The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)'s Chandrayan-3 will be launched in July this year, ISRO's Chief S. Somanath informed. He was speaking following the successful launch of the second-generation navigation satellite NSV-01 from Sriharikota's Satish Dhawan Space Centre on May 29.
Chief Somanath stated that the ISRO is planning to launch Chandrayaan-3 in July in the time slot determined by orbital factors. The ISRO's ambitious Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-up mission to Chandrayaan-2 which aims to demonstrate key technologies that will allow the spacecraft to touch down on the south pole of the moon in less than two months.
It is made up of a native lander module, a propulsion module, and a rover. The lander and rover will be equipped with research payloads to conduct experiments on the lunar surface. The mission will be equipped with tools for analysing the elemental composition close to the landing site, lunar seismicity, the surface plasma environment, and the thermo-physical properties of the lunar regolith. According to the ISRO, Chandrayan-3 would be launched by LVM3 (Launch Vehicle Mark-III) from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.
Chandrayaan-3 had successfully passed the tests, demonstrating its capacity to survive the challenging acoustic environment that the spacecraft would have to deal with during its launch in March. Earlier, Chief Somnath explained that while mission parameters would remain the same, there were several changes being made to the design. “The design and engineering are significantly different, compared to Chandrayaan-2 to make it more robust and avoid the problems from last time.”
India's first lunar mission, Chandrayaan-1, was launched on October 22, 2008, by the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C11). The mission was over after communication with the spacecraft was lost on August 29, 2009, after the satellite had completed more than 3400 orbits around the moon.
After Chandrayaan 1's success, Chandrayaan 2 was India's second lunar mission. In order to comprehend the genesis and evolution of the moon, topographical and mineralogical studies were done as part of this mission. The main aim of the mission was to trace the location and abundance of lunar water on the moon’s surface.
