ISRO's missions to moon, sun likely to take place in July

Chandrayaan is a series of outer space missions by Isro, and Aditya-L1 is India’s first scientific mission to study the sun

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is planning to launch the third edition of India’s moon mission and the first sun mission in July, an official said on Saturday.

Chandrayaan-2 was successfully launched and inserted into lunar orbit in 2019. (PTI)

The space agency is aiming to launch Chandrayaan-3 in July, followed by Aditya-L1, an Isro official aware of the project development said. “We are completing all tests and hoping we will be able to stick to schedule,” the official said, seeking anonymity.

Chandrayaan, India’s lunar exploration programme, is an ongoing series of outer space missions by Isro. The first moon rocket, Chandrayaan-1, was launched in 2008 and was successfully inserted into lunar orbit.

Chandrayaan-2 was successfully launched and inserted into lunar orbit in 2019, but its lander crash-landed on the moon when it deviated from its trajectory while attempting to land on September 6, 2019, due to a software glitch.

Chandrayaan-3 consists of an indigenous lander module, a propulsion module and a rover. Its objectives include developing and demonstrating new technologies required for interplanetary missions. The lander will have the capability to soft land at a specified site and deploy the rover, which will carry out a chemical analysis of the lunar surface during its mobility.

Aditya-L1 is India’s first scientific mission to study the sun. Earlier, this mission was conceived as Aditya-1 with a 400kg class satellite carrying one payload, the VELC, and was planned to be launched in an 800km low earth orbit.

However, since a satellite placed in the halo orbit around the First Lagrangian Point (L1) of the sun-earth system has the major advantage of continuously viewing the sun without any occultation or eclipses, the Aditya-1 mission was renamed as Aditya-L1 mission, which will be inserted in an orbit around the L1 point, 1.5 million km from the earth towards the sun.