SRIHARIKOTA: India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), long regarded as ISRO’s most reliable workhorse, suffered a rare setback on Monday morning when the PSLV-C62 mission failed due to an anomaly in its third stage, marking the second such failure linked to the PS3 stage in less than a year.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) launched the PSLV-C62 mission carrying the Earth Observation Satellite EOS-01 for the Indian Army along with 15 foreign satellites from the second launch pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SHAR), Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh, at 10.18 am on Monday.
The mission also included satellite payloads belonging to the United Kingdom, Brazil, Spain, Nepal and France. The lift-off and the performance of the first and second stages were reported to be normal. However, an anomaly occurred during the operation of the third stage (PS3), which uses solid fuel, leading to a deviation in the rocket’s trajectory and resulting in mission failure.
This is the second consecutive failure associated with the PSLV’s third stage. The earlier PSLV-C61 mission, launched in May 2025, had also failed due to a malfunction in the PS3 stage, according to ISRO sources.
Despite these recent setbacks, PSLV remains India’s most dependable launch vehicle. Out of 64 missions conducted so far, only four have failed. These include the maiden PSLV-D1 mission in 1993 due to a second-stage separation and ignition issue, PSLV-C39 in 2017 caused by heat shield separation failure, and the recent PSLV-C61 (2025) and PSLV-C62 (2026) missions, both linked to third stage anomalies.
Addressing the media after the launch, ISRO Director V Narayanan said that the PSLV has four stages, two solid fuel and two liquid fuel stages. “The rocket’s performance was normal up to the third stage. However, an anomaly was encountered towards the end of the PS3 stage. A detailed analysis is currently underway,” he said.
He added that data is being collected from multiple ground stations to thoroughly analyse the mission and identify the root cause of the anomaly.