Zephyr 07, the annual aerospace exhibition hosted by the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Powai's aerospace engineering department got off to a start at IIT Powai on the evening of October 5th, 2007 with an inaugural address by Dr B Suresh, director of the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre.

Dr Suresh's address was preceeded by the screening of the film '16 days: Columbia's final mission' on the disastrous space shuttle flight that resulted in the death of Kalpana Chawla and six other astronauts.

Dr Suresh, in his address, spoke of the failures experienced by ISRO and VSSC in the Indian space initiatives. He pointed out that ISRO's failure rates were more or less comparable with those of space programmes the world over, which is in itself remarkable because ISRO's learning experience had to be based on its own experiences, as space programmes all over the world are notoriously secretive, and do not easily part with data.

Starting from the failure of its first ever rocket, the SLV3, on 18 august 1979, he said that failure and success are separated by a very thin, but extremely critical line. Failure is expensive, as each PSLV and GSLV mission that fails costs the public exchequer between Rs300-350 crore.

Among India's four major launch vehicles - SLV, ASLV, PSLV, and GSLV - the PSLV programme ha been most successful, he said, with only one failure in 12 launches. While equipment failures were the main culprit in the first few launch failures that ISRO experienced, as time went on and learning experiences accumulated, he said that equipment are rarer and human failures more common as the cause of disasters.

Pointing out that the first PSLV launch failure resulted from a single solenoid valve that did not close properly owing to a dust particle while the GSLV failure in 2006 resulted from a one-mm larger aperture in one of the strap-on boosters that caused it to fail. He said the failure of even a small critical system amongst hundreds of such systems can make all the difference.

However, a rigorous system of setting up failure analysis committees that go into the data that comes from each launch that failed has resulted in limiting the number of failures that India's space programme has experienced.

He pointed out in fact that the re-entry vehicle tested earlier this year in preparation for the 'Chandrayan' moon flight, and for possible manned flights in future, exceeded the parameters prescribed for it, and could be described as close to perfect.

Dr Suresh is the first speaker for the second day of the Zephyr '07 event, when he will talk about ISRO's Chandrayan mission, and the future plans of VSSC. Other speakers on the occasion include Dr AR Upadhya of the National Aerospace Laboratories (NAL), P VEnugopal of 'Bhramos' who will speak about the Indo-Russian supersonic cruise missile, and Pulak Sen, who will speak on the history of Indian Aviation.

The keynote speaker will be NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, who will also host an interactive session on her recent flight on the space shuttle, and the longest stay ever in space aboard the International Space Station by a woman.

This will be followed by a display of fighter helicopters by the Indian Air Force, and an astronomy workshop after dark.

The programme begins at 0930 at IIT's IRCC Auditorium.