August 15, 2003: Then Prime Minister, the lateAtal Bihari Vajpayeeannounces theChandrayaan programme.
October 22, 2008: Chandrayaan-1 takes off from theSatish Dhawan Space Centreat Sriharikota.
November 8, 2008: Chandrayaan-1 enters a Lunar Transfer Trajectory.
November 14, 2008: The Moon impact probe ejects from Chandrayaan-1 and crashes near the lunar South Pole — confirming the presence of water Molecules on Moon’s surface.
August 28, 2009: End ofChandrayaan1 programme as perISRO.
July 22, 2019: Chandrayaan-2 launched from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota.
August 20, 2019: Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft inserted into lunar orbit.
September 2, 2019: Vikram Lander was separated while orbiting the moon in a 100kms lunar polar orbit, however, Communication from the lander to the ground stations was lost at an altitude of 2.1 km from the surface of the moon.
July 14, 2023: Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft scheduled to lift off from the second launchpad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota.
August 23/24, 2023: Scientists at ISRO have tentatively scheduled soft landing on the lunar surface expected to take place by August 23-24 making India join elite nations to achieve the feat.
Key points of Chandrayaan 3:
Chandrayaan-3is the third lunar exploration mission ready for take off in the fourth operational mission (M4) of LVM3 launcher.
The soft landing on the moon’s surface is planned for late August.
The largest and heaviest LVM3 rocket (formerly GSLV MkIII), fondly called as ‘fat boy’ by ISRO scientists for its heavylift capability, has completed six consecutive successful missions.
Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-2. Unlike its predecessor, which carried an orbiter along with Vikram & Pragyan (the rover), Chandrayaan-3 is a composite of 3 modules: Propulsion, lander and rover.
The spacecraft will weigh 3,900kg – the propulsion module weighs 2,148kg, while the lander module, including the rover, weighs 1,752 kg.
Unlike Chandrayaan-2, when the landing was tracked through a Madrid (NASA-JPL) station, this time tracking of the lander will happen fromIsro Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (Istrac) station in Bengaluru.