The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has successfully completed raising its second orbit manoeuver of the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft. “The second orbit-raising manoeuver is performed successfully. The spacecraft is now 41.603 km × 226 km orbit. The next firing is planned for tomorrow between 2-3pm IST,” ISRO tweeted on Monday afternoon. Chandrayaan-3 is now in an orbit, which when closest to Earth is at 173 km and farthest from Earth is at 41,762 km, the space agency said.
The Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft’s voyage towards the Moon began after ISRO’s largest and heaviest rocket, the Launch Vehicle Mark III (LVM3), carried India’s third lunar exploration mission from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh.
After the challenges encountered during the soft landing of Chandrayaan-2 in 2019, ISRO has made several improvements to ensure the success of Chandrayaan-3. On Sunday, the first orbit raising manoeuver (Earth-bound apogee) firing of Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft was performed successfully.
On July 14, ISRO successfully launched the third edition of its lunar exploration programme from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh. Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-2 to demonstrate end-to-end capability in safe landing and roving on the lunar surface, said ISRO. It consists of Lander and Rover configurations.
The aim of this mission is to make a soft landing on the unexplored south-pole of the Moon that would help India achieve a rare feet. Chandrayaan-3 has a mission life of one lunar day, or 14 Earth days. Only three countries — the United States, China and Russia — have managed to land on the lunar surface so far.
As per the schedule, Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft will reach to the lunar orbit on August 3. It is expected to make a soft landing on the moon by August 23.
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Updated: 17 Jul 2023, 09:25 PM IST