Thumba
From Open Encyclopedia
Thumba is a small fishing village near Thiruvananthapuram, capital of Kerala, India.
On November 21, 1963 it entered India into space-travel history when a group of scientists worked for six months to launch the country's first rocket from the newly created Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station (TERLS). A local Catholic church and its associated buildings served as the office, workshop and laboratory where the scientists built and fine tuned the rocket. The main person behind the project was Dr.Vikram Sarabhai and scientists under him included the current President of India Dr.A P J Abdul Kalam.
Dr Sarabhai chose Thumba as the ideal site because it is near the magnetic equator, at 8°32′N 76°52′E
Now Thumba is home to Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). With three launch pads TERLS still continues to do weekly rocket launches for weather and atmospheric research. It is an international launch site for sounding rockets, a research funded by the United Nations. The old village community and the church still exist in the middle of the various VSSC office compounds.
