Failed rocket launch may set back India space business

CHENNAI, Apr 15 (bdnews24.com/Reuters) - A rocket powered by a domestically built engine failed on Thursday, officials said, in a potential setback to the country's quest for a bigger share in the multi-billion dollar global satellite launch market.

The Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) lifted off from a base in southern India, but eight minutes into the flight the mission failed as the rocket veered off its designated path behind a trail of smoke and fire.

G. Radhakrishnan, head of Indian Space Research Organisation, told reporters that the rocket went out of control after one of its engines failed.

India is aiming to expand its satellite launch business to about $120 million a year, which is estimated to be only a fourth of China's present launch business.

But its dependence on Russian-built cryogenic engines, needed for lifting heavy payloads, has hampered growth plans, forcing ISRO to look for home-built engines.

Had Thursday's mission succeeded, using an Indian-made cryogenic engine for the first time, India would have joined a very small group of countries.

In April 2008, India sent 10 satellites into orbit from a single rocket. The same year it also dispatched its first unmanned mission to the moon.

That mission was abandoned 10 months later but not before it had sent back data with evidence of ice on the moon.