BENGALURU: Exactly 14 days from now, India will launch its third unmanned mission to the Moon, Chandrayaan 3. Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) officials on Wednesday confirmed that Chandrayaan 3 will be launched at 2.30 pm on July 13. Initially, ISRO Chairman S Somnath had stated that the window that the organisation was looking at for the launch was between July 12 and July 19. However, it has been confirmed by officials that the launch will take place on July 13 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) in Sriharikota.
Chandrayaan 3 is the third mission under the Chandrayaan mission aimed at proving India’s space capabilities. Chandrayaan 3, unlike its predecessors, will not have an orbiter, but only a lander carrying a rover and a propulsion module that will take the two up to 100 km of the lunar orbit.
ISRO scientists told TNIE that the launch date and time had been chosen based on a specific window. The window of July 12 to July 19 was given because of various factors, including weather, the distance of the Moon from the Earth and the positioning of the Moon in its orbit around the Earth. The specific time was decided taking calculations into consideration for Chandrayaan 3 spacecraft to make its rendezvous with the Moon after its initial earth orbits.
The launcher identified for Chandrayaan 3 is GSLV-Mk3, which will place the integrated module in an Elliptic Parking Orbit of 170 x 36500 km around the Earth. According to the mission profile released by ISRO, the integrated Chandrayaan 3 (propulsion module, lander and rover) will make five orbits around the Earth before transferring into the lunar orbit, where it will make seven orbits before landing on the Moon.
Rover to carry out chemical analysis
Chandrayaan 3 consists of a propulsion module, lander module and a rover with an objective of developing and demonstrating new technologies required for inter-planetary missions. The propulsion module will take the lander and rover up to the 100-km mark of the lunar orbit and release the lander to make the touchdown while carrying the rover in its belly.
The lander will soft-land at a specified lunar site and deploy the rover, which will carry out on site chemical analysis of the lunar surface during the course of its mobility. The lander and the rover have scientific payloads to carry out experiments on the lunar surface over its mission life of 14 earth days (1 lunar day). Chandrayaan 3 is a follow-up mission of Chandrayaan 2 which was launched in 2019. Chandrayaan 2 consisted of a lunar orbiter, lander and a lunar rover. However, the lander failed while attempting to soft land on the Moon’s surface. Chandrayaan 3 will continue its predecessor’s mission.