10 ms·

From India, Proof That a Trip to Mars Doesn’t Have to Break the Bank

167 points by codelion 12y ago

someperson 12y ago
What the NYT article didn't mention was the lack of sterilization of the ISRO spacecraft. A huge portion of the budget for a probe like MAVEN [1] or JUNO [2] is spent reducing the chance of Earth microbes colonizing Mars or a moon of Jupiter. It would be a huge shame for us to have doubt whether the first extra terrestial microbes we find in the solar system were really alien or simply Space Age Earth based life [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAVEN http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAVEN [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_(spacecraft) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_(spacecraft) EDIT: Why the downvotes? Is what I'm saying incorrect? EDIT2: Sources: NASA cleanroom assembling Curiosity - http://www.nasa.gov/centers/jpl/images/content/482654main_pia13388-640.jpg http://www.nasa.gov/centers/jpl/images/content/482654main_pi... (source: ISRO assembling the Mangalyaan Mars probe in question http://www.thehindu.com/multimedia/dynamic/01608/vbk-05-mars_1608506g.jpg http://www.thehindu.com/multimedia/dynamic/01608/vbk-05-mars... (source: http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/science/indias-october-28-mars-mission-on-schedule-isro/article5204371.ece http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/science/indias-october-28-m...) Engineers don't use gloves or facial masks for interplanetary missions. This jives with this video and the following anecdotes - http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/14/india-to-launch-its-first-mission-to-mars-video/ http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/14/india-to-launch-its-first-... via https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6551331 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6551331 >This comment has nothing to do with India, ISRO, politics or Mars, but I am curious if anyone with expertise can comment on the clean room practices seen applied in this video. Is it odd that the workers don't have on full 'bunny' suits and have (what seems to be) a relatively large amount of skin/hair unprotected? I don't know if it matters that much, it just seems a little lax given the cost of failure. > Firstly, I've visited ISRO Bangalore(A few years back). And I did see the exact things you mentioned. I did ask the guy(Not sure, if he was the PR guy) who took our class for the tour. His answer was, they were likely assembling some test equipment and not the real equipment that was going to space. (Which unlikely given parent's NYT article:) > The modest budget did not allow for multiple iterations. So, instead of building many models (a qualification model, a flight model and a flight spare), as is the norm for American and European agencies, scientists built the final flight model right from the start. It's unclear whether the room is a particulate controlled up to standard, but they may (hopefully) do sterilization through chemical and heat treatments, but that alone isn't enough for planetary protection.
- programmer_dude 12y ago
  Can you provide some sources which demonstrate the lack of sterilization of the ISRO spacecraft?
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - someperson 12y ago
    I can't provide evidence of lack of heat and chemical based sterilization treatment post assembly of spacecraft but see my updated post for sources on lack of clean room procedures DURING assembly - particularly the video at http://www.space.com/23199-indias-first-mars-mission-prepares-for-launch-video.html http://www.space.com/23199-indias-first-mars-mission-prepare... which shows assembly conditions very clearly
    - programmer_dude 12y ago
      Thanks, all good points. However we cannot yet rule out post assembly sterilization.
- ganwar 12y ago
  It is un-verifiable. Back your statements with facts or reports which mention as such. Dont go loose in the la la land.
  - someperson 12y ago
    This video is a good source: http://www.space.com/23199-indias-first-mars-mission-prepares-for-launch-video.html http://www.space.com/23199-indias-first-mars-mission-prepare...
    - deleted 12y ago
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- chdir 12y ago
albeva 12y ago
I think the real reason in difference in costs is that in India salaries are much lower and profits expected by 3rd party providers are much smaller. So building and engineering is way cheaper. How about quality?
- DominikR 12y ago
