India’s second moon mission Chandrayaan-2 was launched on July 22 by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota in Andhra's Nellore district at 2.43 pm. It was launched atop a Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) MkIII, India's most powerful rocket and will carry an orbiter, a Lander Vikram, and a Rover Pragyan, which would revolve around the moon for 12 days.

ISRO just confirmed in its recent tweet that the third of five earth-bound orbit-raising maneuvers of the Chandrayaan 2 spacecraft has been successfully completed today afternoon. "Today after performing the third orbit-raising maneuver, we are now 3 steps closer to the moon !!!" ISRO's post read. "The maneuver was carried out at 3.12 pm IST using the onboard propulsion system for a firing duration of 989 seconds (~16 minutes), two days after the second orbit-raising was completed, placing the spacecraft in a 251 x 54,829 km orbit (nearest x furthest Earth-bound altitude)," according to ISRO.

The success of the Chandrayaan 2 mission makes India the fourth country, followed by the US, Russia, and China to pull off a soft landing on the moon. It has been reported that the budget of ISRO is less than 20 times that of USA's NASA.

#Chandrayaan2
Today after performing the third orbit raising maneuver, we are now 3 steps closer to the moon !!!#ISRO pic.twitter.com/M8iqxwZgZr

— ISRO (@isro) July 29, 2019