NEW DELHI/BENGALURU: ISRO has said that it has accomplished de-docking of the SpaDeX satellites, clearing the way for future missions, such as exploring the moon, human spaceflight and building its own space station.
India is the fourth country in the world to achieve successful space docking after the United States, Russia, and China.
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ISRO sucessfully docks satellites as part of SpaDeX Mission
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“On January 16, 2025, we had a major achievement; we successfully docked both the satellites together, and it was rotating as a single body. Then, we wanted to separate it out, the undocking process, for that we carried out a lot of studies and analysis and we made a simulator and carried out 120 simulations, as there should not be any mistakes. On 13th March, 2025, at 9:20 am, in the first attempt itself, we succeeded in the undocking process,” the ISRO chairman said.
The undocking process involved a precise sequence of events, culminating in the separation of the SDX-01 (Chaser) and SDX-02 (Target) satellites, which were launched on December 30, 2024, using Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV)-C60 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.
Union Minister of State for Earth Sciences, and Science and Technology Jitendra Singh announced the successful de-docking of satellites in a post on ‘X’ on Thursday.
“SpaDeX satellites accomplished the unbelievable de-docking. This paves the way for smooth conduct of ambitious future missions including the Bharatiya Antriksha Station, Chandrayaan 4 & Gaganyaan,” he said.