  Money alone wont get you far in this area. It's talented engineers and the right strategy that is important. Otherwise you couldn't explain why the Soviets/Russians had such a remarkably reliable space program, even though they always had less resources than the US. From what I understand, NASA tends to overload projects with thousands of requirements and features, which introduce additional points of failure, whereas the Russians focus more on the basics. It seems like the Indians will also use the same strategy, and focus on the basics and reuse what they already have, which makes sense, considering their limited resources.
  - Shivetya 12y ago
    Actually NASA tends to build to 535 requirements, give or take a few. The is similar to the problem the military faces.
    - DominikR 12y ago
      The F-35 has the same problem. It is built to perform in so many roles, that it is bad in every single one of it. (price, weight, maneuverability, payload, range)
      - autokad 12y ago
        yeah the military seems to always be obsessed with 1 aircraft that can do everything. that just means you get something that can do everything poorly.
- ganwar 12y ago
  Indian space program is one of the most reliable (less number of accidents) space programs in the world. Just yesterday Indian successfully launched PSLV to put 5 foreign satellites in orbit. It's 26th consecutive successful flight. It is the most reliable and cost effective rocket in the world right now. Salaries do play a part in bringing the cost down but that is not the only reason. ISRO functions like a very agile organisation with small teams focusing on specific targets with autonomy. Also, a lot of cost is saved in the testing phase as well.
deleted 12y ago
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mellisarob 12y ago
seems quite ironic. India ? Mars?
xmonkee 12y ago
The article mentions "jugaad" as the Indian way of doing things inexpensively. It roughly means a "hack", and it really is very fundamental to the Indian engineering brain. I once read a list of interesting words in foreign languages and Portuguese had something similar. I think all engineering teams should have at least one jugaadu person on it.
- icebraining 12y ago
  I once read a list of interesting words in foreign languages and Portuguese had something similar. Yeap: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/desenrascanço http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/desenrascanço I'd say it's both a source of national pride and shame for us, in the sense that we can find ingenious solutions, but often those are only required because we didn't do it right in the first place.
  - eklavya 12y ago
    More often than not it's "couldn't due to resource constraints".
    - Fuxy 12y ago
      That's mostly why I kind of feel like I want to wait and see if the spacecraft actually manages to do what it's designed to. If you have to send multiple 70+ million dollar missions because the hacks keep failing the cost benefit is not all that good compare to the more expensive 300 million dollar mission.
    - icebraining 12y ago
      I'm talking about the Portuguese term, not the Hindi.
  - wreckimnaked 12y ago
    In Brazil it's called "gambiarra", and the same mixed pride/shame feelings also apply.
- capex 12y ago
smoyer 12y ago
I'd like to know the hardware cost and number of man-hours put into each mission. Labor is a large part of a creating and operating a spacecraft, so comparing man-hours eliminates the differences you might find due to the expected rate of the engineers in each country. I should also note that when I say "hardware cost", I'm also including a break-down for each sub-contractor (and sub-sub, sub-sub-sub, etc) since you can't really say you bought a large component from one vendor so that's the hardware cost of that component. This criteria makes it pretty hard to every know the actual hardware cost versus engineering/manufacturing hours.
- jerf 12y ago
  If India can field rocket scientists greatly more cheaply than the US, I'd submit that still says something important about the two countries. "I should also note that when I say "hardware cost", I'm also including a break-down for each sub-contractor (and sub-sub, sub-sub-sub, etc)" One nice thing about money in a mostly free economy is that you can use it as a bound on such things. If you can buy a widget at $5, the company you are purchasing it from can not have put more than $5 of resources into it (barring some exceptions, probably none of which matter for this). It doesn't matter if they sub-sub-sub-sub-contract it out, it's still bounded by the final cost. Again, if India can source a component for much more cheaply than the US, it still says something important and real about their program. The differences are fully real, and I don't think trying to "undo" them and produce the artificial numbers you are proposing will produce any useful real information.
  - smoyer 12y ago
