutes into next day (IST), engineers at ISRO began to crank up its velocity to levels where the earth can no longer hold it in its orbit. After 22 minutes of this exercise, it was pushed out of the earth orbit at a velocity of 11.4 km per second, and on to a parabolic arc around the sun that would eventually take the orbiter to Mars. On December 4 at 2:16 am, the orbiter will completely leave the earth’s sphere of influence. By then it would have travelled enough in its parabolic trajectory for ISRO engineers to accurately determine deviations from its predicted path, if any. On December 11, ISRO would carry out a correction ‐ if required ‐ in the spacecraft’s path. “The path of the spacecraft is very close to the expected trajectory,” says ISRO chairman Dr K Radhakrishnan.
Source: Economic Times
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