ISRO Calls Off Chandrayaan 2 Launch Due To Technical Snag, As India Waits Patiently
ISRO's Chandrayaan 2 mission was supposed to blast off at 2:51 am from Shriharikotas launchpad at Satish Dhawan Space Centre. A last minute technical snag meant the highly anticipated mission had to be called off with ISRO not wanting to risk the mission in its final stages before liftoff.
As most of India slept, ISRO's Chandrayaan 2 mission was supposed to blast off at 2:51 am from Shriharikota's launchpad at Satish Dhawan Space Centre.
But a last minute technical snag meant the highly anticipated Chandrayaan 2 launch had to be called off, with ISRO not wanting to risk the mission in its final stages before liftoff.
ISRO
With having put years of research and engineering effort, ISRO erred on the side of caution as it halted the launch of Chandrayaan 2 exactly 56 minutes before it was supposed to liftoff for its moonly abode.
As the world and India's media waited with bated breath to see Chandrayaan 2 take-off on the shoulders of GSLV-MKIII, an ISRO spokesperson confirmed the reason of the delay.
"A technical snag was observed in launch vehicle system at T-56 minute. Chandrayaan 2 launch has been called off for today. Revised launch date will be announced later," read the official ISRO statement on the Chandrayaan 2 delay.
ISRO tweet
Had the GSLV MKIII lifted off with Chandrayaan 2 and the lunar craft landed on the moon on its scheduled date of September 6-7, India would have become only the fourth country in the world after USSR, US and China to land a spacecraft successfully on the moon's surface.
It is unclear right now whether the "technical snag" that delayed ISRO's Chandrayaan 2 launch can be solved within this week for a new launch date to be announced soon. But given ISRO's cautious approach, they will leave no stone unturned trying to find and fix the error in the launch sequence rather than jeopardise years of hard work.
In fact, it will be great if ISRO doesn't rush the Chandrayaan 2 launch, if recent history has anything to teach us. Just in April this year, Israel's Beresheet lunar craft had crash landed on the moon's surface, after which ISRO postponed its launch of Chandrayaan 2 from April till July.
People online are reacting pretty positively to the whole Chandrayaan 2 launch:
Great Identification by the Technical team ???
¡ª Anand Srinivasan ??? (@anandsri0007) July 14, 2019
Precaution was taken by identifying the snag!
Hope it will be cleared soon..
Eagerly waiting for your new launch date and time.#Chandrayaan2 #ISRO #JaiHind
#Chandrayaan2
¡ª Alok Kumar Dubey #AWarrior?? (@alokdubey1408) July 14, 2019
Lauch cancelled for the day...due to some technical snag..??
No problem..no hurry..@isro
Will wait anxiously for new date..
All the best for safe and successful mission..
?????
All the best team #ISRO !!? Better to be late than to be sorry...We shall await the next lift-off schedule for #Chandrayan2 ?
¡ª Rita Singh (@Rita_2110) July 14, 2019
Go India! ? Just let us know when it's go time again!
¡ª Lorenzo Herrera (@lorenzoherrera) July 14, 2019
No problem we'll be waiting for launch. #CHANDRAYAN2 #ISRO
¡ª EKTA GAUR (@EKTAGAUR12) July 15, 2019
Now we have to wait for a little more for Chandrayaan 2 launch and keep its date with the moon. Better late than never, right?
