Chennai: India’s second moon mission Chandrayaan 2 seeking to explore the unchartered lunar south pole by landing a rover was launched onboard its most powerful rocket GSLV-Mk0III-M1 from Sriharikota on Monday afternoon.
The Rs 978 crore mission, which has been rescheduled after scientists corrected the glitch in the rocket, was launched at 2.43 pm from the second launchpad at Satish Dhawan Space Centre here, over 100 km from Chennai.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) scientists, who aborted the previous launch with 56 minutes left for the countdown to end on July 15, have taken quick remedial action based on an analysis carried out by a team set up to look into the snag and announced the rescheduled launch three days ago.
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Chandrayaan 2 comes 11 years after ISRO’s successful first lunar mission Chandrayaan 1 which scripted history by making more than 3,400 orbits around the Moon and was operational for 312 days till August 29, 2009.
The 43.43m tall three-stage rocket dubbed ‘Baahubali’ for its ability to carry heavy payloads would blast-off carrying Chandrayaan-2 and inject the spacecraft into Earth orbit about 16 minutes later. After lift-off, the 3,850 kg Chandrayaan-2, comprising an orbiter, lander and rover, will undergo 15 crucial manoeuvres before landing on the Moon, expected by the first week of September.
Billed as the most complex and prestigious mission undertaken by the ISRO since its inception, Chandrayaan-2 will make India the fourth country to soft land a rover on the lunar surface after Russia, the United States and China.
