Scientists: Successful manoeuvre pushes Chandrayaan-3 further away from Earth | India News

BENGALURU: Isro scientists completed on Saturday the first Earth-bound manoeuvre to increase the altitude of Chandrayaan-3, taking it further away from Earth in its 3. 8-lakh-km journey towards the Moon. After Saturday’s manoeuvre, the “spacecraft is now in a 41,762 km x 173 km orbit”, Isro said, reports Chethan Kumar. The operation, carried out to increase the spacecraft’s apogee (farthest point from Earth) began at around 12. 05 pm, as planned, and lasted for 11-and-a-half minutes, multiple scientists confirmed to TOI.
“The spacecraft is healthy and today’s manoeuvre went as planned. Further analysis of data is being carried out for the next few manoeuvres,” one scientist said. If all goes as planned, scientists will carry out a minor burn of onboard propulsion systems on Sunday to increase the perigee (closest point to Earth). It will be pushed to about 220km from the current position.
“The perigee will then remain stable. The remaining three manoeuvres we’ve planned will all be for apogee raising,” another scientist said. The three other operations around Earth, as reported by TOIearlier, are planned for July 18, 20 and 25 to push the apogee to around 1 lakh km before Isro attempts to slingshot the spacecraft towards the Moon in the intervening night of July 31 and August 1.