Banking on the success of Chandrayaan-3, ISRO on Monday announced that Aditya-L1 spacecraft will be launched on September 2 at 11.50 am from the Sriharikota spaceport.
Aditya-L1 is the first space-based Indian observatory to study the sun. It is designed to provide remote observations of the solar corona and in-situ observations of the solar wind at L1 or the Lagrangian point between the sun and the earth. The point is about 1.5 million kilometre from the earth.
It will be India's first dedicated space mission for observations of the sun. ISRO said in a post on X platform that the spacecraft would be launched by PSLV-C57 rocket.
How to witness the launch from Sriharikota?
ISRO said the launch can be watched from the Launch View Gallery at Sriharikota by registering HERE. The registration is expected to start from August 29 at 12 pm. The registration has been closed. To read about livestreaming details, click HERE.
What will Aditya L1 study?
The Aditya-L1 mission, aimed at studying the sun from an orbit around the L1, would carry seven payloads to observe the photosphere, chromosphere and the outermost layers of the sun, the corona, in different wavebands. It will also observe the in-situ particle and plasma environment providing data for the study of particle dynamics from the sun.
Earlier, ISRO chairman S. Somnath said the space agency is also getting ready for the first phase of Gaganyaan, which aims to send humans to space. "We are also planning a mission by the end of September or October to demonstrate our crew module and crew escape capability, which will be followed by many test missions until we launch our first manned mission to space (Gaganyaan), possibly by 2025."
-- with PTI inputs