    That's besides the point ... if India is doing something different (more entrepreneurial, less bureaucracy, etc), it would be worth understanding what it was. One clue in the article was that they had a limited time to reach their launch window ... Might that constraint be responsible for cutting back to just what was necessary? I never claimed what they accomplished wasn't impressive. I tend to think their entry level rocket scientists (at $1000) generated some of the savings but what was the "mindset" that allowed the rest of the savings?
quarterwave 12y ago
In his autobiography 'Wings of Fire', A.P.J.Abdul Kalam, himself an ISRO rocket scientist & program director who later became a highly popular President of India (he draws crowds to this day, several years after office), quotes Gen. Patton: "A good plan violently executed right now is far better than a perfect plan executed next week." That could well summarize the ISRO style. Kalam also highlights the leadership-by-open-discussion style of Vikram Sarabhai and Satish Dhawan who successively headed ISRO in its formative years. If that sounds commonplace, bear in mind this was in a civilian government organization of the 1960's. People like Sarabhai (a Cambridge Tripos and inheritor of a family business empire) and Dhawan (a double PhD in math and aerospace from Caltech) could have played the part and been overbearing - but they deliberately chose to build a "startup culture" where people were encouraged to speak up.
- swatkat 12y ago
  Yes. "Wings of Fire" is an excellent book; a must read. Also, if anyone's interested in knowing about ISRO's origins, their "hacker culture" etc. then I recommend these two excellent books: "A Brief History of Rocketry in ISRO" by PV Manoranjan Rao, P Radhakrishnan; and "India's Rise as a Space Power" by Prof UR Rao. These two books give an excellent overview on how ISRO was started (starting from INCOSPAR, TERLS, Sounding rockets, Rohini, Aryabhata, SLV, ASLV, PSLV, INSAT, to GSLV Mk3).
wil421 12y ago
Lets still hold our breath, the Mangalyaan hasnt made it to Mars. NASA and a contractor made some fatal conversion mistakes and overshot Mars. I doubt they will have the same problems but it still needs to reach orbit. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter
nova22033 12y ago
They're comparing apples and iPhones.
return0 12y ago
It was only a matter of time when space travel would be outsourced as well.
- spain 12y ago
  I don't get the downvotes, I thought this was pretty witty.
hellbreakslose 12y ago
Yes? And may we know how many underaged kids died out of slavery work for that to succeed?
sampk 12y ago
Protip: Disable JavaScript to see the article if it gives you a paywall.
autokad 12y ago
i see little overlap with sending humans to mars. i dont think its a great way to send people such a distance (and expect to get them back) by cutting corners in planning, redundancy, etc. And its my understanding that the bulk of the costs of going there is getting all the fuel and supplies from earth to there, which is not solved by paying rocket scientists 1000$ a month. NASA already operates on a shoestring budget. the article makes it sound like NASA has lavish funds. And they do so with a really good track record.
- crassus 12y ago
  Every US Government department operates on a shoestring budget, if you listen to them. It's amazing that they can keep the lights on.
- deleted 12y ago
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- seanflyon 12y ago
  It is so expensive to get all the fuel and supplies from earth to mars precisely because you have to pay a rocket scientist to make a very large rocket
IanDrake 12y ago
Seems like a pretty ill conceived article. Might as well have written about how American car companies like GM are able to produce much less expensive cars than the Italians like Ferrari. Both cars have engines, tires, etc... but WOW, can the Americans do it for so much less...
- mikeash 12y ago
  If there was nothing on the roads but fancy Ferraris, and then somebody came along and made a cheap GM that got the job done for much less, that would be newsworthy.
  - IanDrake 12y ago
    To me it's not that it's newsworthy or not, but how it's presented. It's not that Americans/Europeans can't do what the Indians did, but that we're not interested in doing what they did. The article seems to confuse the two.
    - mikeash 12y ago
      How do you know they can do it, if they never have? "I could do that, I just don't want to" is the lamest excuse in the book.
      - IanDrake 12y ago
        That is a lame excuse in some contexts. However, if Superman leaps over an entire building, then is asked to jump off a curb and declines, I think you can safely assume he could do it, but doesn't feel like it. If I jump off a curb and say I could jump over that yonder building (if I felt like it, but I don't). Then, yes, that would be lame.
        mikeash 12y ago
