TIL Desk/National/Bengaluru/ In a significant milestone for India’s Moon mission, ISRO will fire Chandrayaan2’s liquid engine on Tuesday to insert the spacecraft into a lunar orbit. “It’s tomorrow morning (tentatively between 8.30 am and 9.30 am). It’s challenging,” Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation K Sivan told on Monday on the operation to put the spacecraft in an orbit around the Moon.
Following this, there will be further four orbit manoeuvres to make the spacecraft enter into its final orbit passing over the lunar poles at a distance of about 100 km from Moon’s surface, ISRO has said.
Subsequently, the Vikram lander will separate from the orbiter on September 2, according to the Bengaluru-headquartered space agency. Two orbit manoeuvres will be performed on the lander before the initiation of powered descent to make a soft landing on the lunar surface on September 7, ISRO said.
Chandrayaan2, launched on July 22 by GSLV MkIII-M1 vehicle, had entered the Lunar Transfer Trajectory on August 14 after final orbit raising manoeuvre of the spacecraft was successfully carried out.
