Travel from Earth to Mars orbit

India’s Mars Orbiter Mission, also known as Mangalyaan or MOM, launched on PSLV-C25 on November 5, 2013. It was primarily a technology demonstration: build and operate an interplanetary spacecraft, navigate the journey, enter Mars orbit and keep working there. Its five science instruments added investigations of the surface and atmosphere.

A successful rocket launch did not by itself complete those objectives. PSLV placed the spacecraft into an Earth parking orbit. The spacecraft then had to perform its own propulsion and operational tasks. The integration photograph shows the physical Mars Orbiter Mission spacecraft above the rocket’s fourth stage before the protective fairing closed.

The route used Earth-orbit-raising maneuvers before departure onto an interplanetary path. During the cruise, the spacecraft and Mars both moved around the Sun. The destination was therefore where Mars would be at arrival, not simply where it appeared on launch day.

An original analogy is meeting a moving train at a station farther down the line. Reaching the track is insufficient if the train passes before or after you arrive. In a space mission, departure time, trajectory and later corrections must produce the intended encounter. A diagram of crossing paths alone does not establish that the two objects meet at the same time.

MOM entered orbit around Mars on September 24, 2014. A spacecraft arriving on a flyby trajectory does not automatically become a satellite just because it passes close to a planet. The insertion maneuver changed the spacecraft’s Mars-relative motion to produce a bound orbit.

The mission’s elongated orbit supported both relatively close views and broader views from farther away. Near and far parts of an ellipse serve different observing geometries. An orbiter’s successful capture also differs from a landing: MOM remained above the surface and carried no rover onto the ground.