India’s first mission to the Moon is underway, after a clockwork launch of its uprated Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C11) from this Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) facility in the Bay of Bengal.

Liftoff of the four-stage rocket came at 6:22 a.m. local time (8:52 p.m. Oct. 21 EDT), after a 52-hour countdown. Launch occurred from the new Second Launch Pad on the facility at Sriharikota Island, about 80 km. north of Chennai.

The 1,380-kilogram (3,042-pound) spacecraft reached its 255-by-22,860-kilometer transfer orbit, inclined 17.9 degrees, using twin uprated strap-on boosters carrying 12 metric tons of solid fuel instead of the standard nine metric tons. It was the 14th launch of the PSLV.

Over the next eight days controllers in Bangalore will fire its Liquid Apogee Motor LAM several times to raise its apogee closer to lunar orbit, with a final kick from the LAM to send the probe to the Moon and another to slow it into lunar orbit at an altitude of a few hundred kilometers.

Once that orbit is circularized at 100 kilometers, the spacecraft’s Moon Impact Probe will be ejected. The impactor is designed to demonstrate technology for a future Indian soft landing on the Moon, and to collect high-resolution imagery.

Other instruments on the spacecraft – a mix of domestic and international hardware – will map the lunar surface and mineralogy. Among them are an Indian hyperspectral imager, and a prototype synthetic aperture radar provided by the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University in the U.S.

Photo: Indian Space Research Organization