India’s Space Agency Pauses Rocket Launches to make Coronavirus Supplies: Report
ISRO is making ventilators and hand sanitizer.

By Meghan Bartels

March 30. 2020 | As the coronavirus-borne disease COVID-19 spreads around the world, India’s space agency has responded by pausing launches and pivoting resources to develop ventilators and hand sanitizer, according to local media reports.

ISRO prepared a Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle rocket to launch an Earth-imaging satellite called GISAT-1; the launch has since been delayed indefinitely.
(Image: © ISRO)

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) oversees the country’s launches and spacecraft missions, including its Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle rocket and the Chandrayaan-2 mission currently orbiting the moon. As work on forthcoming missions pauses, the agency has redirected its focus to aid the fight against COVID-19. “We are designing a ventilator and making hand sanitizers and distributing them,” S. Somanath, head of agency’s Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, told the Times of India.