Bengaluru, Apr 2: The Indian Space Research Organisation on Sunday successfully conducted the Reusable Launch Vehicle Autonomous Landing Mission (RLV LEX).The test was conducted at the Aeronautical Test Range (ATR), Chitradurga, Karnataka, the national agency headquartered here said.With that, ISRO successfully achieved the autonomous landing of a space vehicle”, it said in a statement.“With LEX, the dream of an Indian Reusable Launch Vehicle arrives one step closer to reality”, ISRO said.In a first in the world, a winged body has been carried to an altitude of 4.5 km by a helicopter and released for carrying out an autonomous landing on a runway.RLV is essentially a space plane with a low lift to drag ratio requiring an approach at high glide angles that necessitated a landing at high velocities of 350 kmph.The RLV took off at 7:10 am IST by a Chinook Helicopter of the Indian Air Force (IAF) as an underslung load and flew to a height of 4.5 km (above Mean Sea Level).
