GSLV-D5

• Takes off from Satish Dawan Space centre at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh

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In a new year gift to the nation, ISRO on Sunday successfully launched a Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV-D5) with an indigenous cryogenic engine from the spaceport of Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, entering a select club of nations.
With this launch, ISRO became the sixth space agency in the world after U.S., Russia, Japan, China and France to have tasted success with an indigenous cryogenic engine.

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“I am extremely happy and proud to say team ISRO has done it. The Indian cryogenic engine and stage performed as predicted, as expected for this mission and injected precisely the GSAT-14 communication satellite into intended orbit,” a jubilant K. Radhakrishnan, ISRO chairman said from the Mission Control Room soon after the launch vehicle placed the 1,982 kg GSAT-14 satellite into the intended orbit.

Launching a GSLV with an indigenous cryogenic engine has been a major challenge for ISRO since 2001 after multiple unsuccessful attempts. Only four of earlier seven attempts have succeeded.
GSLV-D5’s scheduled launch on August 19 last year was called off in the eleventh hour after a fuel leak, following which ISRO moved the vehicle back to the Vehicle Assembly Building and rectified the defect.

This launch is India’s eighth flight of GSLV and also the fourth developmental flight of GSLV. During this flight, the indigenously developed Cryogenic Upper Stage (CUS) was flight tested for the second time.

GSAT-14 is India’s 23rd geostationary communication satellite, as four of GSAT-14’s predecessors were launched by GSLV during 2001, 2003, 2004 and 2007, respectively.

GSAT-14 would join the group of India’s nine operational geostationary satellites. The primary objective of this mission is to augment the in-orbit capacity of extended C and Ku-band transponders and provide a platform for new experiments.
The GSAT-14 will be positioned at 74 degree East longitude and co-located with INSAT-3C, INSAT-4CR and KALPANA-1 satellites.
The 12 communication transponders onboard GSAT-14 will further augment the capacity in the INSAT/GSAT system.

ISRO’s Cryogenic Upper Stage Project envisaged the design and development of the indigenous Cryogenic Upper Stage to replace the stage procured from Russia and used in GSLV flights, according to ISRO.

ISRO officials had been extremely vigilant in tightening loose ends this time around to avoid an unsuccessful attempt.
Design modifications were implemented wherever required in the launch vehicle along with thorough ground testing and improvements.

The modifications included redesigning of Lower Shroud, which protects the cryogenic engine during atmospheric flight of GSLV-D5 and redesigning of the wire tunnel of the cryo stage to withstand larger forces in flight.

The national space agency also performed two ‘Acceptance Tests for flight unit of Fuel Booster Turbo Pump (FBTP), High altitude tests to confirm the ignition sequence in flight under vacuum, to validate design improvements and Cryogenic Main Engine (200 sec) and Steering Engine (100 sec) acceptance tests at Main Engine Test and High Altitude Test.

Battle of Khanwa (1527)

BATTLE OF KHANWA 

 On March 16, 1527 the two armies met. Attack was launched by Rana Sanga. A combined Rajput confederacy fought the Mughal in the Battle of Khanwa, but the Mughal artillery wreaked havoc in the Rajputs closed ranks.

The Canons did the fearful execution. The cannon fire was new to the Rajputs and this caused the elephants in the Rajput army to stampede. Rajputs went ahead stuffed themselves in the mouth of the cannons to silence them. The maximum loss was caused by Mughal Cavalry and later Rajputs started perishing, fled in every direction.

The great Rajput army soon disintegrated into the disordered crowd and their gallantry was turned into massacre.
The Rajput chiefs fell and the fallen Rajput chiefs were beheaded and their heads were rose in ghastly tower erected by the victor. Babur had a passion of making towers out of the heads of infidels.

End of Hindu Rulers
Rana Sanga fled from the battle, wounded, assisted by Rao Maldev. He vowed that unless he defeats Babur, he will not return to Chittor. In a fear that Rana was pushing the Rajputs to another battle, his own Knights poisoned him, and this was the end of "Hindupat" who was once thought to establish the Hindu rule in India. The battle was so awful for the Rajputs that all the remaining kingdoms fell one by one without much resistance.

 Rana Sanga was the last Hindu king, who tried to establish Hindu Rule in India and all castes of Rajputs made a Rajput confederacy under him.

The battle of Khanwa was a decisive battle which established Mughal rule in India.

In Baburnama, Babur writes that Rana Sanga was treacherous.
Rana Sanga was having 80 wounds on his body.
Babur assumed the title "Ghazi" after this battle.
Babur was now almost undisputed emperor of Delhi. The Rajputs were now not a problem.

 In 1529, Muhammad Lodi, brother of Ibrahim, who was the last Lodi claimant of the Delhi Throne, was defeated at the Battle of Ghaghra.