        When have any of these agencies ever done the cheap space mission equivalent of leaping over a building?
jsudhams 12y ago
I am all for the mutually exclusive programs of poverty and technological advancement (in this case sending vehicle to Mars orbit) but the other part getting rid of the poverty and other things (corruption, bad governance,Individual's discipline, and safety, are pretty much going down the drain). I don't why these scientist can't find solution Bangalore's garbage drop issue, traffic issue and real estate woes and so on. I think India is driving on wrong direction with not governance on education system which i feel is the singe source of all the issues.
- whacker 12y ago
  I think we are very good as individuals, but we fail collectively. That is why even the poorest Indian home will be clean, but the wealthiest public street could be dirty.
  - jsudhams 12y ago
    Never thought about it and you are right on "That is why even the poorest Indian home will be clean, but the wealthiest public street could be dirty". I think the root cause is the discipline in public, i am trying to assert when we (Indians) became so selfish or given up about public issues. One reason i could think is that urbanisaztion is still settling in and we do not know how to behave and live in cities yet because i remember that in our village we use undertake common interest and maintain those like ensuring that the pond are cleaned in time and volunteer one day man hour or equivalent money (coolie) to be given to local panchayat.
manishsharan 12y ago
There may be some confusion about jugaad. Some may think it is equivalent of "jerry rigged " or doo-hickey or a kludge. I would argue that jugaad is not a solution that is not driven by the problem at hand or the pressing need; rather it is driven by an attitude or a way of thinking, that is reinforced by the harsh reality of day-to-day living in India. I once worked for an electronic typewriter company In India which hacked and improved upon cannon's electronic typewriter s/w to support all of India's scripts (27 of them ). My team did not have capability to design stepper motor controls from bottom up like what canon had achieved. We never aspired to build a new electronic typewriter. We looked at the Cannon typewriter and asked why can't this support Telugu and Tamil etc. etc. Once we figured out the why , we worked to overcome it. Canon ended up licensing this hack to support other scripts worldwide. Please note that I am saying rocket design is same as hacking stepper motor control s/w . However the driving attitude is quite similar.
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suprgeek 12y ago
I detest the spin on "Jugaad" that this article provides. Having lived day-to-day in India I have seen way too many unsafe and potentially deadly "jugaads" every single day. From the CNG Car driver hacking up his Car to use a cheaper subsidized gas tank, to the hospital hacking up their BP monitors to run longer despite failed parts to continual flouting of Petrol storage rules keeping it in tin cans. This stupid mentality of taking dangerous short-cuts and flouting safety rules in the name of innovation just needs to die. You can escape disaster some of the time but finally you must pay the piper some time. So while ISRO is indeed a bright spot, the craft they designed in this case was un-manned, not designed to land, and carried on top of the older workhorse PSLV rocket and was more of a technology demonstrator.
- deleted 12y ago
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- kamaal 12y ago
  There is a big difference between 'Jugaad' and deliberate mistakes. 'Jugaad' can be best translated into English as 'making the best of what one has to deliver stuff'. And that's a very good thing. Heck we even had a subject in Primary school called SUPW(Socially useful productive work) which was basically a fancy name for Jugaad, where they covered every thing from building candles to making door mats with discarded cigarette packs, to building simple engine based toys with rubber band based springs.
chdir 12y ago
NASA Budget (2013-14) ~ 17.8 Billion USD ISRO Budget (2013-14) ~ 1.1 Billion USD
mcguire 12y ago
"Just days after the launch of India’s Mangalyaan satellite, NASA sent off its own Mars mission...named Maven. Its cost: $671 million. The budget of India’s Mars mission...was just three-quarters of [...] $100 million..." I would like to point out that Maven is 1.8 times the mass of Mangalyaan (in terms of "launch mass" according to Wikipedia; Maven's "payload mass" is 4.3 times that of Mangalyaan). Mass costs.
known 12y ago
At the expense of 50% malnourished children in India http://m.timesofindia.com/india/Every-second-Indian-child-is-malnourished-Report/articleshow/25724848.cms http://m.timesofindia.com/india/Every-second-Indian-child-is...

