[LINK] "India triumphs in maiden Mars mission, sets record in space race"

[rfmcdonald]

Reuters shares the good news that India's Mars Orbital Mission has successfully arrived in Mars orbit.

India's first mission to Mars entered orbit on Wednesday, making it the first Asian nation to reach the Red Planet, all for less than the budget of the Hollywood space blockbuster "Gravity".

The Mars Orbiter Mission, or MOM, cost $74 million, a fraction of the $671 million the U.S. space agency NASA spent on its newly arrived MAVEN Mars mission.

"History has been created today," said Prime Minister Narendra Modi, bursting into applause along with hundreds of scientists at the Bangalore command centre of the state-run Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

"We have dared to reach out into the unknown and have achieved the near-impossible."

India joins the United States, Russia and Europe in successfully sending probes to orbit or land on Mars.

In 2011 a Chinese spacecraft destined for Mars failed to leave Earth's orbit after a botched Russian launch.

ISRO successfully ignited the main engine and eight small thrusters, which fired for 24 minutes, trimming the speed of the craft so it could be captured by Mars's gravity and slide into orbit.