Srinivas Hegde, who was the mission director of India’s first moon mission Chandrayaan-1, passed away in Bengaluru.
- Mr. Hegde, was with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for more than three decades.
- He was associated with several landmark missions undertaken by ISRO and notable among them was the Chandrayaan-1 launched in 2008.
- India’s maiden lunar mission had made the pathbreaking discovery of water molecules on the moon.
- Chandrayaan-1, India’s first mission to Moon, was launched successfully on October 22, 2008 onboard PSLV-C11 from SDSC SHAR, Sriharikota.
- The spacecraft was orbiting around the Moon at a height of 100 km from the lunar surface.
- The spacecraft carried 11 scientific instruments built in India, USA, UK, Germany, Sweden and Bulgaria.
- The satellite made more than 3400 orbits around the moon and the mission was concluded when the communication with the spacecraft was lost on August 29, 2009.
