Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla and three others are expected to travel to the International Space Station on June 19, after SpaceX successfully resolved the liquid oxygen leak in its Falcon-9 rocket, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced on Saturday.
INOX Air Products has commissioned a new ultra-high purity liquid oxygen facility in Hosur, Tamil Nadu, to support India's growing semiconductor and solar manufacturing sectors, reducing reliance on imports.
'If you're so sick, so ill, how will you show that power?'
The rocket flight was aborted in order to plug the liquid oxygen leak identified during post-static fire Falcon 9 rocket inspections.
'ISRO recommended to carry out in-situ repairs or replacement and conduct a low-temperature leak test to validate system performance and integrity, before proceeding with launch.'
'The solution is to replace, clean up, retest and proceed.' 'There is nothing to worry about if corrected.'
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has put off Sunday's launch of the Axiom-4 mission carrying Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla and three others to the International Space Station and a new date will be announced in the coming days.
The mission was originally scheduled for lift-off on May 29 but was put off multiple times when engineers detected a liquid oxygen leak in the boosters of the Falcon-9 rocket and NASA also detected leaks in the ageing Russian module of the ISS.
Over the weekend, many companies stepped in to ease the bottleneck in supply and transportation of oxygen, as demand ran high with the surge in cases.
Intensifying its efforts, the Indian Navy has deployed nine warships to bring liquid oxygen and other medical supplies from several countries in Persian Gulf and south-east Asia as hospitals across India continued to reel under acute shortage of the life-saving gas following a massive surge in COVID-19 cases.
Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla's Axiom-4 mission to the International Space Station has been postponed to June 22, to allow National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to evaluate the operations on the orbital lab after the recent repairs in the Russian section, Axiom Space announced on Wednesday.
The elite healthcare facility in central Delhi had sent multiple SOS messages last week amid a severe shortage of oxygen as the lives of hundreds of patients at the facility hung by a thread.
Karnataka Medical Education Minister K Sudhakar tweeted that as soon as he came to know about the shortage of oxygen at the KIMS, a private hospital, directions were issued to shift patients by ambulance to Victoria, Bowring and Rajiv Gandhi hospitals in the city.
Terming the situation as scary, Nath also said there was a shortage of Remdesivir injections used in the treatment of coronavirus, and alleged that the key anti-viral drug and oxygen were available only on paper and not in reality.
The supply shipment is being undertaken in cooperation with the Adani group and Linde company.
'The launch of Axiom 04 slated for 11th June 2025 for sending first Indian Gaganyatri to ISS is postponed.'
Meanwhile, Musk said some parts of the ISS were "simply getting too old and obviously that risk grows over time."
On Thursday, NASA announced that it was working with Roscosmos to understand a new pressure signature, after the recent post-repair effort in the aft-most segment of the International Space Station's Zvezda service module.
Following the postponement of the Axiom 4 mission, Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla's father, Shambhu Dayal Shukla, said that his family is 'mentally' prepared for the mission.
Glimpses of SpaceX's next-generation Starship spacecraft atop its powerful super heavy rocket is prepared for launch at the company's Boca Chica launchpad in Brownsville, Texas.
Battling an acute shortage of oxygen, some hospitals in Delhi on Sunday sent out desperate SOS calls to authorities to replenish their dwindling stocks, with one healthcare facility even requesting the government to shift out its patients.
A government doctor said hospitals in Delhi are wary of admitting more patients amid a serious shortage of oxygen in the city.
However, a prolonged and intense second wave that curtails oxygen supply to industries for a longer-than-expected period will exacerbate downside risk in affected sectors
The incident occurred on Wednesday afternoon when the patients, who were either on ventilator or oxygen support, suffocated to death after their oxygen supply stopped suddenly because of a malfunction in the main storage at Dr Zakir Hussain Hospital in Maharashtra's Nashik city.
However, chief medical officer Dr Ravindra Kumar, part of the panel, said that the deaths were not due to lack of oxygen.
NISAR will not be used for surveillance and will be used to observe the earth.
The Government of India has supported the states and undertook a series of actions including provisioning medical oxygen, and other consumables to ensure clinical care of COVID-19 patients in view of the steep rise of COVID-19 trajectory in the country during April- May 2021.
The official said that the Centre needs to intervene as a large number of hospitals are affected due to the "stoppage of oxygen supply from Haryana".
According to industry figures, the pre-Covid demand for liquid medical oxygen (LMO) before the pandemic was 700 tonnes per day across the country. Now, with the second wave, the demand has gone up more than seven times, reports Jyoti Mukul.
In a letter to all states and UTs, Health Ministry Additional Secretary Manohar Agnani said the operationalisation and maintenance of these medical infrastructure is of utmost importance to meet any eventuality even though the number of cases in the country is low now.
The $1.2 billion in-space manufacturing market is expected to grow and be worth more than $20 billion by 2033.
The country's top carmaker Maruti Suzuki India (MSI) on Wednesday said it has decided to advance maintenance shutdown at its two Haryana-based manufacturing plants by a month amid a surge in the COVID-19 cases across the country. The auto major was supposed to take the shutdown at its two plants in Gurugram and Manesar in June, but due to the tsunami of COVID-19 cases, it decided to take it one month earlier to save oxygen for medical needs. MSI noted that as part of the car manufacturing process, it uses a small amount of oxygen in its factories, while relatively much larger quantities are used by the manufacturers of components.
Hospitals in the national capital continued to grapple with a shortage of oxygen, saying they are still operating on the "beg and borrow" mode, while three of them also raised the issue before the Delhi high court on Monday, stating they were not receiving enough supplies.
The Tatas, L&T and Bharat Forge expressed interest in building pressure swing adsorption oxygen plants at hospital sites, while IOC and RIL are pitching in with both oxygen and cryogenic tankers needed for its transportation.
In view of the high demand for oxygen in the country following a record spike in coronavirus cases, the Railways has decided to run Oxygen Express trains to transport liquid medical oxygen and oxygen cylinders across the country.
The second wave of the pandemic has not only crippled medical infrastructure in terms of hospital beds, but has also led to bottlenecks in invasive ventilators and medical oxygen capacities and supplies.
PM also said that states must act against any hoarding of oxygen and directed officials to ensure that the oxygen supply to various states happens in a smooth, unhindered manner and called for fixing responsibility with the local administration in cases of obstruction.
The Delhi high court said on Saturday that if any official at the central, state or local administration was obstructing in the picking up or supply of oxygen, then it would 'hang' that person.
The second wave of the coronavirus has put huge pressure on the country's health system, with hospitals facing shortage of oxygen, medicines and equipment to treat COVID-19 patients, besides beds.
The query was put to the Centre by a bench of Justices Vipin Sanghi and Rekha Palli which during the hearing said the central government has to either show some justification for this or "make amends" now that the situation has been brought to its attention.
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