CATASTROPHIC EARTHQUAKES

The 10 most powerful recorded Earthquakes

An Indonesian man in Banda Aceh surveys the damage after the deadliest tsunami in history in 2004. Photograph: Steve Crisp/Reuters

22 May 1960 – Chile

Magnitude 9.5

The world's most powerful earthquake left 4,485 people dead and injured and 2 million homeless after it struck southern Chile in 1960. The port of Puerto Saavedra was destroyed in the ensuing tsunami, which caused $550m worth of damage in Chile and killed a further 170 people as five-metre waves hit the coasts of Japan and the Philippines. A day later Volcán Puyehue in Chile's lake district spewed ash 6,000m into the air in an eruption that lasted for several weeks.

28 March 1964 – Prince William Sound, Alaska

Magnitude 9.2

The Gulf of Alaska was devastated by the Prince William Sound earthquake that caused landslides in Anchorage and raised parts of outlying islands by as much as 11 metres. The resulting tsunami reached heights of 67 metres as it swept into the shallow Valdez inlet and was responsible for most of the 128 deaths and $311m worth of damage. The massive water displacement was felt as far away as the Louisiana Gulf coast and registered on tidal gauges in Puerto Rico.

26 December 2004 – Off the west coast of northern Sumatra

Magnitude 9.1

The deadliest tsunami in history was felt in 14 countries across Asia and east Africa, triggered by a "megathrust" as the Indian tectonic plate was forced beneath the Burmese plate. Indonesia was the worst affected with an estimated 170,000 of the nearly 230,000 dead. With many of the victims' bodies missing, the eventual death toll took a month to establish. Some the world's poorest communities lost more than 60% of their fishing and industrial infrastructure.

4 November 1952 – Kamchatka

Magnitude 9

The volcanic Russian peninsula was near the epicentre of the quake, but it was the Hawaiian islands that took the brunt of the tsunami that caused a million dollars' worth of damage as waves scoured the coasts, ripping boats from their moorings and, in Honolulu harbour, lifting a cement barge before throwing it down on to a freighter. No deaths were recorded, unless you count the six cows lost by one unfortunate Oahu farmer, who was left cursing an event that had occurred more than 3,000 miles away.

13 August 1868 – Arica, Peru (now part of Chile)

Magnitude 9

Hawaii also felt the force of the tsunami created by this pacific basin earthquake, but here the destruction was just as heavy in South America with the city of Arequipa destroyed and 25,000 killed. The quake was felt as far away as La Paz in Bolivia. Four hours after the first shocks, waves as high as 16 metres inundated the coast and carried one US gunboat two miles inland to rest precariously on the edge of a 60m cliff.

26 January 1700 – North Pacific coast of America

Magnitude 9 (estimated)

The only North American account of one of the continent's largest earthquakes comes from the oral history of native Americans near Vancouver island which describes how the large community of Pachena bay was wiped out by a huge wave. Across the pacific, the quake was accurately recorded by Japanese observers of the large tsunami that struck Japan on 27 January 1700. The power of that inundation has been used by historians and seismologists to pinpoint the magnitude of the Vancouver quake.

27 February 2010 – off Bio-Bio, Chile

Magnitude 8.8

The region around Concepción has been recorded as a centre for seismic shocks since the 16th century, but few have been as devastating as the early morning quake that generated a Pacific-wide tsunami and cost the lives of 521 people. With a further 12,000 injured and more than 800,000 left homeless, Chile was left reeling at the scale of a disaster that would cost the nation $30bn by the end of 2010.

13 January 1906 – coast of Ecuador

Magnitude 8.8

Emanating from the ocean off Ecuador and Colombia, the quake generated a tsunami that killed between 500 and 1,500 people along a coastline from Central America to San Francisco. To the west in Hawaii, rivers suddenly drained about 12 hours after the first shocks, then were submerged as a series of successively larger waves flooded the coast.

1 November 1755 – Lisbon

Magnitude 8.7

The near-total destruction of Lisbon and the deaths of a quarter of the city's population were caused by an earthquake, followed by a tsunami and fire, that was felt in north Africa, France and northern Italy. In the age of enlightenment, the cultural impact of the quake spread even further afield as the horrors of Lisbon provided inspiration for sensationalist artworks and philosophical tracts. Voltaire penned a poem on the catastrophe and scientists found a wealth of written first-hand accounts to advance their understanding of the physical world.

15 August 1950 – Assam-Tibet

Magnitude 8.6

Seventy villages simply disappeared in the string of disasters generated by an earthquake with an epicentre in Tibetan Rima but which wrought most destruction in India's Assam state. Across the region, landslides claimed the lives of 1,526 people and rendered parts of the landscape unrecognisable from the air. The quake was followed by severe flooding, and eight days after the first tremors a natural dam on the Subansiri river burst, releasing a seven-metre wall of water against nearby villages. Near the epicentre of the quake, witnesses mentioned "explosive sounds" that seemed to come from high in the air, while seismologists as far away as England and Norway noted "oscillations" in lakes.