India launches mission to conquer the Moon

The Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft will rotate around the earth's orbit for 23 days, before heading to the south pole of the Moon. The landing is scheduled for 6-7 September. If the operations to take place without unexpected events, India would enter the "big four" list along with the USA, Russia and China.

New Delhi (AsiaNews / Agencies) - At 2.43 in the afternoon, wrapped in a beam of light  the applause of scientists from the space base of Sriharikota, in Andhra Pradesh of the propeller rocket and welcomed by: this is how Chandrayaan left yesterday -2, the Indian spaceship that will conquer the Moon. The unmanned mission will orbit the earth for 23 days, then begin a series of maneuvers to descend towards the south lunar pole, where landing is scheduled for 6-7 September.

The launch of the spacecraft represents a historic moment for India's progress, until a few years ago among the poorest countries in the world and where one third of the population still lives on less than a dollar a day. If it were to land on lunar craters, it would be the fourth country in the world to achieve this goal.

In fact, before Delhi, only three other big names have succeeded: the United States, Russia (former Soviet Union) and China. Not surprisingly, as soon as we received the news that the launch was successful, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted: "Indian in the heart, Indian in the spirit! What should make every Indian joyful is that # Chandrayaan2 is an entirely local mission ".

In fact, the components of the probe are almost entirely "made in India": launched with a GSLV Mk III rocket, it consists of a Lander Vikram landing module weighing 1.4 tons and a Rover Prayan lunar vehicle of 27 kilograms, powered by solar energy. In addition to the local origin of the materials, what characterizes the mission is its low-cost approach: just 140 million dollars, very low compared to the amount spent by the United States for the 15 space voyages of the Apollo program, about 100 billion dollars.

Scheduled for July 15, a few days before the 50th anniversary of the first landing of the man on the moon, the departure was suspended by the Indian space agency (Isro) just 56 minutes before the launch for a " unforseen technical events". The task of space exploration is to search for water, fossil remains of the primordial solar system and measure lunar oscillations (similar to earthquakes).