Bangalore: Euphoric over finding traces of
water by a Chandrayaan payload, confirmed by NASA's spacemate
onboard the country's maiden moon mission, India is mulling
exploring lunar surface deeper for water in its next Odyssey.
"What data we have got is really exciting. We want to see
what further additions we can make to Chandrayaan-II's
payload. We will definitely revisit the scientific
objectives", Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)
Chairman Madhavan Nair told reporters here.
ISRO was exploring a "mid-course correction" of the
Chandrayaan-II's objectives, Nair said a day after the
discovery of evidence of traces of water was announced by NASA
in Washington and ISRO here.
Nair said ISRO was considering going deeper during
Chandrayaan II, like landing a rover and drilling the surface
to detect if there was any presence of water underneath the
moon's surface.
"I think there is a strong interest that we should have
more instrumentation for water. But we will look at it", the
top scientist said.
Asked if Chandrayaan-II mission would be advanced, he
said, "Moon has become exciting following the findings of
water. But we cannot rush through the second mission. We will
stick to the time line of 2013."
"We may have made a headstart in view of the results of
the first moon mission," but it would take around two and half
years to accomplish "concept to realisation stage of
Chandryaan-II. But, more scientific objectives will be added,"
Nair said.
Apart from India's Moon Impact Probe, the Moon Mineralogy
Mapper (M3) of NASA on board Chandrayaan-I also confirmed the
presence of water.
In the wake of lessons learnt relating to the high degree
of solar radiation during Chandrayaan I, forcing it to abort
its mission prematurely late last month, he said, "We will
take adequate margin and bolster shielding. It is quite
manageable," he said.
Except for the lander and rover, the rest of the payloads
on Chandrayaan II will be Indian. Chandrayaan II will have
two rovers, one Indian and other Russian and the lander will
also be from Russia.
On whether there had been any proposal on carrying more
foreign payloads, he said, "I have handful of proposals. If
you are going to pursue all of them, I will need three
launches".
"Now we have to be very careful in selecting. As such
Chandrayaan is full at the moment. We have to try our best to
put extra capacity. We will be working on them", he said.
Bureau Report
First Published: Friday, September 25, 2009, 22:24