India prepares to land rover on moon in global space race
NEW DELHI (AP) — India is looking to take a giant leap in its space program
and solidify its place among the world’s spacefaring nations with its second
unmanned mission to the moon, this one aimed at landing a rover near the
unexplored south pole.
The Indian Space Research Organization plans to launch a spacecraft using
homegrown technology on Monday, and it is scheduled to touch down on the moon
Sept. 6 or 7. The $141 million Chandrayaan-2 mission will analyze minerals, map the
moon’s surface and search for water.
It will “boldly go where no country has ever gone before,” ISRO said in a statement.
With India poised to become the world’s fifth-largest economy, the ardently nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is keen to show off the country’s prowess in security and technology.
India successfully test-fired an anti-satellite weapon in March, which Modi said demonstrated the country’s capacity as a space power alongside the United States, Russia and China. India also plans to send humans into space by 2022, becoming only the fourth nation to do so.
The country’s ambitions are playing out amid a resurgent space race.
The U.S. — which is marking the 50th anniversary this month of the Apollo 11 mission that made Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin the first humans on the moon — is working to send a manned spacecraft to the lunar south pole by 2024. In April, an unmanned Israeli craft crashed into the moon in a failed attempt at the first privately funded lunar landing.
source : flipboard
source : flipboard