Ax-4 mission with leakage would have been 'catastrophic',' our scientists detected issue: ISRO chief

Hyderabad, Aug 19 (PTI) ISRO scientists identified a crack in the main feed line of the rocket that carried India's Subhanshu Shukla and three other astronauts to the ISS, prompting a rescheduled launch, and had the mission continued with the issue it would have been a "catastrophic failure," the agency chief V Narayanan said here on Tuesday.

The crack forced the Axiom-4 mission (Ax-4) to be postponed from June 11 to 25 of the same month, he recalled.

Delivering the Convocation Address of Osmania University here, Narayanan, narrating the sequence of events prior to Shukla's space voyage, said the ISRO team, camping at Kennedy Space Centre in the US, came to know about the flaw detected in the rocket on June 10, forcing the Indian scientists to demand a thorough probe into the issue.

"There were 14 questions asked and none of the questions were answered satisfactorily, including where the leak was. It was not identified. We demanded the entire correction, because we were very clear. Because I have been working in that area for 40 years, I know what is the difficulty if a rocket takes off with a leak," Narayanan, also the Secretary, Department of Space, added.

Afterwards, based on the Indian Government's demand, the Indian team had put up a note and the entire leakage was corrected.

Later, the first launch (on June 11) was called off after the Indian scientists inspected and found a crack in the main feed line, he further said.

"If the rocket would have taken off (with the leak), it would have been a catastrophic failure. Based on the insistence of Indians, the Indian education system, the training of ISRO, the rocket was corrected. Today we have accomplished a safe mission, not only Subhanshu Sjukla, along with him three more international astronauts," he said.

Shukla returned to India early Sunday after his historic visit to the International Space Station (ISS). He was part of the Axiom-4 private space mission that lifted off from Florida on June 25 and docked at the ISS on June 26.

He returned to Earth on July 15, along with three other astronauts- Peggy Whitson (US), Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski (Poland), and Tibor Kapu (Hungary).

Shukla conducted over 60 experiments and 20 outreach sessions during the 18-day mission. PTI GDK SA