ISRO launched the country’s maiden solar mission — Aditya-L1 in September (File)
Mumbai:
Chairman of The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) S. Somanath attended the annual science and technology festival of IIT Bombay and announced that the Aditya-L1 spacecraft is set to reach its cosmic destination, Lagrange Point 1 (L1), on January 6, 2024.
Speaking at the three-day annual Science and Technology Fest, S. Somanath said, “Aditya-L1 is going to reach Lagrange Point on January 6 at 4 pm.”
“The Chandrayaan-3 has been a great success. This gives us lots of confidence to us and to the team to work on the programmes. After 14 days of its contribution of collecting data, it is now sleeping very well there so I advise our IT not to wake it up again so it’s sleeping forever, but unfortunately we were hoping it would wake up through its ability but it couldn’t happen,” he said.
“Many things could have gone wrong and that is why this couldn’t wake up again. Possibly if Pragyan (rover) woke up it would not be known unless communication between Pragyaan and Vikram is established,” he added.
“We hope that whatever data we have collected in 14 days is going to give us a fantastic scientific outcome in the coming days. Our scientists are working on it now,” said the ISRO chief.
Earlier this week, ISRO chief along with BJP leader Rivaba Jadeja attended the 7th national conclave organized by Chhatra Sansad in Gujarat’s Vadodara.
After the successful soft landing of Chandrayaan-3 near the South pole of the moon, the ISRO launched the country’s maiden solar mission — Aditya-L1 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota on September 2.
Earlier in the month, ISRO informed that the Solar Wind Ion Spectrometer (SWIS), the second instrument in the Aditya Solar Wind Particle Experiment (ASPEX) of its maiden solar mission, Aditya L1 is operational.
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