ISRO successfully brings satellites to 3-meter range under SpaDex

The Indian Space Research Organisation has made significant progress in stabilising its two satellites under the SpaDex programme before docking. It succeeded in bringing Chaser and Target satellites at 3 3-meter distances before moving them back to a safer distance. ISRO has shared photographs taken by onboard cameras in the satellites. The Indian Space Agency has tweeted that the docking process will be done only after analysing the data. All the sensors developed by ISRO for this mission have to be fully calibrated and tested before docking experiments. The satellites are moved back and forth before the handshake happens after a complex manoeuvre. After docking, both the satellites will be controlled as a single spacecraft. Electrical power will be transferred from one satellite to another to check if the docking is successful. Thereafter both the satellites will be undocked to function independently. India will be the fourth country to achieve this feat after the USA, Russia and China. If the indigenous Bharatiya Docking system developed by ISRO is successful, it will propel ISRO to work on its proposed Bhartiya Antriksh station and accomplish the Chandrayaan 4 mission when the Indian spacecraft lands on the Moon and comes back carrying lunar particles.