Chandrayaan-2 Mission of Isro

 News:-  Chandrayaan-2 was launched at 2:43 pm IST on Monday , July 22, 2019.

If Chandrayaan-2 Mission would have got successful, India would have became the 4th country to land on the lunar(moon) surface after US, Russia and China.

The cost of Chandrayaan-2 mission is estimated to be - $140 million

This mission was launched by India's heaviest and most powerful rocket to date - GSLV MK III (also known as "Baahubali").

There were 3 components of this mission -

1. ORBITER (it will orbit the moon)

2. LANDER (it will do soft landing on the surface of moon) 

3. ROVER (it is a 6 wheel type car that will move around the surface of moon and collect samples)

➤LANDER - VIKRAM

This lander will perform soft landing on the south pole region of the moon.

➤ROVER - PRAGYAN

This rover will work on solar energy

Chandrayaan-1 mission which was designed to just orbit the moon (had only an orbiter and no rover or lander) discovered water in frozen state on the lunar soil.

This Frozen ice mostly lies in the shadow areas of craters near the poles. (more at the south pole than the north pole)

How Come water on moon?

The water found on the moon's surface is found in frozen state in the shadow regions of craters near the poles because of the very small tilt of the Moon's rotation axis, sunlight never reaches these regions

Chandrayaan-2 Mission would have landed near the lunar south pole. If successful, it woud have been the 1st ever mission to land a rover near the lunar south pole.

Why was Southern Polar region chosen?

"There is a possibility of the presence of water in permanently shadowed areas around it. In addition, South pole region has craters that are cold traps and contain a fossil record of the early solar system" the space agency has said.

Objectives of the mission

1.Study the Moon's topography , mineralogy, exosphere an hydroxyl signatures and water ice. Till now the exact theory for the existence of moon has not been found, this mission might help new theories about the formation of moon.

2.Study the water ice in the polar region.

INTERESTING FACT - The 1st ever mission to reach the surface of moon was Luna-2 (of USSR).

Unfortunately the Vikram landed did not had the soft landing and it lost contact with the orbiter when it was close to the moon surface while landing. Maybe it had hard landing and because of it , it got crashed.