Chandrayan-1 Mission is Over

1. Project Director of the Chandrayaan-1 mission M Annadurai
2. The mission was launched on October 22, 2008.
3. The Deep Space Network at Byalalu near Bangalore received the data from Chandrayan-1.
4. Weight : 1,380 kg
5. Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft was launched by PSLV-C11 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota, Nellore District, Andhra Pradesh, about 80 km north of Chennai.
6. The vehicle was successfully inserted into lunar orbit on 8 November 2008.
7. The probe impacted near Shackleton Crater ejecting underground soil that could be analysed for the presence of water or ice.
8. Estimated cost for the project was Rs. 386 crore (US$ 80 million)
9. It completed 312 days in orbit
10. It made more than 3,400 orbits around the moon.
11. Chandrayaan-1 had sent more than 70,000 images of the lunar surface in July which provided breathtaking views of lunar mountains and craters, especially craters in the permanently shadowed areas of the Moon’s polar region.

Scientific Objectives:

1. To design, develop, launch and orbit a spacecraft around the Moon using an Indian-made launch vehicle.
2. Preparation of a three-dimensional atlas (with high spatial and altitude resolution of 5-10 m) of both the near and far side of the Moon.
3. Chemical and mineralogical mapping of the entire lunar surface at high spatial resolution, mapping particularly the chemical elements magnesium, aluminium, silicon, calcium, iron, titanium, radon, uranium, & thorium.
4. To increase the scientific knowledge The impact of a sub-satellite (Moon Impact Probe — MIP) on the surface on the Moon as a fore-runner to future soft-landing missions.

August 31, 2009: India’s Mars mission by 2013-2015

• G Madhavan Nair chief of ISRO has said that there is a low cost plan about India’s Mission to Mars is at conceptual stage which shall be taken up after Chandrayan 2. He said this at 8th international conference on low cost planetary missions at Goa.