The 25 hours 30-minute countdown for the launch of the country’s third moon mission Chandrayaan-3 commenced on July 13 at the spaceport in Bengaluru, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said.
Friday’s lunar expedition follows the 2019 Chandrayaan-2 mission where space scientists are aiming for a soft landing on the surface of the moon. A successful mission would see India enter an elite club of nations achieving such a feat, the others being the United States, China and the former Soviet Union.
The Chandrayaan-3 which will be India’s third lunar mission consists of an indigenous lander module (LM), propulsion module (PM), and a rover with the objective of developing and demonstrating new technologies required for inter-planetary missions.
The dream run of India’s ambitious second lunar mission, Chandrayaan 2 ended in a tragedy early on September 7 as the Indian Space Research Organisation lost contact with the spacecraft’s lander Vikram.
