Know how Chandrayaan-2 will land on the Moon

Hours before Chandrayaan-2 historic landing on near the south pole of the Moon, the Indian Space Research Organisation has made an animation video screening how things will happen later tonight. The animated video shows how Chandrayaan-2 landing module, named Vikram, will descend on to the lunar surface.

The lander Vikram will start its descent from an altitude of 30 kilometres above the Moon. At this point, the Vikram lander will begin a curving, parabolic motion to bring itself close to a 90-degree angle to the Moon's surface.

After some time the Chandrayaan-2 lander will activate its lander position detection camera (LPDC) that will scan the lunar surface to find a suitable spot for the spacecraft to land. Once it decides the landing site, the Vikram lander will perform a series of manoeuvres to gradually lower itself on to the lunar surface.

The Vikram lander will perform another parabolic motion to bring itself 10 metres above the lunar surface, which is when the final descent will take place at an angle of precisely 90 degrees to the lunar surface.

The #Chandrayaan2Landing is tonight! Will be live from the @ISRO Telemetry Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) from this afternoon on @IndiaToday. Here's what will be taking place tonight near the Moon's South Pole 🌓🇮🇳 pic.twitter.com/RhATQHJuce

— Shiv Aroor (@ShivAroor) September 6, 2019

After landing, Chandrayaan-2's Vikram will deploy the three payloads that it carries onboard. The three payloads will do many experiments.

Hours after landing, Vikram will deploy Pragyaan. Pragyaan's mission life will last one lunar day, or 14 Earth days, during which it will perform several surface and sub-surface experiments.

Chandrayaan-2 was launched on July 22 this year and is India's most ambitious space project till date. Chandrayaan-2 will aim to determine the extent of water presence on the Moon and understand the origins of the Solar System.