SAIL Says It Supplied Special Steel For India’s First Manned Space Flight
The special grade steel consisting of expensive alloying elements has very high strength and heat resistance.
State-owned Steel Authority of India Ltd. has supplied special grade steel plates produced at its Bhilai unit for the country’s first human space mission programme -- Gaganyaan, a company official said.
In addition, SAIL’s Rourkela Steel Plant has also supplied MDN 250 (maraging steel) grade special steel for the ambitious project. SAIL has contributed to the Gaganyaan space mission and has successfully produced plates to be used in the satellite launch vehicle that would launch the mission, Bhilai Steel Plant Chief Executive Officer Anirban Dasgupta told PTI.
A consignment of 40 tonnes of MDN 250 grade slabs rolled into plates at BSP's plate mill was flagged off by Dasgupta in the first week of February. The ambitious Gaganyaan mission was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his Independence Day speech in 2018.
"Stringent technological norms were formulated and followed by entire collective of plate mill and other concerned departments of SAIL along with several other associated departments. The slabs (were) supplied by Misra Dhatu Nigam Ltd.," he said.
Dasgupta further said that "these forged slabs of special steel of very high strength and high-temperature resistance consisting of a high percentage of expensive alloying elements were rolled into thinner plates of 9.3 mm thickness." Earlier, the company had supplied special steel from its Salem Steel Plant for Indian Space Research Organisation's Chandrayaan 1 and Chandrayaan 2 and Mangalyaan mission.