Chandrayaan-2 Launch LIVE: Filling of liquid hydrogen for Cryogenic Stage begins
New Delhi, July 22: Chandrayaan 2, India's second lunar exploration mission, is all set to be launched at 2.43 pm today. A 20-hour countdown for the launch began at 6.43 pm on Sunday. 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 mission undertaken by the ISRO, Chandrayaan-2 will make India the fourth country to soft land a rover on the lunar surface after Russia, the United States and China.
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Stay tuned with us for all the LIVE updates relating to the launch:
Filling of Liquid Hydrogen for the Cryogenic Stage(C25) of #GSLVMkIII-M1 commenced, tweets ISRO.
ISRO aims to study the extent of water molecule distribution on the lunar surface. There is a possibility of the presence of water in permanently shadowed areas around the south pole. The region has craters that are cold traps and contain a fossil record of the early solar system. Chandrayaan 2 aims to extensively map the lunar surface to study variations in lunar surface composition to trace back the origin and evolution of the Moon. In addition, the South Pole region has craters that are cold traps and contain a fossil record of the early solar system.
Previous mission, Chandarayaan-1 did not involve landing on moon, the main objective of that mission was to produce a complete map of moon's chemical characteristics and three-dimensional topography.
Less than five hours for the launch !!!
— ISRO (@isro) July 22, 2019
Filling of Liquid Oxygen for the Cryogenic Stage(C25) of #GSLVMkIII-M1 commenced#Chandrayaan2 #ISRO
ISRO tweet:
Chandrayaan-2 has three modules namely Orbiter, Lander (Vikram) and Rover (Pragyan). Orbiter and Lander modules will be stacked together as an one entity inside the launch vehicle GSLV MK-III.
ISRO encountered the snag on July 15 when the liquid propellant was being loaded into the rocket's indigenous cryogenic upper stage engine. Veteran scientists heaped praise on ISRO for calling off the launch rather hurrying into a major disaster.
Yesterday, ISRO Chairman K Sivan said all preparations were on and the glitch had been rectified. "Whatever technical snag we observed on July 15 has been rectified. The vehicle is in good health... The (pre-launch) rehearsal has been successfully completed," he told reporters at the Chennai airport on brief a stopover enroute here.
Among many of the objectives of Chandrayaan-2, what has time and again cropped up is about Helium-3 (He-3) exploration. Helium-3, many opine, could be the fuel of the future. HE-3 is hardly available on Earth but abundant on the moon. He-3 is considered a clean source of energy, unlike fossile fuels. This isotope of Helium can theoretically meet global energy demands for three to five centuries. There are approximately 1 million metric tons of Helium-3 embedded in the moon, according to a report. India's official stand on Helium-3 is that exploring it or mining the isotope is "outside the scope of the current Moon mission".
On July 15 between 1.50 am to 2 am, speculations that the launch could be called-off began making rounds much before the official announcement from the ISRO came as the reverse countdown clock was stopped exactly when 56 mins and 24 seconds remained for the take-off. The countdown clock read 56:24 when it was stopped.
Chandrayaan-2 mission, if executed perfectly, will establish India's capability to safely land on the moon and operate a rover on the lunar surface for the first time. The next step is Gaganyaan.
Filling of N204 for the liquid core stage (L110) of #GSLVMkIII-M1 completed today (22.07.2019) at 0240 hrs IST, tweets ISRO.
Chanddrayaan-2 and Gaganyaan would give ISRO a much required impetus in the highly competitive satellite launch market which is expanding into a multi-billion industry.
Chandrayaan 2 is an advanced version of the previous Chandrayaan 1 mission successfully launched about 10 years ago.
Space missions are very complex. A lot of systems and processes have to work precisely in a coordinated manner for a mission to be successful. There is absolutely no room for any error no matter how insignificant it may seem. Extensive checks and inspections are done as one small failure can result in a disaster, in fact it was due to such a mechanism that glitch could be detected before Chandrayaan-2's July 15th launch.
Chandrayaan-2, which will be launched on-board the most powerful Geostationary Launch Vehicle GSLV-Mk-III dubbed 'Baahubali, is ready "to take a billion dreams to the Moon", the Indian Space Research Organisation said on Twitter.
Announcing fresh date, ISRO tweeted: "Chandrayaan-2 launch, which was called off due to a technical snag on July 15, 2019, is now rescheduled at 2:43 pm IST on Monday, July 22, 2019."
Chandrayaan-2 will take 54 days to accomplish the task of landing on the Moon through meticulously planned orbital phases.
The Chandrayaan-2 mission aims to deliver a rover to an elevated plane close to the uncharted lunar South Pole on September 6 or 7 and investigate the surface for signs of water and potentially new sources of abundant energy. It's one step in an envisioned progression that includes putting a space station in orbit and - eventually - landing a crew on the moon.
The mission launch, described as the most complex and prestigious undertaken since ISRO's inception, was called off due to a technical snag less than an hour before blast-off early Monday due to technical problems.
The Rs 978 crore mission, which has been rescheduled for Monday after scientists corrected the glitch in the rocket, will be launched at 2.43 p.m 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.
A 20-hour countdown for the launch began at 6.43 pm Sunday, ISRO announced. 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.
"Chandrayaan 2 is ready to take a billion dreams to the Moon now stronger than ever before! Join us for the launch on Monday 22 July, 2019 at 2:43 PM IST," ISRO had tweeted on July 18 while announcing the rescheduled launch. On the eve of launch,
ISRO Chairman K Sivan said all preparations were on and the glitch had been rectified.
What went wrong with the Chandrayaan-2 launch:
A leak of helium gas from a bottle in the cryogenic upper stage of the rocket was the villain of the piece on July 15.
The leak forced the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to cancel the launch of its Geo-synchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle-Mark III (GSLV-Mk III). It was a prestigious mission for ISRO because it involved putting the spacecraft Chandrayaan-2, with the lander, called Vikram, and a rover, named Pragyan, into an orbit around the moon.
Cost of the mission:
The cost of Chandrayaan-2 mission is Rs 978 crore, including Rs 603 crore for the orbiter, lander, rover, navigation and ground support network and Rs 375 crore for the heavy rocket -- Geo-stationary Satellite Launch Vehicle with an indigenous cryogenic engine
Where did Chandrayaan-1 leave us?
Chandrayaan-1 was India's first mission to the Moon and lasted for 312 days before the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) lost contact with it. The National Aeronautical and Space Administration (NASA) found it in 2017 still orbiting the Moon.
Chandrayaan-1 detected water molecules on the surface of the Moon in its maiden mission.
Chandrayaan-2 is aimed at sampling the water as well as other minerals, Nayak added.
According to mission scientists, global interest in India's low-cost Moon mission is peaking.
In 2014, ISRO successfully put a satellite into orbit around Mars, becoming only the fourth nation to do so. In 2017, India created history by successfully launching 104 satellites on a single mission, overtaking the previous record of 37 satellites launched by Russia.
If Chandrayaan 2 is successfully placed in the lunar orbit and its components fulfill the objectives then it would not only help us understand the Moon better but also create background knowledge to transform it into a staging area. From here, future human missions to explore far-off planetary bodies can be launched.