Steps in Chandrayaan 2's epochal mission to moon

Chandrayaan 2, India's second moon mission, is slated to create history early Saturday when its 'Vikram' module makes a soft landing on moon's south polar region.

It is first time that a country is attempting to land on the south pole area of the moon. Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft is a composite module mission consisting of orbiter, lander and rover.

Here is timeline of the historic mission.

September 18, 2008

The then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's Cabinet approved the Chandrayaan-2 lunar mission. The subsequent years went into mission planning and execution with home-grown technology used for the expedition.

July 15, 2019The launch of Chandrayaan 2 was called off about an hour before the launch due to technical snag.

July 22, 2019

ISRO successfully launched Chandrayaan-2 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh.

July 24, 2019 First earthbound orbit-raising manoeuvre for Chandryaan-2 spacecraft performed successfully.

July 26,2019 Second earthbound orbit-raising manoeuvre for Chandryaan-2 spacecraft performed.

July 28,2019 Third orbit-raising manoeuvre performed.

August 3, 2019 ISRO released the first set of earth pictures captured by Chandrayaan 2

August 6, 2019Fifth and the last orbit-raising manoeuvre performed

August 14, 2019 After revolving around the earth's orbit for nearly 23 days, the spacecraft entered the Lunar Transfer Trajectory.

August 20, 2019Chandrayaan-2 successfully inserted into lunar orbit.

August 22,2019ISRO released first moon image captured by Chandrayaan-2's LI4 Camera.

September 1, 2019The fifth and lunar manoeuvre executed successfully.

September 3, 2019The first de-orbiting manoeuvre performed successfully in four seconds.

September 4, 2019 The second de-orbiting manoeuvre executed in nine seconds.

September 7, 2019The Vikram lander of Chandrayaan 2 scheduled to soft-land on moon between 1.30 am and 2.30 am on Saturday. It will be followed by the rollout of rover 'Pragyan' between 5.30 a.m and 6.30 a.m.