The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has announced the launch date of the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft to the Moon as on July 14. On Wednesday, July 5, ISRO integrated the spacecraft with the launch vehicle Mark-III. Chandrayaan 3 will be launched by the Launch Vehicle Mark-III from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.

ISRO tweeted, “LVM3-M4/Chandrayaan-3 Mission: Today, at Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, the encapsulated assembly containing Chandrayaan-3 is mated with LVM3.”

According to ISRO, Chandrayaan-3 will comprise of an indigenous lander module (LM), propulsion module (PM), and a rover to demonstrate new developed technologies for executing inter-planetary missions safely and smoothly. These missions include safe landing on the lunar surface and conducting on-site experiments.

ISRO Chairman S. Somnath said, “The Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft will be launched by the Launch Vehicle Mark-III (LVM3) and the launch window is between July 12 and 19.”

He also added, “If the launch takes place on that day then we will be ready for landing on the moon possibly by the last week of August. The date (landing date) is decided when there is sunrise on the moon. When we are landing, sunlight must be there. So the landing will be on August 23 or 24.”

LVM3 is a three-stage launch vehicle that includes two solid boosters (S200), the core liquid fuel-based stage (L110), and a high-thrust cryogenic upper stage (C25).

It is the heaviest rocket in India with a gross lift-off weight of 640 tonnes, a length of 43.5m and a 5m-diameter payload fairing (nose-shaped equipment to protect the rocket from aerodynamic forces). It can carry up to 8 tonnes of payload to the lower earth orbits.

As informed by ISRO, “The vehicle takes off with the simultaneous ignition of the two S200 boosters. The core stage (L110) is ignited at about 113s (seconds) through the flight, during the firing of the S200 stages. Both S200 motors burn for about 134s and the separation occurs at 137s. The payload fairing is separated at an altitude of 115 km and at about 217s during L110 firing. The L110 burnout and separation and C25 ignition occur at 313s. The spacecraft is injected into a GTO (Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit) orbit of 180×36000 km at a nominal time of 974s.”

You can read about Launch Vehicle Mark-III (LVM3) here in detail:

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