India: India has launched Aditya-L1, its first space mission to the sun. The launch comes days after the country made history by becoming the first to land near the moon’s south pole. Aditya-L1 lifted off from the launch pad at Sriharikota. It will travel 1.5 million kilometres (932,000 miles) from the Earth, or 1 percent of the Earth-Sun distance. According to India’s space agency, it will take four months to travel that far.
The mission is named after Surya, the Hindu god of the sun, also known as Aditya. And L1 stands for Lagrange Point 1, the exact place between the sun and Earth where the Indian spacecraft is heading. Once Aditya-L1 reaches this “parking spot,” it will be able to orbit the sun at the same rate as the Earth.
Thousands of people gathered in the viewing gallery set up by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) near the launch site to watch the blastoff. After an hour and four minutes of flight time, ISRO declared the mission successful”.
“Now it will continue on its journey. It is a very long journey of 135 days. Let’s wish it the best of luck,” ISRO chief Mr. Sreedhara Panicker Somanath stated.
Project director Ms. Nigar Shaji commented that once Aditya-L1 reaches its destination, it will benefit not only India but the global scientific community. Aditya-L1 will now travel several times around the Earth before being launched towards L1.
According to ISRO, the orbiter carries seven scientific instruments that will observe and study the solar corona (the outermost layer), the photosphere (the sun’s surface or the part we see from the Earth), and the chromosphere (a thin layer of plasma that lies between the photosphere and the corona). The studies will help scientists understand solar activity, such as solar wind and solar flares, and their effect on Earth and near-space weather in real time.
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