167 points by codelion 12y ago

What the NYT article didn't mention was the lack of sterilization of the ISRO spacecraft. A huge portion of the budget for a probe like MAVEN [1] or JUNO [2] is spent reducing the chance of Earth microbes colonizing Mars or a moon of Jupiter. It would be a huge shame for us to have doubt whether the first extra terrestial microbes we find in the solar system were really alien or simply Space Age Earth based life [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAVEN http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAVEN [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_(spacecraft) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juno_(spacecraft) EDIT: Why the downvotes? Is what I'm saying incorrect? EDIT2: Sources: NASA cleanroom assembling Curiosity - http://www.nasa.gov/centers/jpl/images/content/482654main_pia13388-640.jpg http://www.nasa.gov/centers/jpl/images/content/482654main_pi... (source: ISRO assembling the Mangalyaan Mars probe in question http://www.thehindu.com/multimedia/dynamic/01608/vbk-05-mars_1608506g.jpg http://www.thehindu.com/multimedia/dynamic/01608/vbk-05-mars... (source: http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/science/indias-october-28-mars-mission-on-schedule-isro/article5204371.ece http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/science/indias-october-28-m...) Engineers don't use gloves or facial masks for interplanetary missions. This jives with this video and the following anecdotes - http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/14/india-to-launch-its-first-mission-to-mars-video/ http://venturebeat.com/2013/10/14/india-to-launch-its-first-... via https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6551331 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6551331 >This comment has nothing to do with India, ISRO, politics or Mars, but I am curious if anyone with expertise can comment on the clean room practices seen applied in this video. Is it odd that the workers don't have on full 'bunny' suits and have (what seems to be) a relatively large amount of skin/hair unprotected? I don't know if it matters that much, it just seems a little lax given the cost of failure. > Firstly, I've visited ISRO Bangalore(A few years back). And I did see the exact things you mentioned. I did ask the guy(Not sure, if he was the PR guy) who took our class for the tour. His answer was, they were likely assembling some test equipment and not the real equipment that was going to space. (Which unlikely given parent's NYT article:) > The modest budget did not allow for multiple iterations. So, instead of building many models (a qualification model, a flight model and a flight spare), as is the norm for American and European agencies, scientists built the final flight model right from the start. It's unclear whether the room is a particulate controlled up to standard, but they may (hopefully) do sterilization through chemical and heat treatments, but that alone isn't enough for planetary protection.

programmer_dude 12y ago
Can you provide some sources which demonstrate the lack of sterilization of the ISRO spacecraft?
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- someperson 12y ago
  I can't provide evidence of lack of heat and chemical based sterilization treatment post assembly of spacecraft but see my updated post for sources on lack of clean room procedures DURING assembly - particularly the video at http://www.space.com/23199-indias-first-mars-mission-prepares-for-launch-video.html http://www.space.com/23199-indias-first-mars-mission-prepare... which shows assembly conditions very clearly
  - programmer_dude 12y ago
    Thanks, all good points. However we cannot yet rule out post assembly sterilization.
ganwar 12y ago
It is un-verifiable. Back your statements with facts or reports which mention as such. Dont go loose in the la la land.
- someperson 12y ago
  This video is a good source: http://www.space.com/23199-indias-first-mars-mission-prepares-for-launch-video.html http://www.space.com/23199-indias-first-mars-mission-prepare...
  - deleted 12y ago
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chdir 12y ago

albeva 12y ago

I think the real reason in difference in costs is that in India salaries are much lower and profits expected by 3rd party providers are much smaller. So building and engineering is way cheaper. How about quality?

