Current Events

Current Events
Compiled by Sarasij Majumder, 1971 Civil Engineering

India’s Mars Orbiter
India’s Mars Orbiter, which was a Rs. 450 Crore Mission spacecraft, launched by PSLV was designed to last for six months when launched in November 2013, has recently lost communications with the ground stations, bringing an end to its life after eight long years. ISRO is investigating. Reason could be—Long Eclipse of 22.
The spacecraft had handled two black-out phases during an eclipse and one white-out phase in the first year and another in the second year. In all these instances, the spacecraft was completely autonomous without any help from the ground. That ISRO achieved this in its first attempt was a feather in the cap.
The satellite had been designed with autonomous functions to come out of eclipses and it has done it in the past too. While recovering from the last eclipse, the fuel may have been exhausted. The other reason could may be that, while exiting the eclipse a command for a roll-spin to change direction was done, which could have caused the “Earth-facing antenna to change direction.”

Data trove: Carrying five payloads, it sent in over 1TB data in its first year and over 5TB data in successive five years. This helped in understanding of Martian Climate, and Geo-morphology better.

Made in India Chopper Takes to The Skies
After Apache and Chinook helicopters, Indian Air Force has inducted the first batch of indigenously developed Light Combat Helicopter (LCH). It will handle COMBAT ROLE in Mountains.
The 5.8-tonne twin-engine LCH is equipped with Shakti engine developed by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) in Collaboration with the French engine-maker Safran. The LCH was declared ready for production in February 2020.

Armed with air-to-air missiles, 20 mm turret guns, rocket systems and other weapons, the Helicopter can hit enemy infantry, tanks, bunkers, drones and other assets in high-altitude regions. Air Chief Marshal V R Chaudhari said the capabilities of LCH is at par with the helicopters of its class globally.
The main strength of this Apache-looking helicopter is that it can operate at an altitude of up to 20,000 feet.

It has a number of stealth features, armored-protection systems, night attack capability and crash-worthy landing gear for better survivability, officials said.
The IAF operates the older Russian Mi-25 and Mi-35 attack helicopters, of which one squadron has been phased out following the induction of 22 Boeing AH-64E Apache attack helicopters.
The LCH is the first dedicated attack helicopter of the Army, which otherwise operates 75 Rudra helicopters.

Medicine
Bar codes could come soon to plug menace of sub-standard drugs. Initially it will cover 100 Drugs to fight low standard / counterfeit drugs in the market. This is a very welcome sign of present GOI.

SARS COVID 19
Bad News:-Present viruses have mutated so much, that the available Vaccines are useless against them.
Good News:- However, most of them are not LETHAL, and can cause not much harm. Treat them just like seasonal FLUE. And, research suggests, new drugs may turn VIRUS against itself!

Sports
Tennis
Rojer Federer, born 8th August 1981, retired from the professional tennis following the Laver Cup in September 2022 at the age of 41. He was ranked world No. 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for 310 weeks, including a record 237 consecutive weeks, and finished 5 times as the year-end No. 1. He won 103 ATP singles titles, the second most of all time, including 20 Grand Slam singles, a record of 8 men’s singles Wimbledon, an Open Era record-tying 5 men’s singles US Open, and a record 6 year-end championships. At the 2018 Australian Open, Federer became the first man to win 20 major singles titles and shortly the oldest ATP world No. 1 at age 36. A Wimbledon junior champion in 1998 and former ball boy, Federer won his first major singles title at Wimbledon in 2003 at the age of 21. At his age of 27 in 2009, he surpassed Pete Sampras’ record of 14 men’s major singles titles at Wimbledon.

