Countdown began for Chandrayaan 2 Mission
The countdown for the launch of India's most ambitious space mission, began. Chandrayaan-2 mission aims to place a robotic rover on the moon, near the unexplored south pole as it holds the maximum promise for presence of water as well as of fossil footprints. Chandrayaan 2 will be launched on Monday at 2:51 am from India's only space port at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh. The mission is very important for ISRO as after the success of this mission India will become the fourth nation to soft-land a spacecraft on the lunar surface after the US, Russia and China.
Earlier in year 2008, with the budget of 450 crores India launched Chandrayaan-1 mission which was an orbiter.
- President Ram Nath Kovind will himself witness the midnight live launch.
- ISRO will use its most powerful rocket launcher, GSLV Mk III, to carry the 3.8 tonne Chandrayaan-2 into orbit. The entire mission has a life of one year.
- Chandrayaan 2 will ultimately head close to the South Pole of the moon for a soft landing after spending nearly two months on its long 3. 84 lakh km journey.
- One thousand crore Chandrayaan-2 mission will carry a 1.4 tonne lander Vikram.
- The space agency’s most ambitious mission till date is aimed at landing a rover