India's moon mission launch called off due to 'technical' problem
Space agency ISRO says launch of Chandrayaan-2 called off minutes before blast-off due to a technical snag.
8 hours ago
India wants the Chandrayaan-2 mission to make it only the fourth country after Russia, the United States and China to land a craft on the lunar surface [Chris Thomas/Reuters]
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India's space agency said it delayed the launch of its second lunar mission, Chandrayaan-2, in the early hours of Monday due to a "technical snag" which was observed less than an hour before the scheduled liftoff.
India wants the Chandrayaan-2 - or Moon Chariot 2 - mission to make it only the fourth country after
Russia, the
United States and
China to land a craft on the lunar surface.
Countdown at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre was halted 56 minutes and 24 seconds before the planned liftoff at 2:51am (2121 GMT on Sunday).
"A technical snag was observed in launch vehicle system at T-56 minute," the India Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said on Twitter.
"As a measure of abundant precaution, #Chandrayaan2 launch has been called off for today. Revised launch date will be announced later."
READ MORE
India prepares to land rover on moon in second unmanned mission
Officials at the
space centre on an island off the coast of Andhra Pradesh state said the problem was in the launch vehicle system.
ISRO had announced one hour before launch that the filling of liquid hydrogen fuel had been completed.
The agency did not say when a new launch could be held.
Attention on the Indian mission had increased as the launch was to be carried out just five days before the 50th anniversary of American
Neil Armstrong's history-changing walk on the Moon.
India had spent about $140m on preparations for Chandrayaan-2 and had hailed the mission as one of the cheapest ever.
A landing on the moon had been scheduled for September 6.
In comparison, the US spent about $25bn - the equivalent of more than $100bn at current prices - on 15 Apollo missions in the 1960s and 70s.
Made in India
Almost all of Chandrayaan-2's orbiter, lander and rover were designed and made in India.
India had prepared its most powerful rocket, the GSLV Mk III, to carry the 2.4-tonne orbiter. The orbiter was to keep circling the moon for about one year taking pictures of the surface and sending back information on the atmosphere.
The orbiter was to carry the 1.4-tonne lander Vikram - which in turn was to take the 27-kg rover Pragyan - to a high plain between two craters on the lunar South Pole.
The solar-powered rover can travel up to 500 metres and was expected to keep sending back images and data for one lunar day, the equivalent of 14 Earth days.
Pragyan, which means wisdom in Sanskrit, will be looking for signs of water and analysing lunar rocks and soil.
India's first lunar mission in 2008 - Chandrayaan-1 - did not land on the moon, but carried out a search for water, using radars.
A soft landing on the moon would be a huge leap forward in India's space programme. National pride is at stake as Prime Minister Narendra Modi has vowed that a manned mission into space will be launched by 2022.
India also plans to land a probe on Mars. In 2014, India became only the fourth nation to put a satellite into orbit around the Red Planet.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019...ed-due-technical-problem-190714233550198.html
https://www.indiatoday.in/science/c...was-done-at-the-right-time-1569163-2019-07-15
India's Chandrayaan-2 moon mission called off minutes before launch
Nation’s first attempt at a landing on the moon put on hold due to ‘technical snag’
Rebecca Ratcliffe in Delhi
Sun 14 Jul 2019 22.58 BSTLast modified on Mon 15 Jul 2019 04.44 BST
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The orbiter vehicle of Chandrayaan-2, India’s first moon lander and rover mission Photograph: Indian Space Research Organisation Handout/EPA
India’s moon mission, destined for the uncharted south pole, has been
put on hold less than an hour before take off, following a technical glitch.
The mission, which was scheduled to launch at 02:51 local time from Sriharikota space centre, north of Chennai, is India’s most ambitious to date.
At 56.24 minutes from launch, the countdown stop was frozen and a media feed from the control room was cut off. Shortly afterwards, the Indian
SpaceResearch Organisation confirmed that the launch had been abandoned for the day.
“A technical snag was observed in launch vehicle system at T-56 minute. As a measure of abundant precaution,
#Chandrayaan2 launch has been called off for today,” the agency tweeted.
A revised launch date will be announced later, it added.
The mission has another 10-minute back up window in which it could launch on Tuesday.
Chandrayaan-2 is India’s first attempt at a surface landing on the moon - a feat achieved by only Russia, the US
and China. If successful, it would also be the first mission to conduct a surface landing on the little-explored lunar south pole region, where scientists hope to collect information about the moon’s mineral and chemical composition, and search for water.
The four-tonne spacecraft is equipped with a lunar orbiter, a lander and a rover that is designed to spend two weeks analysing the moon’s surface.
The mission comes amid a renewed global interest in moon exploration. In January, a Chinese spacecraft became the first to
land on the far side of the moon, while in April, the
Israeli spacecraft Beresheet, the first privately funded mission to the moon, crashed after an apparent engine failure.
India’s space programmes have been hailed by nationalist prime minister Narendra Modi as a marker of the country’s rising status as a global power. In March,
Modi announced the successful test of the country’s first space weapon, an anti-satellite missile. The missile test was
criticised by Nasa, who warned it had created dangerous orbital debris.
Monday’s attempted launch follows
Chandrayaan-1, India’s first lunar mission in 2008, which helped confirm the presence of water on the moon, but did not land on the lunar surface.
As well as Chandrayaan-2, India is developing a plan to
launch a manned space mission by 2022.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...es-before-launch-liftoff-cancel-chandrayaan-2
