India's Chandrayan- II Mission : A Tale of Vikram & Pragyan

Mission Highlights

GSLV-Mk III / Chandrayaan-2 Mission :

• Chandrayaan-2, India’s second lunar mission, has three modules namely Orbiter, Lander (Vikram) & Rover (Pragyan).                          

• The Orbiter and Lander modules will be interfaced mechanically and stacked together as an integrated module and accommodated inside the GSLV MK-III launch vehicle.
• The Rover is housed inside the Lander. After launching into earthbound orbit by GSLV MK-III, the integrated module will reach Moon orbit using Orbiter propulsion module.
• The lander is named Vikram (meaning valour, after the father of the Indian space programme, Vikram Sarabhai). It will release a small robotic rover, named Pragyan (“Wisdom” in Sanskrit), to move around, feel and understand the lunar surface.
• Lander will separate from the Orbiter and soft land on a light plains area (~71°S) between Manzinus C and Simpelius N craters. This site, near the Boguslawsky crater, is farther south than any previous lander and currently slated as the landing site for Luna 24 by the Russian space agency Roscosmos.
• Further, the Rover will roll out for carrying out scientific experiments on the lunar surface. Instruments are also mounted on Lander and Orbiter for carrying out scientific experiments.

Scientific objectives of Chandrayaan 2 : 

• The mission carries 14 payloads or instruments to observe and gauge the lunar scene – both from a distance and on its surface. One of them is a tiny NASA reflectometer to mark the spot for future missions and assess the distance from the earth.
• The orbiter will have a suite of scientific payloads including a high-resolution camera, a neutral mass spectrometer, a synthetic aperture radar, a near-infrared spectrometer, a soft X-ray spectrometer, and a solar X-ray monitor to extend the high-resolution visible and compositional mapping of the lunar surface from orbit.
• These instruments will provide information on the current seismicity of the Moon, the temperature and thermal conductivity of the regolith and the near-surface environment.
• The rover, called Pragyan will use cameras, an alpha-particle X-ray spectrometer, and laser-induced ablation spectroscopy (LIBS) to analyze the chemical composition of the lunar surface.
• The mission uses all Indian technology from end to end, with the exception of the NASA-provided retroreflector.

Challenges of a Moon landing :

The most challenging part of the mission is Soft landing which is described in the following image. Vikram must gently descend on a harsh rugged lunar surface, without getting damaged. It must also avoid landing in a shadowy patch. It needs sunlight for generating its power. The moon’s constantly sunny side gets light for 14 Earth days or one lunar day. The lander and the rover are expected to work for just that duration. 

Benefits of Chandrayaan-2 

Result and Impact:

The spacecraft was launched on its mission to the Moon from the second launch pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Andhra Pradesh on 22 July 2019 at 2.43 p.m. IST (09:13 UTC) by a GSLV Mark III M1. The craft reached the Moon's orbit on 20 August 2019 and began orbital positioning manoeuvres for the landing of the Vikram lander. The lander and the rover were scheduled to land on the near side of the Moon, in the south polar region at a latitude of about 70° south on 6 September 2019 and conduct scientific experiments for one lunar day, which approximates to two Earth weeks. A successful soft landing would have made India the fourth country after the Soviet Union, United States and China to do so.

However, the lander deviated from its intended trajectory while attempting to land on 6 September 2019 which caused a 'hard landing'. According to a failure analysis report submitted to ISRO, the crash was caused by a software glitch. ISRO may re-attempt a landing by the second quarter of 2021 with Chandrayaan-3.

Even after the failure of Chandrayaan-2, Narendra Modi highly appreciated the work of ISRO Chief K Sivanand and consoles him like a big brother. Our scientists and engineers have worked a lot in making this mission successful but maybe destiny has written something else for us and it is, for sure, something big .

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