DominikR 12y ago
Money alone wont get you far in this area. It's talented engineers and the right strategy that is important. Otherwise you couldn't explain why the Soviets/Russians had such a remarkably reliable space program, even though they always had less resources than the US. From what I understand, NASA tends to overload projects with thousands of requirements and features, which introduce additional points of failure, whereas the Russians focus more on the basics. It seems like the Indians will also use the same strategy, and focus on the basics and reuse what they already have, which makes sense, considering their limited resources.
- Shivetya 12y ago
  Actually NASA tends to build to 535 requirements, give or take a few. The is similar to the problem the military faces.
  - DominikR 12y ago
    The F-35 has the same problem. It is built to perform in so many roles, that it is bad in every single one of it. (price, weight, maneuverability, payload, range)
    - autokad 12y ago
      yeah the military seems to always be obsessed with 1 aircraft that can do everything. that just means you get something that can do everything poorly.
ganwar 12y ago
Indian space program is one of the most reliable (less number of accidents) space programs in the world. Just yesterday Indian successfully launched PSLV to put 5 foreign satellites in orbit. It's 26th consecutive successful flight. It is the most reliable and cost effective rocket in the world right now. Salaries do play a part in bringing the cost down but that is not the only reason. ISRO functions like a very agile organisation with small teams focusing on specific targets with autonomy. Also, a lot of cost is saved in the testing phase as well.

deleted 12y ago

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mellisarob 12y ago

seems quite ironic. India ? Mars?

xmonkee 12y ago

The article mentions "jugaad" as the Indian way of doing things inexpensively. It roughly means a "hack", and it really is very fundamental to the Indian engineering brain. I once read a list of interesting words in foreign languages and Portuguese had something similar. I think all engineering teams should have at least one jugaadu person on it.

icebraining 12y ago
I once read a list of interesting words in foreign languages and Portuguese had something similar. Yeap: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/desenrascanço http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/desenrascanço I'd say it's both a source of national pride and shame for us, in the sense that we can find ingenious solutions, but often those are only required because we didn't do it right in the first place.
- eklavya 12y ago
  More often than not it's "couldn't due to resource constraints".
  - Fuxy 12y ago
    That's mostly why I kind of feel like I want to wait and see if the spacecraft actually manages to do what it's designed to. If you have to send multiple 70+ million dollar missions because the hacks keep failing the cost benefit is not all that good compare to the more expensive 300 million dollar mission.
  - icebraining 12y ago
    I'm talking about the Portuguese term, not the Hindi.
- wreckimnaked 12y ago
  In Brazil it's called "gambiarra", and the same mixed pride/shame feelings also apply.
capex 12y ago

smoyer 12y ago

I'd like to know the hardware cost and number of man-hours put into each mission. Labor is a large part of a creating and operating a spacecraft, so comparing man-hours eliminates the differences you might find due to the expected rate of the engineers in each country. I should also note that when I say "hardware cost", I'm also including a break-down for each sub-contractor (and sub-sub, sub-sub-sub, etc) since you can't really say you bought a large component from one vendor so that's the hardware cost of that component. This criteria makes it pretty hard to every know the actual hardware cost versus engineering/manufacturing hours.

jerf 12y ago
If India can field rocket scientists greatly more cheaply than the US, I'd submit that still says something important about the two countries. "I should also note that when I say "hardware cost", I'm also including a break-down for each sub-contractor (and sub-sub, sub-sub-sub, etc)" One nice thing about money in a mostly free economy is that you can use it as a bound on such things. If you can buy a widget at $5, the company you are purchasing it from can not have put more than $5 of resources into it (barring some exceptions, probably none of which matter for this). It doesn't matter if they sub-sub-sub-sub-contract it out, it's still bounded by the final cost. Again, if India can source a component for much more cheaply than the US, it still says something important and real about their program. The differences are fully real, and I don't think trying to "undo" them and produce the artificial numbers you are proposing will produce any useful real information.
- smoyer 12y ago
  That's besides the point ... if India is doing something different (more entrepreneurial, less bureaucracy, etc), it would be worth understanding what it was. One clue in the article was that they had a limited time to reach their launch window ... Might that constraint be responsible for cutting back to just what was necessary? I never claimed what they accomplished wasn't impressive. I tend to think their entry level rocket scientists (at $1000) generated some of the savings but what was the "mindset" that allowed the rest of the savings?

