The 24-hour countdown for India’s space
odyssey–maiden PSLV-C57/Aditya-L1 mission tomorrow to explore
the Sun–began at the spaceport of Sriharikota, on Friday.
ISRO sources said the countdown began at 1150 hrs at the SHAR
Range after the Launch Authorisation Board and the Mission
Readiness Committee reviewed the progress of the mission and
gave the clearance for the mission.
The Aditya-L1 satellite, which will be the first space based Indian
Observatory to study the Sun, will be launched by ISRO’s workhorse
launch vehicle PSLV-C57 from the Second Launch Pad at 1150 hrs
on Saturday.
During the countdown, propellant filling operations will be carried
out in the four-stage vehicle.
This will be the second major inter-planetary exploration by India
in a short span of ten days, after the Lander Module, onboard the
Chandrayaan-3 successfully soft landed on the dark side of the
Moon on August 23 and the Rover, deployed from it on the Lunar
surface, started conducting in-situ chemical analysis of the region
and has been sending images of the Moon, identifying several
chemical particles on the region using the instruments in the
rover.
