Bengaluru: The orbit of Chandrayaan-2’s landing module ‘Vikram’ was successfully lowered for the first time on Tuesday and one final manoeuvre remained for India to pull off a historic soft-landing on the moon in the early hours of Saturday.
The 4-second de-orbiting operation was undertaken a day after the indigenously developed lander was separated from Chandrayaan-2’s orbiter in a major milestone pushing India’s second lunar mission into its last and most crucial leg–a controlled, soft-landing on the Moon. The propulsion system on-board the lander was fired for the first time to lower its orbit after it started orbiting the moon independently, said the Indian Space Research Organisation(ISRO).
The ISRO will perform one more de-orbiting manoeuvre on Wednesday, before the powered descent of ‘Vikram’ on September 7 for its landing in the lunar south pole.
A successful landing will make India the first to launch a mission to the unexplored south pole of the Moon.
“The first de-orbiting manoeuvre for Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft was performed successfully today (September 03, 2019) beginning at 0850 hrs IST as planned, using the onboard propulsion system. The duration of the manoeuvre was 4 seconds,” the ISRO said, adding that the second and final manoeuvre to further lower the orbit is scheduled on Wednesday between 3.30 and 4.30 am IST. (PTI)
