National flag on moon on Republic day 2018!
Team Indus, a private company is aiming to hoist the national flag on the moon, on republic day 2018. Regarding this, it bought a ticket aboard a 320-ton giant rocket, bringing it closer to its goal.
The moonshot will be realized with the trusted ISRO's engineered polar satellite launch vehicle (PSLV). According to ISRO, Team Indus is buying the launch at commercial rates. Besides a trip to the moon and the bragging rights that follow, the coveted Google Lunar XPRIZE is also at stake.
The competition that was announced in 2007, offers a $20 million first prize to the first privately funded teams to land a robot on the moon that successfully travels more than 500 meters and transmits back HD images and video.
"As of right now we're looking at a December 2017 launch. We have a very young team and I must say we've got a bright bunch of folks here," Rahul Narayan, Team Leader at Team Indus said.
"We have signed a launch services agreement with Team Indus, which essentially provides a PSLV launch for launching a lunar orbiter and lander," Rakesh Sasibhushan, chairman and managing director of Antrix Corporation - the commercial arm of ISRO, Bengaluru, said.
As the deal is already signed, the group is now supposed to race against time and meet the deadline. Is ISRO taking a big risk by launching a lunar satellite from a novice company? "Not really, all satellites that have to fly on the PSLV have to undergo a qualification test and we will ensure that the satellite is worthy of flying on the PSLV," Mr Sashibhushan said.
