ISRO successfully completed the fifth orbit-raising maneuver (Earth-based perigee fire) of the on Tuesday Chandrayaan-3 spaceship from the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) here.
“The spacecraft is expected to reach a 127,609 km x 236 km orbit. The orbit achieved will be confirmed after the observations,” said the national space agency based here.
“The next launch, TransLunar Injection (TLI), is scheduled for August 1, 2023 between midnight and 1 a.m. IST,” added ISRO, which launched the Chandrayaan-3 mission moon on July 14th.
An ISRO official told PTI that after TLI, the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft would break out of Earth orbit and embark on a path that would take it close to the moon.
In other words, the spacecraft would begin its journey to the Moon on August 1, after de-orbiting after the TLI maneuver and entering a “lunar transfer orbit.”
ISRO has announced that it will attempt a soft landing of the lander on the lunar surface on August 23.
After the successful launch of Chandrayaan-3 on GSLV Mark 3 (LVM 3) Heavy Launcher, Director of ISRO S Somanath called This landing is an important step for further exploration.
“Chandrayaan-3 is a very important step… Landing this time is very important. If you don’t land, you can’t take samples, you can’t land humans, and you can’t set up lunar bases. Therefore, the landing is an important step for further exploration,” said ISRO boss S Somanath.
Chandrayaan-3 is ISRO’s follow-up attempt after the Chandrayaan-2 mission faced challenges in its soft landing on the lunar surface in 2019 and ultimately deemed its core mission objectives a failure.
(This story was not edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
