RH200, THE versatile sounding rocket of ISRO, on Wednesdayregisteredits200th consecutive successfullaunch from the shores of Thumba, Thiruvananthapuram. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) termed it a“historicmoment.”Itwaswitnessed by former President Ram Nath Kovind and ISRO ChairmanSSomanath,among others.“Indiansoundingrockets are used as privileged tools for the scientific community forcarryingoutexperimentson meteorology, astronomy and similar branches of space physics,” an ISRO statement said. Campaigns such as Equatorial ElectroJet (EEJ), Leonid Meteor Shower (LMS), Indian Middle Atmosphere Programme(IMAP),Monsoon Experiment(MONEX),Middle Atmosphere Dynamics (MIDAS), and Sooryagrahan2010 have been conducted usingthesoundingrocketplatform for scientific exploration of the Earth’s atmosphere.

TheRhino SoundingRocket (RSR)serieshavebeentheforerunners forISRO’s heavier and morecomplexlaunchvehicles, with a continued usage even today for atmospheric and meteorological studies.