India achieves ‘historic’ space docking mission

India docked two satellites in space yesterday, a key milestone for the country’s dreams of a space station and manned Moon mission, the space agency said.

The satellites, weighing 220 kilograms each, blasted off in December on a single rocket from India’s Sriharikota launch site. Later they separated.

The two satellites were manoeuvred back together yesterday in a “precision” process resulting in a “successful spacecraft capture”, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said, calling it a “historic moment”.

India became the fourth country to achieve the feat — dubbed as SpaDeX, or Space Docking Experiment — after Russia, the United States and China.

The aim of the mission was to “develop and demonstrate the technology needed for rendezvous, docking, and undocking of two small spacecraft”, ISRO said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated Indian scientists for the successful docking.

Two earlier docking attempts by ISRO were postponed due to technical issues.

ISRO said the technology is “essential” for India’s Moon mission, and comes after Modi announced plans last year to send a manned mission to the Moon by 2040.