Chandrayaan's date with moon in final stages.
"The nine-second de-irbiting manoeuvre was executed at 3:42am on Wednesday using the lander's jets."
Joined by 60 high school students from across the country, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be present at the ISRO centre in Bengaluru to witness live the space feat.
A successful landing taking billion dreams to the moon will make India the fourth country after Russia, the USA & China to achieve a landing on the lunar surface. But it will be the first to launch a mission to the unexplored Moon's south pole.
The nine-second de-irbiting manoeuvre- the second in two days- was executed at 3.42am using the lander's on-board propulsion system, the ISRO said in a statement giving the latest update on the Rs 978 crore unmanned moon mission. "With this manoeuvre the required orbit for the Vikram lander to commence it's descent towards the surface of the moon is achieved," said ISRO.
Vikram is now in an orbit that would be about 35kms from the lunar surface at its nearest point from where it will begin its final descent on to the Moon. ISRO scientists said, adding the orbit was just 101km from the lunar surface at the farthest point. The chandrayaan-2 spacecraft continued to orbit the moon at a perigee of 96 km & apogee of 125 km.
" Both the orbiter & lander are healthy." The ISRO said. The lander is scheduled for a powered descent between 1am - 2am on September 7, following 1:30 am & 2:30 am.
Following the landing the rover, pragyan will roll out from Vikram & carry out experiments on the lunar surface for a period of one lunar day, which is equal to 14 days. The main orbiter will continue its mission for a year.
" Chandrayaan 2 is ready to take a billion dreams to the moon now stronger than ever before," ISRO had said while announcing the rescheduled date for the launch after the lift off was aborted in July 15 due to a technical snag.
