Friday, Jan 17, 2003
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Columbia was launched the from Kennedy Space Center (KSC) at 10.39 a.m. (2119 IST) amid a tight security cover in near perfect weather conditions. India-born space engineer, Ms. Chawla is in the mission led by Commander Rick Husband, a colonel in the U.S. Air Force. Earlier, she was one of the six-astronaut crew that flew the Columbia Flight STS-87 on November 19, 1997. Ms. Chawla, who undertakes her second mission, and the other crew members will carry out several experiments that would analyse changes which take place in human beings and proteins under zero gravity conditions. The results of these experiments would go a long way in developing medicines to treat several diseases, including cancer. In a pre-flight talk with reporters at the KSC, Ms. Chawla said J.R.D Tata, who flew the first mail flights in India prompted her to take up aeronautics as a career. ``What J.R.D. Tata had done during those years was very intriguing and definitely captivated my imagination,'' she said. Incidentally, Sunita Lyn Williams (nee Pandya) is also in the elite list of short-listed astronauts and may become the second American Indian to go into space after Ms. Chawla. The latest Columbia flight will be the first dedicated research mission to be flown by the shuttle in almost three years. The mission would also give 70 international scientists access to micro-gravity environment of space, and a set of seven human researchers, for 16 uninterrupted days. The presence of Israel's Ilan Ramon, a 48-year-old Air Force colonel who, as a fighter pilot, took part in several missions against Arab targets in 1973 and 1982, has overshadowed the more than 80 experiments to be carried out during the two-week mission. Security around the shuttle launches had been significantly stepped up since the September 11 attacks in the United States in 2001, with fighter jets patrolling the skies and ground-to-air missile batteries deployed around the launch sites. Columbia will carry in its payload bay the first SPACE-HAB Research Double Module, which will hold most of the mission's more than 80 experiments involving more than 70 scientists worldwide that will investigate space, life and physical sciences. PTI
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