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Chandrayaan 1 Enters Lunar Orbit

Cool.

India is celebrating the arrival of its Chandrayaan 1 spacecraft at the Moon.

An 817-second burn from the probe’s engine on Saturday slowed Chandrayaan sufficiently for it to be captured by the lunar body’s gravity.

The craft is now in an 11-hour polar ellipse that goes out to 7,502km from the Moon and comes as close as 504km.

Further brakings will bring the Indian satellite down to a near-circular, 100km orbit from where it can begin its two-year mapping mission.

Launched on 22 October, Chandrayaan is India’s first satellite to break away from the Earth’s gravitational field and reach the lunar body.

Posted by Owen at 2027 hrs
Foreign Affairs + Technology

1. COOL???

   Do you realize how badly telephone tech support is going to suffer when India moves its call centers to the moon?

   Posted by Aaron on November 10, 2008 at 1401 hrs
   
   
   

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