(NDTV)
India’s first unmanned mission to the moon- Chandrayaan 1- which was believed lost, is still orbiting the moon, say NASA scientists.The Chandrayaan-1, which cost $79 million, was launched in 2008 to map the moon’s surface and look for precious resources. It was assigned a two-year mission. Scientists at the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) lost contact with Chandrayaan-1.
Now, scientists at NASA have successfully located the spacecraft still circling some 200 kilometres above the lunar surface.Finding the spacecraft required some “detective work because the last contact with the spacecraft was on August 29, 2009,” said Marina Brozovic, a radar scientist in Californiai.The Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft is very small, a cube about 1.5 meters on each side – about the size of a Maruti 800.
