Chandrayaan-2 second launch will be successful: Isro chairman

CHENNAI: India’s unmanned lunar mission that will land on the South Pole of the moon — a first for any country — will be successful in its second bid on Monday, said the space agency chief, a week after a technical snag put off the first try of the launch at the final hour.

“The technical snag we had observed on July 15 has been corrected. The vehicle is in good condition; the rehearsal has gone well too,” K Sivan, chairman, Indian Space Research Organisation, told reporters on Sunday. “Tests were conducted for 1.5 days to ensure the same snag does not recur. There are no chances of it happening again.”

ET last week reported that a drop in pressure in one of the tanks in the upper stage of the geosynchronous satellite launch vehicle mark 3 or GSLV-Mk-3 led scientists to call off the launch.


The indigenously developed GSLV-Mk-3 is India’s most powerful rocket and can carry a 4-tonne satellite 36,000 km above earth. The Chandrayaan-2 mission — the spacecraft with an orbiter, lander and rover — weighs 3.8 tonne.

Chandrayaan-2 is scheduled for launch at 2.43 pm on Monday from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.

“The soft landing will take place at a point where no spacecraft has landed—the South Pole of the moon. This means the scientific findings will be new and unique.” said Sivan.

The Rs 978-crore Chandrayaan-2 Project will launch India into a club of nations that have successfully landed spacecraft on the moon — the US, Russia and China. Besides, India will make significant findings about the origin of the moon, its elements composition, and more importantly, validate initial findings of the Chandrayaan-1mission about the presence of water on the moon.

The 640-tonne GSLV-Mk-3, on its first operational flight, will place Chandrayaan-2 in the earth parking orbit (EPO) approximately 16.2 minutes after take-off.