India’s second lunar exploration mission, Chandrayaan-2- which launched on 22nd July 2019- has recently sent the first images of Moon taken from the moon’s orbit.
The images were captured by Chandrayaan-2 LI4 Camera on 21 August 2019 19:03 UT at an altitude of 2650 kilometers from the moon’s surface. Two of the most noticeable features in the edge are the Mare Orientale basin and the Apollo craters.
Take a look at the first Moon image captured by #Chandrayaan2 #VikramLander taken at a height of about 2650 km from Lunar surface on August 21, 2019.
Mare Orientale basin and Apollo craters are identified in the picture.#ISRO pic.twitter.com/ZEoLnSlATQ
— ISRO (@isro) August 22, 2019
ISRO took Twitter and shared the news, which reads:
“Take a look at the first Moon image captured by #Chandrayaan2 #VikramLander taken at a height of about 2650 km from Lunar surface on August 21, 2019.”
On 20 August 209, Chandrayaan 2 successfully completed its first orbital maneuver in lunar orbit. The duration of maneuver was 1738 seconds beginning from 0902 hrs IST. With this, Chandrayaan-2 was successfully inserted into a Lunar orbit. The orbit achieved is 114 km x 18072 km.
Following this, a series of orbit maneuvers will be performed on Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft to enable it to enter its final orbit passing over the lunar poles at a distance of about 100 km from the Moon’s surface.
Subsequently, the lander will separate from the Orbiter and enters into a 100 km X 30 km orbit around the Moon. Then, it will perform a series of complex braking maneuvers to soft-land in the South polar region of the Moon on September 7, 2019.