quarterwave 12y ago

In his autobiography 'Wings of Fire', A.P.J.Abdul Kalam, himself an ISRO rocket scientist & program director who later became a highly popular President of India (he draws crowds to this day, several years after office), quotes Gen. Patton: "A good plan violently executed right now is far better than a perfect plan executed next week." That could well summarize the ISRO style. Kalam also highlights the leadership-by-open-discussion style of Vikram Sarabhai and Satish Dhawan who successively headed ISRO in its formative years. If that sounds commonplace, bear in mind this was in a civilian government organization of the 1960's. People like Sarabhai (a Cambridge Tripos and inheritor of a family business empire) and Dhawan (a double PhD in math and aerospace from Caltech) could have played the part and been overbearing - but they deliberately chose to build a "startup culture" where people were encouraged to speak up.

swatkat 12y ago
Yes. "Wings of Fire" is an excellent book; a must read. Also, if anyone's interested in knowing about ISRO's origins, their "hacker culture" etc. then I recommend these two excellent books: "A Brief History of Rocketry in ISRO" by PV Manoranjan Rao, P Radhakrishnan; and "India's Rise as a Space Power" by Prof UR Rao. These two books give an excellent overview on how ISRO was started (starting from INCOSPAR, TERLS, Sounding rockets, Rohini, Aryabhata, SLV, ASLV, PSLV, INSAT, to GSLV Mk3).

wil421 12y ago

Lets still hold our breath, the Mangalyaan hasnt made it to Mars. NASA and a contractor made some fatal conversion mistakes and overshot Mars. I doubt they will have the same problems but it still needs to reach orbit. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter

nova22033 12y ago

They're comparing apples and iPhones.

return0 12y ago

It was only a matter of time when space travel would be outsourced as well.

spain 12y ago
I don't get the downvotes, I thought this was pretty witty.

hellbreakslose 12y ago

Yes? And may we know how many underaged kids died out of slavery work for that to succeed?

sampk 12y ago

Protip: Disable JavaScript to see the article if it gives you a paywall.

autokad 12y ago

i see little overlap with sending humans to mars. i dont think its a great way to send people such a distance (and expect to get them back) by cutting corners in planning, redundancy, etc. And its my understanding that the bulk of the costs of going there is getting all the fuel and supplies from earth to there, which is not solved by paying rocket scientists 1000$ a month. NASA already operates on a shoestring budget. the article makes it sound like NASA has lavish funds. And they do so with a really good track record.

crassus 12y ago
Every US Government department operates on a shoestring budget, if you listen to them. It's amazing that they can keep the lights on.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
seanflyon 12y ago
It is so expensive to get all the fuel and supplies from earth to mars precisely because you have to pay a rocket scientist to make a very large rocket

IanDrake 12y ago

Seems like a pretty ill conceived article. Might as well have written about how American car companies like GM are able to produce much less expensive cars than the Italians like Ferrari. Both cars have engines, tires, etc... but WOW, can the Americans do it for so much less...

mikeash 12y ago
If there was nothing on the roads but fancy Ferraris, and then somebody came along and made a cheap GM that got the job done for much less, that would be newsworthy.
- IanDrake 12y ago
  To me it's not that it's newsworthy or not, but how it's presented. It's not that Americans/Europeans can't do what the Indians did, but that we're not interested in doing what they did. The article seems to confuse the two.
  - mikeash 12y ago
    How do you know they can do it, if they never have? "I could do that, I just don't want to" is the lamest excuse in the book.
    - IanDrake 12y ago
      That is a lame excuse in some contexts. However, if Superman leaps over an entire building, then is asked to jump off a curb and declines, I think you can safely assume he could do it, but doesn't feel like it. If I jump off a curb and say I could jump over that yonder building (if I felt like it, but I don't). Then, yes, that would be lame.
      - mikeash 12y ago
        When have any of these agencies ever done the cheap space mission equivalent of leaping over a building?