Cricket
India romp to seventh Women’s Asia Cup title with easy win over Sri Lanka, defeating the opponent by eight wickets at the Sylhet International Cricket Stadium in Sylhet, Bangladesh, on Saturday, 14th October 2022. This is Indian Women’s 7th win in 8 outings

India’s Jhulon Nishit Goswami, born 25 November 1982, known as CHAKDAH EXPRESS hanged her boots, after completing a long successful career spanning 20 years in International Women’s Cricket. A specialist right arm medium pacer, playing in all the 3 formats, she took 44 test wickets (12 matches), 255 ODI wickets (204 matches), and 56 international T20 wickets (68 matches). She had her international debut on 6th January 2002, an ODI against England, and the last match on 24th September 2022, an ODI against England. Representing India for 20 long years, she is acknowledged as one of the best international fast bowlers, even often considered at par with male bowlers. More often than not, she contributed with some quick runs also

Indian cricket vice-captain Smriti Mandhana signed on as a brand ambassador of lubricant manufacturer Gulf Oil India. Gulf Oil claims to become the first company in the lubricant space to appoint a woman cricketer as their ambassador. She joins current men’s cricketers Hardik Pandya and former captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni as an ambassador for the company. Gulf Oil stated that it aims to ‘celebrate women power’ and ‘inspire female audience in the country’, while also honouring the achievements of Indian women cricketers.

Technology & Fashion
The Coperni fashion show took place in Salle des Textiles at Paris’s Musée des Arts et Métiers on 30 September and saw a white dress sprayed live onto the body of model Bella Hadid. The Paris Fashion Week ended with supermodel Bella Hadid in nude lingerie, and then, like a performance art, two crew members took airbrushing guns and sprayed a dress directly on her…it’s amazing. From liquid to fabric, from coating to skirt, from flat to three-dimensional, wonderful chemical reactions dominate this magical transformation…

But how is it all done? According to Vogue Business’s interpretation, the liquid sprayed from the spray gun on the show “contains cotton and synthetic fibers, which are originally suspended in a polymer solution. Once in contact with the human body, the solution will evaporate and the fabric will remain on the surface of the human body”, After the coating is fully evaporated, it will be separated from the skin and ready-made, showing a texture like jersey fabric, which is not much different from a normal dress visually. As a finishing touch, in order to allow Bella to walk freely, the designer also used scissors to slit the “tailor-made” dress on the spot. Afterwards, the music sounded, and the audience’s mouths were wide open in surprise, and Bella in Impossible Dress was already walking freely… Technology has shortened the actual creation cycle of a dress to a few minutes, challenging the audience’s cognition of shock. The trio of technology, fashion and creativity is the sexiest existence.

Business
Former Indian cricket Mahendra Singh Dhoni has launched the made-in-India camera drone named ‘Droni’ with advanced features manufactured by Garuda Aerospace. Dhoni is the brand ambassador of Garuda Aerospace, a company which has attempted to offer drone solutions for agricultural pesticide spraying, solar panel cleaning, industrial pipeline inspections, mapping, surveying, public announcements, and delivery services. It has ventured into the consumer drone market with ‘Droni’.
The event in Chennai also witnessed the launch of a new ‘Kisan Drone’ that is aimed at the agriculture sector, particularly in spraying applications. This battery-powered drone is capable of carrying out agricultural pesticide spraying over a land area of 30 acres per day. It is expected to provide a platform to gain insights into the Indian drone culture and the various possibilities associated with the use of drones.

International
While the Ukraine war is becoming a big global nuisance—no one is clearly in dominating role, at that crucial time India is doing a tight rope walking, and paying the DEBT involved in past K-issues, and 71 Bangladesh war. Come what may—INDIA can’t go against RUSSIA in UNO.
Europe could be in big trouble in this winter, if Russian Gas are not available for them. Sanction didn’t cause any short term bad effect on Russian Economy. Strengthening Roubles are also not a good sign. Russian GDP may go down by 8-10%. Russian manufacturing plants imports 40% raw material. That in not possible for sanction. Many factories are getting closed. People are losing jobs. Internal unrest is coming up.

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Sources:- ISRO bulletin, Indian Defense Journal, IMA Bulletin, NYT, Newspapers.
Photos:- From Bulletins, Newspapers.