Mumbai: India's second mission to Moon
'Chandrayaan II', expected to be launched in 2013, has many
challenges for scientists and engineers, mission director M
Annadurai said on Saturday.
"Chandrayaan II will not be just a probe. It will be
landing on moon and is an incrementally and technically
challenging mission for Indian scientists," Annadurai said in
an interactive session with students at the South Indian
Education Society (SIES) college at Sion in central Mumbai.
The fact that water molecules have been confirmed on moon
surface especially on the sunlit areas and their origin is not
external sources like meteors (new postulate), it has become
important to seek more exploration and Chandrayaan II will be
landing on moon to collect more data on it, he said.
Asked whether the scientists involved in Chandrayaan I
project will work for Chandrayan II, he said "yes" and added
that even the same participants from abroad will be in the
mission.
Interest has been shown by other countries like Russia and
"there is a chance of Russia participating in Chandrayaan II
mission," he said.
When asked how long it will take to analyse all the data
collected from Chandrayaan I mission, Annadurai said "it will
take at least two to three and a half years for complete
analysis."
Replying to query how India's Chandrayaan I was different
from several moon missions in the world, Annadurai said,
"there were so far 70 moon missions and Chandrayaan I was
different by having 11 scientific instruments and 60
detectors."
Annadurai said that the missions like Chandrayaan I is
economically viable and cost-wise it is competitive as the
ISRO scientists use aggressive models.
Simulations are used and then the models are made also to
reduce the cost. The cost of Chandrayaan I was Rs 386 crore.
To a query how he had joined ISRO and participated in all
the launch programmes and now heading the Chandrayaan mission,
56-year-old Annadurai said, "from my childhood I did something
little different and that made all the difference."
"I got into higher studies in the general category
although I could have gone in reserved category and determined
to accomplish things (including getting scholarships) by doing
something different and Chandrayaan was one of them," he said.
He told students that India provides a lot of
opportunities and gives much more returns and invited them to
join ISRO taking a science career by have an attitude of "you
can make a difference."
Bureau Report
First Published: Saturday, September 26, 2009, 18:37