On Tuesday, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), the national space agency of the country, completed the third orbit-raising maneuver (Earth-bound perigee firing) of the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft.
On July 20, the next firing is planned. It will take place between 2 pm and 3 pm, informed the space agency.
“The third orbit-raising maneuver (Earth-bound perigee firing) is performed successfully from ISTRAC (ISRO Telemetry, Tracking, and Command Network)/ISRO, Bengaluru,” it tweeted.
On Monday, the second orbit-raising maneuver (Earth-bound apogee firing) was done. The spacecraft was in 41603 km x 226 km orbit.
On July 14, the Chandrayaan-3 mission to the Moon was launched. It is the third and most recent Moon exploration mission of the ISRO. Similar to Chandrayaan-2, Chandrayaan-3 consists of a lander and the Pragyan rover. However, it does not have an orbiter. Its propulsion module behaves like a communication relay satellite.
If all goes well, India will be the fourth country to land its spacecraft on the surface of the moon. US, Russia, and China are the other three countries.
The Indian Space Research Organisation is keeping its fingers crossed, after its Chandrayaan-2 moon mission (in July 2019) went awry.