Photos: India's Mars Orbiter Mission arrives at launch site

How do you ship a spacecraft in India? By Tata truck, of course. I have been honked at a lot by these trucks while traveling here and there on vacation to visit my husband's family in India and Sri Lanka. I would really like to know how much honking this truck did while bearing its precious cargo along the 400-kilometer journey from Bangalore to Sriharikota this week! These images were posted to the Indian Space Research Organisation website; thanks to Pradeep Mohandas for the pointer to them.

I'm very happy to see that the spacecraft has arrived safely, and I look forward to its launch on October 28 at 16:14:45 Indian standard time (3:44:45 PDT / 10:44:45 UTC).

By the way, a report appeared in Indian media this week that the US government shutdown might cause a delay in India's Mars mission, but those reports appeared to have been the uninformed worrying of a single writer, and were quickly denied by ISRO: "India's October 28 Mars mission on schedule: ISRO"

Here's more images, taken during spacecraft development.

All images credit ISRO.