Chandrayaan-2 leaves earth’s orbit, moving towards moon

TIL Desk/National/Bengaluru/ India’s second moon mission ‘Chandrayaan-2’ left the earth’s orbit early on Wednesday, 23 days after being launched, and is moving towards the moon following the successful completion of a crucial manoeuvre by the Indian Space Research Organisation.              

The Bengaluru-headquartered space agency said it has carried out a manoeuvre called ‘Trans Lunar Insertion’ at 2:21 am on Wednesday, following which the spacecraft has successfully entered the Lunar Transfer Trajectory. The Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft is expected to reach the moon’s orbit on August 20 and land on lunar surface on September 7.           

“Today (August 14, 2019) after the Trans Lunar Insertion (TLI) maneuver operation, #Chandrayaan2 will depart from Earth’s orbit and move towards the Moon (sic),” the ISRO tweeted. “During the final orbit raising of the spacecraft around the earth, the liquid engine was fired for about 1203 seconds. With this, Chandrayaan-2 entered the Lunar Transfer Trajectory,” the space agency said. Earlier, the spacecraft’s orbit was progressively increased five times between July 23 and August 6.