The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Wednesday announced the integration of the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft with the Launch Vehicle Mark 3 (LVM3). The national space agency is eyeing a July 12-19 launch window for the lunar mission.
Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-on mission to 2019’s Chandrayaan-2 which saw an unsuccessful landing attempt. “Today, at Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, the encapsulated assembly containing Chandrayaan-3 is mated with LVM3,” ISRO tweeted on Wednesday.
LVM3 is set to launch from SDSC, Sriharikota, the spacecraft which comes in a lander-rover configuration. The propulsion module is designed to carry the configuration till 100 km lunar orbit.
The mission aims to demonstrate safe and soft landing of the spacecraft on the lunar surface, to demonstrate the rover’s movement on the moon and conduct in-situ scientific experiments with payloads on the lander and the rover.
The lander will have the capability to soft-land at a specified lunar site and deploy the rover which will carry out in-situ chemical analysis of the lunar surface, ISRO said.
Published 05 July 2023, 13:12 IST