New Delhi: The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has confirmed that its Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft has successfully reached the Satish Dhawan Space Centre located in Sriharikota.
The launch window for the 3rd lunar mission opens up on July 12. ISRO chief S Somanath on Saturday said that, “We have a small launch window for Chandrayaan-3, which opens from July 12. We will, however, be announcing a final date for the launch soon.” This mission serves as a follow-up to the earlier Chandrayaan-2 mission, which encountered unforeseen challenges during its landing attempt.
The Chandrayaan-3 lander and rover will be launched into orbit by ISRO’s strong Launch Vehicle Mark-III (LVM3) system. ISRO has revealed that the LVM3’s propulsion module will transport the lander and rover configuration until they reach a lunar orbit situated 100 kilometres above the moon’s surface. Notably, the propulsion module will also carry an instrument called SHAPE (Spectro-polarimetry of Habitable Planet Earth), designed to conduct comprehensive spectral and polarimetric observations of Earth from its lunar vantage point.
The main goal of the Chandrayaan-3 mission is to showcase a successful touchdown on the moon’s surface. Currently, only three nations—the former Soviet Union, the United States, and China—have accomplished a soft landing on the lunar terrain. The failure of the Chandrayaan-2 mission occurred on July 22, 2019. The intended objective was to land a rover on the southern pole of the moon. Despite a successful launch, the Vikram lander encountered issues moments before landing and deviated from its projected path, resulting in the mission’s failure.
M Sankaran, director of the U R Rao Satellite Centre, said on Thursday that “Chandrayaan-3 has already reached the launch port, preparation is going on there at Sriharikota and we do expect that sometime in July the launch can take place.”
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has declared that the last steps of the operationalization of significant missions such as Aditya L1, which is dedicated to solar exploration, and Gaganyaan, India’s ambitious ambition to send personnel to outer space in their own spacecraft, will begin this year.
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