FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Tech

India's Mars Mission Costs Less Than Movies About Mars Missions

Mars Needs Moms cost twice as much as the real MOM orbiting Mars.
Image: Nesnad/Wikimedia Commons

Last night, India became the first Asian geopolitical power to successfully reach Mars, and the only nation to ever nail its Martian mission on its very first attempt.

But what's even more impressive is that India's Mission Orbiter Mars (MOM)—aka the Mangalyaan—only cost 72 million dollars. To put that into perspective, the mega-flop movie Mission to Mars cost 100 million dollars. Yes, that's right: India is actually exploring Mars with a fraction of the budget invested in a crappy movie about exploring Mars.

Advertisement

And it's not just that one cinematic turd that Brian De Palma squeezed out in 2000 either. Mars Attacks!, Red Planet, John Carter, and the Total Recall reboot were all way more expensive than the Indian orbiter. Even Mars Needs Moms cost twice as much as the actual MOM India just sent to Mars.

It goes without saying that among the many titles the Mangalyaan has just cinched includes that of the cheapest interplanetary mission ever. For comparison, NASA's MAVEN orbiter, which arrived in Mars orbit only a few days ago, cost 671 million dollars, the equivalent of about nine MOM orbiters.

India joins the United States, the Soviet Union, and the European Space Agency as the only entities to have successful missions go to Mars. As we noted earlier this year, missions to Mars (including movies with that title) have a really, really poor success rate.

MOM2.jpg

So how did India manage to be so economical about its interplanetary mission? Basically, they stripped the mission down to its the bare necessities.

"We kept it low cost, high technology. That is the Indian way of working," said Sandip Bhattacharya, assistant director of B.M. Birla Planetarium, in an interview with The Washington Post.

"Our goal was to reach Mars and send few pictures and scientific data," he added. "Now in the coming years, this will give us leverage to plan for newer Mars missions in a more aggressive manner with heavier payload with larger exploration goals."

Advertisement

One of the main cost-cutting sacrifices the Indian Space Research Organization made was the orbiter's overall fuel capacity. Blasting loads of propellant off the Earth is very expensive, so the ISRO included only what was necessary to get the probe into any orbit around Mars, no matter how unusual.

As a result, MOM doesn't have enough fuel to nudge itself into a tight, circular orbit around the red planet like its other Martian orbiter friends. It follows a looping, elliptical path that isn't as ideal for observation, but presented a far more frugal option.

That's not to say that MOM will not be doing quality science work over the coming months. The orbiter will be sending back Martian weather reports, taking color snapshots of the planet, and hunting for signs of atmospheric methane, which may contain clues about the potential biological history of the planet.

No doubt MOM's engineers are celebrating their success this morning, and their jubilation is shared by space enthusiasts around the world.

"We congratulate the Indian Space Research Organization for its successful arrival at Mars," said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden.

"It was an impressive engineering feat, and we welcome India to the family of nations studying another facet of the Red Planet," he continued. We look forward to MOM adding to the knowledge the international community is gathering with the other spacecraft at Mars."

As a final added bonus, it seems the people behind MOM's newly minted Twitter page have a good sense of humor. When the Curiosity rover tweeted "Namaste" to the orbiter, MOM responded with "Howdy @MarsCuriosity? Keep in touch. I'll be around."

Turns out the newest member of the Mars exploration party isn't just frugal, it's pretty smooth too.