India on Monday created history by successfully launching the country's second indigenous Chandrayaan-2 mission to the Moon, a feat which comes 11 years after the launch of Chandrayaan-1.
Chandrayaan-2 is India's first space mission that will conduct a soft landing on the moon's South Polar Region. The mission makes India 4th country to the soft-land rover on the surface of the moon after Russia, USA, and China.
Chandrayaan-1 had been launched by the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, PSLV C-11 on October 22, 2008, from Sriharikota. The spacecraft orbited around the Moon at a height of 100 km from the lunar surface for chemical, mineralogical and photo-geologic mapping of the Moon.
The spacecraft, Indian Space Research Orgsation's (ISRO's) first successful odyssey towards the Moon, carried 11 scientific instruments built in India, USA, UK, Germany, Sweden, and Bulgaria and weighed around 1380 kg at liftoff.
After the successful completion of all the major mission objectives, the orbit was raised to 200 km during May 2009. The satellite made more than 3,400 orbits around the Moon and the mission was concluded when the communication with the spacecraft was lost on August 29, 2009.
The spacecraft carried five Indian instruments -- Terrain Mapping Camera (TMC), Hyper Spectral Imager (HySI), Lunar Laser Ranging Instrument (LLRI), High Energy X-ray Spectrometer (HEX), and a Moon Impact Probe (MIP).
While the spacecraft carried seven foreign instruments which were, Chandrayaan-I X-ray Spectrometer (CIXS), Near-Infrared Spectrometer (SIR - 2), Sub keV Atom Reflecting Analyzer (SARA), Miniature Synthetic Aperature Radar (Mini SAR), Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) and a Radiation Dose Monitor (RADOM).
The spacecraft used reaction wheel and attitude control thrusters, sun sensors, star sensors, fibre optic gyros and accelerometers for attitude determination for three-axis stabilisation in the space.
According to ISRO chief K Sivan, the Chandrayaan-2 will perform 15 crucial maneuvers in the days to come
Chandrayaan-2 will be landing on the moon very slowly. "It will land on the South Pole. There is a lot of scientific testing to be done regarding the mission. Scientists around the world are looking forward to the launch," Sivan had told reporters on Sunday.
Chandrayaan-2 is an indigenous mission. It has been fully designed and developed by our scientists. The software for the Chandrayaan-2 mission has also been created by our scientists.
The Chandrayaan-2 was scheduled to be launched on July 15. However, less than an hour before the launch, the mission was aborted after a technical snag was detected.
Chandrayaan-2 will explore a region of Moon where no mission has ever set foot. The spacecraft consists of an orbiter, a lander, and a rover together referred to as "composite body." The probe's total mass is 3.8 ton and is expected to land on the Moon's South Polar Region on September 6 or 7 this year.
( With inputs from ANI )