Chandrayaan 2 launch has been called off by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). The dream project was aborted by ISRO ahead of the lift-off. Chandrayaan-2 on board GSLVMkIII-M1 was scheduled to launch at 2.51 am but the countdown was stopped 56 minutes and 24 seconds before lift off at 1.55 am. ISRO has cited “technical snag” as the reason behind its move to call off the launch.
Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), however, has said that the revised launch date would be announced later.
ISRO tweeted,
President Ram Nath Kovind was at Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota to witness the launch.
After the successful completion of Chandrayaan 2, India will join an elite club of countries to send a rover to the Lunar surface. India would become the first country to do it so on Lunar South Pole. This is the darker side of the Moon and where there has been some possibility of finding water. Among the mission’s other scientific objectives are experiments to map the Moon’s surface, its mineral and element content and moonquakes.
Chandrayaan 2 is quite inexpensive compared to the missions of other countries. It’s total cost is Rs 978 crore which includes Rs 603 crore as mission cost and Rs 375 crore as its launch cost.