jsudhams 12y ago

I am all for the mutually exclusive programs of poverty and technological advancement (in this case sending vehicle to Mars orbit) but the other part getting rid of the poverty and other things (corruption, bad governance,Individual's discipline, and safety, are pretty much going down the drain). I don't why these scientist can't find solution Bangalore's garbage drop issue, traffic issue and real estate woes and so on. I think India is driving on wrong direction with not governance on education system which i feel is the singe source of all the issues.

whacker 12y ago
I think we are very good as individuals, but we fail collectively. That is why even the poorest Indian home will be clean, but the wealthiest public street could be dirty.
- jsudhams 12y ago
  Never thought about it and you are right on "That is why even the poorest Indian home will be clean, but the wealthiest public street could be dirty". I think the root cause is the discipline in public, i am trying to assert when we (Indians) became so selfish or given up about public issues. One reason i could think is that urbanisaztion is still settling in and we do not know how to behave and live in cities yet because i remember that in our village we use undertake common interest and maintain those like ensuring that the pond are cleaned in time and volunteer one day man hour or equivalent money (coolie) to be given to local panchayat.

manishsharan 12y ago

There may be some confusion about jugaad. Some may think it is equivalent of "jerry rigged " or doo-hickey or a kludge. I would argue that jugaad is not a solution that is not driven by the problem at hand or the pressing need; rather it is driven by an attitude or a way of thinking, that is reinforced by the harsh reality of day-to-day living in India. I once worked for an electronic typewriter company In India which hacked and improved upon cannon's electronic typewriter s/w to support all of India's scripts (27 of them ). My team did not have capability to design stepper motor controls from bottom up like what canon had achieved. We never aspired to build a new electronic typewriter. We looked at the Cannon typewriter and asked why can't this support Telugu and Tamil etc. etc. Once we figured out the why , we worked to overcome it. Canon ended up licensing this hack to support other scripts worldwide. Please note that I am saying rocket design is same as hacking stepper motor control s/w . However the driving attitude is quite similar.

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suprgeek 12y ago

I detest the spin on "Jugaad" that this article provides. Having lived day-to-day in India I have seen way too many unsafe and potentially deadly "jugaads" every single day. From the CNG Car driver hacking up his Car to use a cheaper subsidized gas tank, to the hospital hacking up their BP monitors to run longer despite failed parts to continual flouting of Petrol storage rules keeping it in tin cans. This stupid mentality of taking dangerous short-cuts and flouting safety rules in the name of innovation just needs to die. You can escape disaster some of the time but finally you must pay the piper some time. So while ISRO is indeed a bright spot, the craft they designed in this case was un-manned, not designed to land, and carried on top of the older workhorse PSLV rocket and was more of a technology demonstrator.

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kamaal 12y ago
There is a big difference between 'Jugaad' and deliberate mistakes. 'Jugaad' can be best translated into English as 'making the best of what one has to deliver stuff'. And that's a very good thing. Heck we even had a subject in Primary school called SUPW(Socially useful productive work) which was basically a fancy name for Jugaad, where they covered every thing from building candles to making door mats with discarded cigarette packs, to building simple engine based toys with rubber band based springs.

chdir 12y ago

NASA Budget (2013-14) ~ 17.8 Billion USD ISRO Budget (2013-14) ~ 1.1 Billion USD

mcguire 12y ago

"Just days after the launch of India’s Mangalyaan satellite, NASA sent off its own Mars mission...named Maven. Its cost: $671 million. The budget of India’s Mars mission...was just three-quarters of [...] $100 million..." I would like to point out that Maven is 1.8 times the mass of Mangalyaan (in terms of "launch mass" according to Wikipedia; Maven's "payload mass" is 4.3 times that of Mangalyaan). Mass costs.

known 12y ago

At the expense of 50% malnourished children in India http://m.timesofindia.com/india/Every-second-Indian-child-is-malnourished-Report/articleshow/25724848.cms http://m.timesofindia.com/india/Every-second-Indian-child-is...